More TV, Please

Person of Interest 1.11: "Super"

2012-02-10T23:03:00.001-05:00

“Possible Threat Detected. Subject: Ingram, Nathan C.”
- The Machine

With our first episode of 2012, we’re right back where we ended the last episode. We see Reese get shot and then we end up in a Coroner’s office where Finch pays the Coroner (who was a well-respected surgeon in his home country but can’t afford a US license) to stich Reese up with no questions asked. The next morning, Carter leaves her apartment building and spots a green truck on the street and a few guys in suits standing around. Agent Snow appears and tells Carter that they’re watching her to see if Reese contacts her, since it was odd that he managed to get away. After some posturing where Carter and Snow remind each other that threatening a cop and lying to a fed are crimes, Carter heads to work and uses Lionel’s computer. Guess she’s concerned the Feds are bugging hers. She finds the picture of Finch from the bank robbery and realizes she had his cell number the whole time. Too bad it’s been disconnected. Regardless, she puts in a request for all the data on the number.

We have some interesting flashbacks this week, to 2005. They involve Finch and his partner, Nathan Ingram before Nathan died. Nathan is meeting with a woman named Alicia who is from one of the alphabet agencies and she tells Nathan that if they don’t see progress, the funding will be pulled. So he gives her a 9-digit number (a social security number) as Finch watches. Finch assures Nathan that the number will pan out. The Machine just knows. Back in the present, Reese is wheelchair bound and moving into an apartment. The super, a guy named Trask (Sergeant Batista from Dexter) is kind of rambling on about how he used to have six night clubs down in Miami with a mansion and exotic pets. Once he leaves, Finch materializes (breaking that space-time continuum again) and says that given the situation, he thought Reese should be somewhere low profile. Besides, Snow is focusing all his attention on Carter.

And of course, Reese isn’t really there to rest. Trask is their latest number and Finch has verified the guy bought an untraceable handgun. So Finch hacks the entire building’s Wi-Fi signal. We get a really amusing scene where Reese comments on one of the tenants doing yoga, saying she’s “healthy” with an accompanying head tilt of interest. What made it even better was Finch did it, too. Speaking of, Finch has gotten Reese some house-warming presents including books and donut to sit on. Reese’s expression when he sees the donut is great. Meanwhile, Snow and his buddy are watching Carter but all she’s doing is paperwork. She knows what kind of game they’re playing and she’s not going to make it easy for them.

Back at the apartment building, Reese notices that Lily (a cook) appears to be dating Rick, the guy who lives in the penthouse. Finch has managed to verify some details about Trask’s history but says he’s likely got a wild imagination since he didn’t actually have all the luxury he said he did. Reese picks up on the security guard who has been trying to find a jewelry thief. That could a potential victim for Trask. The only way to know who the intended victim might be is for Finch to do a little leg work. He gets into Trask’s apartment easily enough, thanks to Reese taking a hammer to his bathroom, but gets caught when Trask realizes he needs a different wrench. Finch does plant a few cameras and find lots of pictures of Lily.

They solve one mystery as Finch is trying to escape and get back up to Reese. The security guard is coming out of an apartment when he spots Finch and Reese rolls back the video to see the guard is the one stealing the jewelry. Finch gives the guy a choice, they can call the cops or each go on their way like they’d never seen each other. Obviously the security guard takes the second option. And we head in to our second flashback of the week.

Finch races into Nathan’s office and disables his computer just as Alicia and her boss arrive. The social security number indeed panned out. They caught a traitor in the government selling weapons-grade uranium to enemy governments. But Alicia’s boss (Weeks) doesn’t like that there’s not control over the Machine. But he’s really got not choice, seeing as price isn’t an issue (Nathan is developing the Machine for $1). In the next room, Finch is listening in to the conversation while the Machine analyzes the situation and determines that Weeks is a threat to the system. I like that the Machine is becoming its own character, with a little bit of personality.

Back in 2012, Finch and Reese need to get eyes on Lily at work and at home. Unfortunately for her, someone else has been watching her. Finch finds a wireless camera in her heating vent. Poor girl just can’t get away. Over at the precinct, Carter gets the cell phone data on Finch’s phone and sets out to lose her FBI tail and does it pretty well. She commandeers a guy’s coat and hails a cab. Finch has made it to Lily’s work and is watching her and sees her receive some flowers that she immediately tosses in the trash. It’s safe to say she knows that someone is stalking her. Reese isn’t having much luck on his end with the tech side of things. I think he prefers to hit people. Finch has also enlisted Lionel to help throw the CIA off Reese’s trail by giving him a pill bottle with Reese’s prints. It works, too. The CIA get the hit and head off to Connecticut.

Later that night, Carter ends up at the last location Finch’s phone was used and Finch ends up calling a meeting. Carter wants answers but Finch isn’t going to give them up very easily. He does give her a target to focus on, a drunk named Derek Watson. She does a little digging and ends up stopping him before he shoots the guy that foreclosed on his house. She’s got a little bit of an idea of what our dynamic duo does. And things are finally coning to a head at the apartment building. Finch and Lily are on the way back and Reese realizes (thanks to some video watching) that Trask is after Rick. We see Trask confront Rick but Reese does a little MacGuyver-ing and sets off the fire alarm to divert Trask’s attention. Reese confronts Trask but just as he think he knows what’s going on, Finch finds out the hidden network was from Rick. Reese is going to have to whip a can of whoop-ass on Rick to save Lily. Fighting on crutches with gunshot wounds is tough but Reese manages it and Rick ends up flying out a window and going ‘splat’ on the ground. No more possessive stalker guy. We find out that Trask is in WITSEC after testifying against the Cuban mafia. So everything he said was true.

We end this week with our final flashback to 2005. Finch pops the hood as it were on the Machine to explain how it picked out the traitor. It was the tiniest thread linking him to his contact and Finch seems glad that Nathan is the only person to know how it works. Finch is fine with the world not knowing he created the Machine because that’s the only way he can ensure the government uses it properly. Too bad he doesn’t realize his brother-in-arms could be the next victim or perpetrator.

Body of Proof 2.12: "Shades of Blue"

2012-02-10T23:02:00.000-05:00

“Would you do an autopsy on a friend?”
“I’d prefer not to.”
“Well that’s what you’re asking me to do to Meeks.”
- Peter and Kate

This week we find ourselves at a truck stop late at night where a driver finds a dead body after nearly running over a guy. Megan rolls up with an extra coffee for Peter but he was thinking the same thing. Guess it’s good if you like coffee. Bud’s not on scene because his wife is having a bad bout of morning sickness. The other cops on scene are kind of jerks, saying the dead guy is likely a dealer or an addict. Either way, the victim (Johnny Vasquez) was killed execution style. Back at the lab Megan and Ethan are doing the external body exam and find some hairs (Vasquez is bald so it’s likely the killer). Peter stops by with some information on the sawdust on Johnny’s boots. Bud immediately identifies it as used in dive bars to clean up beer and he and Sam head to one of the two near the crime scene. The waitress is high but Sam agrees to not arrest her if she gives them the names of Johnny’s associates. Meanwhile, back at the lab, Megan’s autopsy is unremarkable. Johnny wasn’t an addict but he had drugs in his system. Turns out, once Peter tries to call the guy’s parole officer, Johnny isn’t really Johnny. He’s an undercover cop named Eddie Castillo.

The undercover cop unit is pretty gung ho about finding Eddie’s killer and Megan and Kate are a little surprised. Bud and Sam get back from the bar only to get a call that the waitress they just talked to got caught trying to rob the place. She claims it was because she’d ratted people to the cops. She was afraid for her life and didn’t want to stick around. Back at the lab, Megan and Peter are talking to Eddie’s wife. Not much of value comes out of it, other than that he didn’t break his wrist in a prison fight. Ethan and Curtis are in the lab and Ethan finds some non-biological material in the knuckle wound from Eddie’s hand. Curtis bemoans the fact that it’s going to be a lose-lose situation with a cop killer case until Ethan says he identified who the hairs belong to, a 2-time felon named Quinten. Meeks (Eddie’s current and Peter’s former partner) is really pissed off when he hears the news. His captain agrees to let Meeks go as back up to bring in Quinten.

Megan’s not sure things are all squared away. Quinten tested negative for drugs consistently after his last arrest but the hair found is positive and all the same length. They came from police evidence. Things are not going to go well at the raid. Meeks sort of sneaks off from the group and gets into Quinten’s apartment just as Peter calls Bud and Sam to tell them that Quinten’s being set up by a cop. The SWAT team busts in and stops Meeks from shooting Quinten. Too bad their captain is really pissed off at Kate and Megan for interrupting the operation. He doesn’t think their evidence was compelling. So Megan goes to get a fresh hair sample from Quinten. Ethan finally figures out what the trace was from Eddie’s hand wound: gold from a dental filling. There’s another strike against Meeks. Peter ends up at a bar where Meeks is wallowing in his suspension. Peter is a little horrified to find out that Meeks doesn’t have an alibi for the time of Eddie’s death. He was five miles from the crime scene.

Before Peter can say much more Megan summons him back to the lab. She’s not happy she found out from Ethan about the filling being a match to Meeks. Peter pretty much tells her that he believes his partner and that if they go after Meeks, he (Peter) can’t be with them. I kind of feel bad for Peter. But only a little. Next thing we know, Megan is demanding to see the murder weapon to see if Meeks planted it or not and threatens to have the entire homicide division drug tested to do it. Kate steps in and demands Peter do it, even if it makes him uncomfortable. She tells him that he needs to pick a team.

It looks like Peter has chosen the lab when he tells the captain he doesn’t want to go back to the force. But he only gets the gun by telling the captain about Megan. I’m not sure I really want to know what Peter told him. It seems a little creepy. Before Peter gets back, Bud brings Jeannie by the meet Megan. She’s been having some difficulties (frequent urination and drinking lots of orange juice). With a quick blood test, Megan guesses Jeannie has gestational diabetes. Peter drops off the gun and Megan has a bit of a problem firing. The gun recoils and the slide catches her between her thumb and forefinger. To make matters worse, the two cops from the crime scene show up with a bottle of urine with a bow on it. Really mature. Not.

But there is some good that comes of the bottle of urine. It proves that none of the cops in the homicide division were taking illegal drugs. Unfortunately, the test Megan did on the gun came up with no new evidence. Curtis found a minute trace of latex with partial DNA in the box it was processed in. Megan gets Peter begrudgingly to bring Meeks in to take a blood sample. Meanwhile, Bud and Sam meet up with the waitress. She’s been let go and told that the record producer that Eddie called wants to meet with her if she can get clean. Guess there’s one happy ending.

Bud stops by Megan’s office to tell her that she was right. Jeannie has gestational diabetes but it’s manageable. Megan is glad and when Bud says he owes her, she gets him to go and arrest Meeks. I’m not 100% sure that he did it. The two other cops that were at the scene are kind of jerks and a little sketchy. Anyway, the captain tells the whole squad to write down statements regarding Meeks’ involvement in the case. All is not as it seems though. Peter busts in to find out that arresting Charlie was just to get the others on camera signing their names so they could find the real killer. And I totally called it. One of the two cops from the crime scene was the killer. We end with some encouraging moments. Bud and his wife bond over beans and he promises everything will be fine and Megan and Peter are back on good terms.

Person of Interest 1.10: "Number Crunch"

2012-02-10T22:59:00.001-05:00

“Finch, you said the machine would give us the number in time. It didn’t.”
- Reese

We begin this week in the Machine’s POV for once and we see a car flip and crash on an empty road. We also hear some kind of phone conversation between two men who are looking for a kid. We jump to HQ where Reese wanders in but doesn’t find Finch. He heads to one of the bookshelves and finds a picture of Harold and his partner from back when they first starting the whole project. Finch materializes (sadly not out of a break in the space-time continuum) and says they have 4 numbers. Three women and a man, all seemingly unconnected. Finch sends Reese off to find Claire, she was the first number.

Over at the police precinct, Carter is dealing with an inquiry over the shooting between her, Bottlecap (her CI) and Reese. She maintains she thinks it was Reese who saved her but that she doesn’t know and she didn’t see him. She tells them she won’t talk again unless her union rep is present and slinks back out to her desk where she’s been placed until everything is sorted. Lionel says that maybe it’s good she didn’t see Reese’s face because she wouldn’t know whether to thank him or arrest him. She says it would be easy to arrest him. Speaking of Reese, he shows up at Claire’s apartment to find it crawling with cops. He somehow manages to slip on a CSU jacket without anyone noticing and getting into the crime scene. Claire is dead.

We get another view of the car accident and this time we see 2 cars drive up on the scene and the drivers get out before cutting back to Claire’s apartment. It’s definitely a new way of using the Machine to sort of build the story throughout the episode. Anyway, Reese manages to snag Claire’s cell phone and downloads a little off her laptop before Lionel and his temporary partner (Detective “Happy”) show up. It appears Claire recently came into some money and bought all kinds of things for herself before she got beaten up and shot. Outside, Reese tasks Finch with tracking the guy of their quartet while he plans to put Lionel on one of the remaining women. Back at the precinct, Carter gets called into the Captain’s office and meets a guy in a suit (government type) and ends up admitting that Reese did shoot her CI. She doesn’t seem happy about it.

Reese is following Wendy, a hair stylist and she’s at work at her salon. This is one of the funniest bits of this show to date. He follows a guy on a motorcycle into the salon only find out he’s a messenger and then Reese gets snagged into a haircut. He looks absolutely befuddled at what’s happening. It’s honestly kind of cute and adorable (not 2 words normally associated with Jim Caviezel). Out on the street, Lionel is trying to keep an eye on Paula but she spots him and takes off after possibly buying a gun. Meanwhile, Finch is keeping an eye on the guy (Matt). Unfortunately, Wendy’s also given Reese the slip. Finch sees Matt buy a motorcycle after quitting his job. Just as he gets back in his car, a woman walks by and leaves a baby stroller which turns out to be a bomb. So that’s two of the four numbers down.

Finch is kind of going into overdrive analyzing what he should of done differently to try and save Matt. But Reese tells him that there’s nothing he could have done and they need to focus on finding Paula and Wendy. Finch has figured out that Wendy, Claire and Matt were all at the same car crash (the one we keep getting snippets of). Reese heads off to Wendy’s mom’s address in the hopes of finding Wendy. The cops (thanks to Carter’s boredom) find out that the driver was the son of a Congressman who is friendly with the police unions and auditing the Wall Street banks. Guess that’s one way to hush it up. Reese, Finch and Lionel have a little conference call where Reese verifies what he already knows and Finch tells Lionel to keep his phone on when talking to the Congressman.

The interview with the Congressman yields some interesting information. The Congressman’s son was at a party hosted by one of the men the Congressman was auditing. And Finch discovers that the route from the party to the crash site is nowhere near the son’s house. Things are looking a little fishy. Meanwhile, Reese has found Wendy and Paula. Paula has a gun and Reese is getting ready to shoot her (because everybody carries sniper rifles with them) when the girls embrace. Turns out they’re foster sisters. And Reese has arrived just in time to keep them from getting riddled with bullet holes. Too bad they run off as he’s fighting the shooters.

After a little digging, Reese and Finch discover that Wendy and Paula’s mom was about to lose her house to foreclosure. So at least they had a use for the money they took. Meanwhile, Lionel and Carter get the crash footage and Carters over to the 82nd precinct to talk to a Detective Foster. Turns out it was bogus and Carter makes the 2 CIA guys following her. They head for a café to have a chat. Honestly, I was surprised it took us this long to get to the parts that were used in this week’s promo. The CIA guys explain to Carter who Reese is and claims he killed his partner and went underground. They want to bring him in and since they think Reese trusts Carter, she can help them. Yeah, I don’t trust these guys.

Lionel and Detective Happy talk to the banker and he says the same thing about the Congressman’s son as the Congressman. They’re working something together. Meanwhile, Reese has found Wendy at the hospital and we learn that she and Paula want to give the money back. Finch also discovers that the son was heading to the Caiman Islands on the banker’s private jet. Unfortunately for Wending and Paula, one of the bad guys nabs Paula at the vending machine and demands the money from Wendy as a ransom. Finch pays the Congressman a visit and plants the seed that the banker is going to screw him over with his son’s charity. He gets a video recording of a phone call between the Congressman and the banker plotting to tie up loose ends before moving the money. Meanwhile, Reese calls Carter to kind of apologize for getting her in hot water at work. She thanks him for saving her life and he hangs up on her after telling her about the money exchange in the parking garage. So she’s thanked him and now she’s about to get him arrested (she calls the CIA guys). At least she looks a little regretful while she’s making the call.

Reese wraps up the shooters after Paula and Wendy easily enough (one was a woman who looked like a nurse). Unfortunately, Reese walks out to the roof towards his car only to be stopped by Agent Snow and Carter. Finch rewatches the video feed on Carter and sees she sold Reese out. He’s on his way but it’s too late. The second CIA guy shoots Reese once in the stomach and once in the leg. He manages to get away but he’s not looking hot. He’s all sweaty and bleeding. He tries to tell Finch to stay away but that only makes Finch drive faster. And Carter’s on Reese’s trail. She finally catches up just as Finch is helping Reese towards the car. She recognizes Finch (from one of the bank robbery episode) but ultimately decides to let them go. She even helps Reese into the back seat. This going to be an interesting second half of the season when it comes back from hiatus.

HIMYM 7.13: "Tailgate"

2012-02-10T22:55:00.002-05:00

“Faith is what gives life shape and meaning. I mean, if there aren’t Yetis and leprechauns, what’s the point of even getting up in the morning?”
-Marshall

“Tailgate” was a funny, heartwarming episode of HIMYM. It was a New Year’s episode, which is pretty rare in television. Sometimes reference will be made to the new year, but this episode was completely built around the holiday. It’s the second time I can think of that HIMYM has done a New Year’s episode. The other time was season 1’s “The Limo.” It’s quite amazing to look back on how much the show and the characters have changed since then. The biggest change is Marshall and Lily expecting their baby. As my own college roommate and her husband just welcomed a baby last week, I’ll never fail to appreciate how HIMYM captures this stage of life with such truth and heart. Oh and there’s plenty of humor in this episode, too, of course, as Ted and Barney finally realize their dream of opening up a bar called “Puzzles.” Any Ted and Barney bit is bound to be comedy gold, and Puzzles most definitely does not disappoint.

The episode is framed by Marshall going to visit his father’s grave out in Minnesota for New Year’s Day. He sets up a tailgate to watch the Vikings game by his father’s headstone so that they can experience the day just like they always did when Marvin was alive. I didn’t realize any NFL games were broadcast on New Year’s, but I appreciated the sentiment. I missed watching the Philadelphia Mummers Day Parade for the first time in memory this year because I was on a plane to Morocco, so I get Marshall’s need to keep a tradition like that alive. Marshall basically spends the episode telling Marvin what happened to himself and all his friends on New Year’s. This first story involves Marshall and Lily. Marshall convinces her to call her dad to tell him she’s pregnant, and it doesn’t go well. Lily’s dad is at a board game convention (one of the games he’s selling is “Slap Bet,” which is awesome), and when Lily calls, he just says “Okay, thanks,” and hangs up the phone.

Ted and Barney, meanwhile, are trying to spend their New Year’s Eve at MacLaren’s. It’s not a chill neighborhood bar on the holiday, though. There’s a huge line, a $50 cover charge, and a bouncer they’ve tussled with before (in the episode “The Fight”). The guys have to go to the back of the line because they’re afraid to fight the bouncer again. When they finally get to the front of the line, the bouncer says that the cover charge is not going to be $100 since the bar has gotten crowded. This is the final straw for Ted and Barney, so they decide to open Puzzles, the fairly-priced bar in Ted’s apartment that they’ve been dreaming of for years. With an assist from Kevin, they get the place up and running, and it’s actually quite awesome. The best part about it is that Barney and Ted even came up with a theme song for the place. I always love any opportunity to hear Neil Patrick Harris sing, even if Josh Rador did take the lead on this particular song. At least he got funny lines about wanting to use the bar as an excuse to have sex with women in Ted’s room. That was amusing.

Before Puzzles got up and running, Robin and Kevin had been in the apartment watching Sandy Rivers’ New Year’s Eve broadcast. Sandy is a drunken mess, and Kevin tells Robin she should try to get back on camera. I guess it’s good that he’s being supportive but I found it strange that he was suddenly being so insistent about this. Luckily for Robin and her career ambitions, Sandy calls her in tears saying that the producer of his show (who was also his girlfriend) just quit. Robin has to rush off to try and salvage the broadcast. At the show, the situation with Sandy gets worse and worse, and eventually, Sandy runs off to go find the producer/girlfriend. Robin has one of the underlings run the in memoriam montage while she runs off after Sandy. She finds him at the producer/girlfriend’s apartment, but things quickly go south when Sandy thinks Robin showing up means it’s time for a threesome. Needless to say, Robin has to drag a crying (again) Sandy back to the broadcast because his girlfriend’s broken up with him yet again.

Back at Puzzles things are starting to get a bit rowdy, especially considering it’s actually, you know, Ted and Robin’s home. First they start raising drink prices (which goes against the Puzzles mission statement Barney and Ted made Kevin memorize), and then they end up hiring the MacLaren’s bouncer. The bouncer keeps things under control, but he eventually scares off all the customers. Kevin decides to check the bathroom to make sure everyone has left, and he finds Sandy Rivers in the bathtub. At that moment, Robin calls to tell Kevin she can’t find Sandy because he’s run off again. Kevin decides to neglect to mention that Sandy is right in front of him (and thinking Kevin is from an escort service), and he tells Robin to get on camera and do the New Year’s countdown herself. Robin does the countdown and is awesome, and Saget!Ted tells us it was a turning point in her career.

As Marshall is telling these stories to his dad, more and more people show up in the cemetery, including his two brothers, and even mourners from other funerals in progress. They all want in on the tailgate action. Well, the other mourners do. Marshall’s brothers want Marvin’s grave to themselves. Marshall tries to pretend the interlopers aren’t there and continues on with a story about he and Lily having a fight over how to raise their child. Marshall finds his old copy of a book called “Enigmas of the Mystical” (an encyclopedia of sorts for conspiracy theories), and he says he wants to raise his child as a “believer” and read the book to him/her before bedtime. Lily, understandably, doesn’t think much of this idea. It turns out that what she’s really upset about is that her dad never taught her to believe in anything, because he was never around. She gets a huge surprise at the end of the episode. Her dad shows up at the door with a huge teddy bear. He wasn’t blowing off her phone call about the pregnancy. He was so excited that he ran out of the game convention and drove all the way to New York. Lily can’t believe her eyes. Marshall eventually makes peace with the interlopers too, when one of them says Marshall reminds him of Marvin because of his generous nature. We get a montage showing Marvin feeding everybody who stopped by the New Year’s tailgate just like Marshall has been doing.

Body of Proof 2.11: "Falling for You"

2012-02-05T17:22:00.000-05:00

“Since when do you need an invitation to commit murder?”
- Bud

We find ourselves at a Jewish wedding shortly before the ceremony is to start. We hear a scream and the bride comes flying out of a hotel window and crashes to the ground. Not the best way to start a wedding. Meanwhile, Lacey keeps asking her mom cosmetic stuff (is she fat, does she need a nose job). Megan tells Lacey she’s perfect the way she is just in time for Lacey to run off with a friend. Luckily, Megan gets the call about the dead bride-to-be. Megan is not a fan of weddings (well she is divorced). The bride-to-be’s name is Melissa. She’s got multiple injuries (duh). There’s some debate on whether she was pushed or it was a suicide. Peter and Dani are thinking suicide but Bud’s in the “murder” camp.

Things at the lab are kind of awkward. Curtis is on a diet so he’s cranky and Ethan tries and fails to get Dani to go on a date with him (though she agrees to a Sunday matinee of a movie). Poor guy. There’s just no competing with Peter. In autopsy, Megan and Kate are going over Melissa’s body and find residue and particles consistent with crashing through a tree branch and the wedding canopy. Bud’s in a mood that no one seems to know where it’s coming from. But he’s a little happier when Megan discovers a Melissa had a black eye. So he is going to check out the groom. Bud finds the father of the bride slugging the groom and blaming him for the bride’s death. Bud and Sam take them back to the precinct for a chat. The groom says that Melissa was traditional so he hadn’t seen her since the rehearsal dinner the night before and he had no idea about the black eye. Melissa’s father is still gung ho about blaming the groom.

Meanwhile, the antics around the lab get worse. Ethan sees Peter and Dani flirting. And Curtis considers liposuction as Megan and Kate go over all the work Melissa apparently had done. And she’s apparently had her thyroid removed. And she had alcohol and anti-depressants in her system. Bud and Sam are off to talk to the maid of honor. Apparently Melissa was having second thoughts and maybe it had something to do with her ex-boyfriend being back in town. The next morning, Megan threatens Lacey with no computer if she doesn’t eat and gets a call from Ethan about the missing thyroid. She had to have it removed. She was given meds to stabilize her hormones but they didn’t show up in the labs Ethan ran. No wonder she was depressed.

Megan and Lacey are out shopping and Lacey tries on some rather provocative clothing (for a thirteen-year-old). Megan also nixes Lacey wanting to dye her hair. We then head over to the lab where Megan and Kate are meeting with Melissa’s father and step-mom. They say she was shy and overweight after her mother’s death. But after she had her thyroid removed she was more out-going. Her dad didn’t want her to have all the plastic surgery and it strained their relationship. Bud and Sam go to talk to the ex-boyfriend, Zack. Bud is still in a mood and kind of snippy with the guy and outright says he was so pissed when he came back to find Melissa engaged that he helped her off the balcony. Zack says he’s done talking and shuts the door in their face. Apparently Bud’s wife has been up all night lately because of the pregnancy. So he’s cranky.

We have our much needed Ethan/Curtis comedy bit. They’re trying to figure out the trajectory of Melissa’s fall and Ethan whines about Dani dating Peter. They do discover, however, that she didn’t jump. And they find her missing earring. Over at the plastic surgeon’s office, Megan is in a funk, too. She brings up her father’s suicide and that he never left a note. So she’s trying to understand. She’s also pretty hostile with the doctor. Not surprising given Lacey’s latest kick. As they leave, peter asks who paid for all the plastic surgery. Turns out ex-boyfriend Zack bank-rolled it. Not looking good for him. Back at the lab, Ethan is eating pizza and bolts when he sees Curtis coming and ends up in autopsy. He and Kate find a bit of metallic something in Melissa’s leg wound. Ethan makes the connection that he and Curtis saw paint chip on the bridal suite balcony. She broke her leg before crashing to the ground.

Bud has obviously hauled Zack in and has gone through the guy’s emails. Zack admits to trying to keep in contact and get Melissa back but he denies being at the wedding. He wasn’t even invited. That doesn’t seem to deter Bud. He also gets the groom to drop off some pictures from the wedding. And all is not well in paradise. Peter foolishly decides to go to a hockey game with a friend instead of out with Dani. I think she might be heading Ethan’s way. As they’re looking at the photos Megan sees a picture of the maid of honor giving Melissa aspirin. Combining Botox with aspirin inhibits coagulation and causes black eyes. The maid of honor was jealous of the fact that Melissa got the groom first.

Megan is not having any luck on the Lacey front. Especially when her daughter comes home having dyed her hair with over the counter product. And Lacey refuses to change it. I hope this doesn’t last too long. It’s kind of irritating. Bud has news for Megan. The hotel finally let him see footages from the elevator security tapes and Zack was on it. He went to try and talk Melissa out of the wedding and bolted when he saw her father. Apparently he hated Zack for paying for all the surgeries. Bud and Sam hit a similar road block with the father. Though they did find a shiny motived for murder. A clause in his late wife’s will. Meanwhile, Ethan finds Curtis chowing down on some cake after Kate sort of flips out on him for not doing what she asked. It was a touching little scene of bonding. I have to say those two are some of my favorites on the show and whenever they have scenes together it’s always great.

Ethan tracks down Dani and asks what’s wrong with him. She apologizes for leading him on and he cancels their movie Sunday. However, there is some good news at the lab. There was hair on Melissa’s earring and it matches her father’s DNA. They head over to the funeral to stop Melissa’s father from leaving town after the funeral. But Megan deduces it wasn’t her father that did it. It was the groom (based on his boutonniere). He admits to it, though he says it was an accident. She tried to call off the wedding and he pushed her away when she tried to hug him and she fell. Ethan finally confronts Peter and while there’s not much he can do to keep Peter from seeing Dani, he tells him to not break her heart. And we finally figure out what Lacey’s so upset about. She was invited to a party and so thought she wasn’t one of the ‘cool’ kids so tried to change how she looked. Megan assures her that she is perfect and they laugh about the awful color she’s turned her hair. They’ll be taking a trip to the hairdresser to fix it.

New GIrl 1.09: "The 23rd"

2012-02-05T10:33:00.002-05:00

“I had figure skating lessons until I was thirteen, and then my mom sobered up and realized I was a boy. Let’s do this.”
-Schmidt

“The 23rd” is definitely one of my favorite episodes of “New Girl” thus far, and definitely in my pantheon of all-time great television holiday episodes. The conceit that the whole gang would go to Schmidt’s office holiday party was kind of silly, but it made for some great, hilarious moments. It also had a lot of heart, which is becoming a pretty common characteristic of the best episodes of the series. Plus, it’s a holiday episode. We always want holiday episodes to have a lot of heart. Even when a holiday episode has an edge to it, like “Greys Anatomy’s” “Grandma Got Run Over by a Reindeer,” you always get the nice little heartwarming moment with all the main characters enjoying the holiday together at some point in the episode. And this episode’s heartwarming moment took place on an uber-decked out for Christmas street. Which is right after my own heart. I checked out a street like that in Baltimore with some friends before the holidays this year myself. I’m a sucker for Christmas lights.

The episode opens at the apartment, with the guys taking care of last minute holiday stuff. We see a contrast of who the best and worst gift givers are in the apartment. Nick is wrapping up a box of tacks for his nephew with a note warning his nephew not to eat them. Meanwhile, Jess has given the guys roller skates, and they’re all loving them. There’s also some discussion about how the whole gang is going to be going to Schmidt’s office holiday party later that evening. Jess bursts in on them about to have a bit of a roller skating fight, which was pretty darn hilarious. Jess is freaking out because she needs to buy a Christmas gift for Paul, and she has no clue what to get him. She wants the guys to come to the mall with her to help. We next see Jess and Nick at the mall, discussing the gift dilemma. Because she hasn’t been dating him for very long, Jess isn’t sure whether or not to get Paul a serious or silly gift. So far, all she’s got is a handmade card for “nerdy weird sex that works for both of us.” Nick jokingly takes the card from her and says he’s going to cash it in someday, which of course I thought was a great moment.

On the way home from the mall, Jess drives the guys down “Candycane Lane.” It’s a street where everybody goes all-out with their Christmas decorating. It’s not all that impressive during the day, but Jess is driving there anyway because they won’t have a chance to go at night. Nick has to go directly to the airport from Scmidt’s party because he has a 4 AM flight to Chicago- it was the only flight he could afford. Somehow he’s managed to miss his flight for the past four years in a row, so his mother is really getting on his case to make sure he gets to the airport on time this year. Throughout the episode, Mrs. Miller calls both Nick and Winston to make sure that Nick is going to make his flight.

Next we get some gift exchange scenes, which I suppose are obligatory in any holiday television episode. First, Schmidt stops by a photo shoot Cece is doing (she’s the “after” for a diet pill) to give her a gift. The only problem is that Cece’s douchey boyfriend is at the shoot as well. Schmidt’s gift to Cece is a perfume he designed himself. He didn’t really choose the scents by how they actually smelled, but by what they symbolized. For instance, he chose sandalwood as one of the scents because Cece is “up to no good.” Of course, as the episode goes on, we find out that this means the perfume smells absolutely horrible, but Cece seems to appreciate the gesture anyway. Especially because her douchey boyfriend didn’t even get her a gift. Jess and Paul’s gift exchange doesn’t go nearly as well. Jess’ gift from Paul is plane tickets to Austria and tickets to the Salzburg Music Festival, and all she has to give Paul is a plushie anatomically correct heart. Paul doesn’t mind this, and he tells Jess he loves her. Jess, understandably, freaks out, and all she says in reply is “thank you.” Sure the “thank you” in response to “I love you” has been done on sitcoms before, but I think it worked here because that moment wasn’t dwelt on so much.

The gang all arrives at Schmidt’s office holiday party and finds Schmidt shirtless and playing “Sexy Santa.” It’s pretty hilarious. After they’re all settled at the party, Jess tells Nick about what happened with Paul. Jess is conflicted about when to tell Paul that she doesn’t feel the same way about him as he does her. She thinks it would be cruel to spring this on him in the middle of the holidays. She ends up hiding in the bathroom with Cece (who is hiding from her douchey boyfriend) for a while trying to figure it out. I want to know, in the age of corporations hording all their money, how Schmidt could get away with inviting all his friends and some of his friends’ friends (like Paul and Cece’s boyfriend) to this party. I know of companies that do nothing for the holidays or only give their employees something like $5 each towards a party. I want to work where Schmidt works!

Nick sees Paul looking pensive on the balcony, and when Paul says that yes, he’s talked to Jess, Nick assumes that Jess has already broken the bad news to Paul. So Nick lets it slip that Jess said she doesn’t love Paul. It turns out that what Jess talked to Paul about was that they might need to drive Nick to the airport, not about her feelings. So Nick’s in trouble. Meanwhile, in the bathroom, Jess decides she’s going to wait to have the talk with Paul until after the holidays, and she leaves to go join the party. Cece stays in the bathroom to try her perfume, since Schmidt was nice enough to get her a gift and her boyfriend wasn’t, and she discovers that the perfume sucks. Jess goes out on the balcony and finds out what Nick told Paul, and the three of them end up locked on the balcony while Jess and Paul have a conversation that eventually leads to them breaking up. This is super awkward for Nick, especially when he gets another phone call from his mom. Jake Johnson plays Nick’s desperation to get off the balcony for comedic gold.

Winston has been spending the party talking to the young son of Gina, Schmidt’s pregnant boss. The kid seems to take a liking to Winston, which surprises Gina, because her son doesn’t usually like to talk to people at all. Meanwhile, Cece sees Schmidt being verbally abused by his coworker Kim. It reminds her of how she feels when her douchey boyfriend puts her down, so she tells Schmidt to stand up or himself. Schmidt takes Cece’s advice and tells Kim that he will no longer be Sexy Santa. He makes a comment about killing Santa, and of course Gina’s kid hears it, screams, and runs off. Winston then spends much of the rest of the episode looking for the kid, and in the process, he opens the balcony door, and a grateful Nick runs off as quick as he can. Winston finally finds the kid outside, and he’s done such a good job that Gina essentially offers him quite a lot of money to be the kid’s manny.

Finally the party is over and the gang is on their way to take Nick to the airport. Nick sees how dejected Jess looks following her break-up with Paul, and he makes the decision to turn the car around, ensuring that he’ll miss his flight and piss of his mother yet again. He takes Jess and the guys to Candycane Lane, hoping that getting to see it all lit up would be a good Christmas present to Jess. Unfortunately, the residents of the street have already turned off their lights for the night. Nick gets out at the car and starts yelling at them to show off and turn on their lights, and soon the rest of the gang joins in. The lights of Candycane Lane come on, and the gang takes a brief moment to enjoy them before driving off (they don’t want to get arrested for disturbing the peace, after all).

Person of Interest 1.09: "Get Carter"

2012-01-30T07:04:00.000-05:00

“We got into this to stop bad things from happening to good people. Carter’s been doing that her whole life. She’s not just another number, Finch. Some people the world can’t afford to lose.”
- Reese

We find ourselves back in time in 2004 in the Middle East in an underground bunker. It turns out the US military has captured a man named Yusef whom they believe to be helping Al Qaeda. He claims to only sell fruits and vegetables but the soldier talking to him isn’t buying it. He tells Yusef he’s going to have to talk to his boss. And in walks Detective Carter. I guess she was military before she was police. Back in 2011, we have a voice over of Elias saying that Carter needs to go. At the precinct, Carter gets in to find a chronic battered wife, Mrs. Kovach, there to bail out her abusive husband. Carter tries to impress upon the wife that she needs to stop making up excuses for the injuries but it doesn’t seem to help. Mr. Kovach does take Carter’s card. Just as she and her husband are leaving, Lionel shows up. It looks like Elias himself tried to take out Carter at the shooting a few episodes ago. So she pays his father a visit in prison. It goes nowhere fast and as she’s leaving, Elias’s father says that from the looks of things, Elias is going after her. Not the other way around.

Later that night, both Carter and Lionel show up at the homicide of a young man, Ronny Middleton. He was shot in what appeared to be a drive-by. And he was a witness against a local thug, Hector Alvarez, in a shooting but recanted and the DA dropped charges. Carter is out for blood now. She isn’t going to let the thug get away. Lionel starts shouting to get people’s attention for potential witnesses but runs into Reese. He can be a little creepy sometimes. Meanwhile, Carter tries to get information out of Mr. Castillo, a bodega owner where Ronny bought a Mexican soda before he was shot. Reese has finished talking to Lionel when Finch gets in touch. They’ve got a new number; Detective Carter.

The next morning Carter is having breakfast at a diner with her son, Taylor. Reese is a little surprised that she has a son but he’s been checking into her and knows the dad has been out of the picture for a while. Finch is installing a camera and GPS tracker in Carter’s car and almost gets caught. Reese tails her on a motorcycle (he gets to not wear his usual suit for this episode. He looks kind of good in leather.) to Alvarez’s auto shop where she confronts Alvarez and promises she’s going to get him for Ronny’s murder. Back at HQ, Finch is inserting a camera into a police bobblehead that Reese is going to give to Lionel to keep an eye on Carter at the precinct. We also learn a few interesting things about Carter; she was an army interrogator (which we saw at the start of the episode), she went to law school and passed the New York bar in 2004 but went back to the police force. And she has 3 major threats that could be trying to take her out; Elias, Alvarez and Mr. Kovach. So Reese has his work cut out for him. He knows he can’t get too close or else he risks getting caught but he can’t let her catch a bullet either.

At the precinct, Lionel has gotten the bobblehead and after a little funny scene where Reese tells him to turn to face Carter’s desk,. Reese also tells Lionel to get in touch with some of his corrupt cop buddies to see what they know about wanting to take Carter out. When Carter finds out the bodega owner never showed, she heads off to have another chat. Reese follows her and she hauls some guy into her car. Turns out the guy (Bottlecap) is one of her CIs. She asks him to check around about Elias and Hector. She gives him a small wad of bills for his time and the really heads out to see Mr. Castillo. Meanwhile, Lionel meets up with the Captain on a roof to inquire about getting rid of Carter. The Captain says that Elias runs a tight ship but it’s organized and low profile. And getting rid of Carter has gone all the way up the chain of command and has been approved. The Captain also tells Lionel to keep his distance.

At the bodega, Carter questions Mr. Castillo again. He says he didn’t see Alvarez’s car that night but he’d been in to buy condoms and beer before. But he refuses to give a statement otherwise. Carter walks outside and Hector rolls up in his purple car. She tells him to get lost and before he drives off, he makes a gun with his hand and points it at Mr. Castillo. Not good. Reese follows Carter to a bar where she confronts Mr. Kovach and he promises that if she goes after him, he’ll exercise his Second Amendment rights. She really needs to stop antagonizing these guys.

Back in 2004, Carter is interrogating Yusef and she’s much calmer and more compassionate than the guy who started the interrogation. Despite her compassion, she doesn’t get very far. Yusef pretty much tells her he’d rather die than help because Al Qaeda would murder his wife and son. Back in the present, Carter is back at the precinct looking at Ronny Middleton’s phone. She and Lionel have a little brainstorming session about why Hector would go downtown for condoms and booze when Lionel says Hector probably has a girl on the side. So Carter is going to make some calls and Reese calls Lionel to put him on Carter watch. Reese is going to have a little word with Hector and his boys. He also promises that if anything happens to Carter, Reese is going for Lionel next. Reese blows the door to the auto shop open with some kind of incendiary device, shoots the workers and makes off with the guns they were running and jacks Hector’s car.

We jump back to 2004 where Carter promises to protect Yusef and his family if he helps them. Carter rattles off a lot of personal information about Yusef and his family to show she’s not just in it to negotiate to get rid of dangerous explosives. She convinces Yusef to help, for the sake of their children, and he helps. But when the team gets back, she learns that they killed Yusef. She’s really pissed but she finds the men in her unit don’t care less.

Carter and Lionel head to meet up with her CI about Hector’s other girl. She promises to take her CI to his favorite place for dinner if the lead pans out. She certainly makes a lot of promises to people. At the precinct, in a rather amusing scene, she and Lionel introduce Hector’s two girlfriends to each other. Carter promptly locks them in a room with Lionel to sort it out. She also gets the news about Reese shooting up Hector’s shop. Reese feels confident that Hector is out of the picture as he’s on the run. Finch isn’t so sure. And Reese agrees when he mentions Hector is heavily armed.

At the precinct, Hector’s girlfriends give him up. Downtown Girl says he changed his shirt after coming back from the market empty handed and Uptown Girl tells them he has a warehouse in Queens he goes when he’s expecting a shipment. Just as Carter and Lionel are about to head out there, Carter gets a call from Mr. Kovach. She’s panicked and says her husband has a gun. When Carter and Lionel get there they find Mr. Kovach dangling from the rafters by his wrists and Mrs. Kovach hiding in the bathroom. The phone rings and she hands it to Carter. Reese warns her that someone wants her dead and that Alvarez is heavily armed. He hangs up and ducks out before she can ask any more questions. Carter gets back to the precinct to find they have a warrant for Hector’s warehouse and sympathy flowers waiting on her desk (which Elias just delivered). It’s clear he’s out for her.

The cops raid Hector’s warehouse and Reese is there undercover as a member of ESU. While there’s a big gunfight going on inside, Hector sneaks out in his truck around back and Carter manages to take him down without getting shot herself. So two of the three threats are taken care of. Unfortunately, she goes to meet her CI and he shoots her, claiming Elias gave him the choice of his life or Carter’s. But Reese has found her and shoot the CI before he can deliver the final shot. We then see that Carter was wearing a bullet proof vest (thanks to Reese’s hint about someone wanting her dead). Reese leans over just out of sight in the shadows and tells her that he knows she’ll still come after him but that she’s not alone. And he uses her name, Joss. The next morning, Reese manages to get back the surveillance equipment as Carter has breakfast with her son and grills him about the dance he went to. Just as Reese slips out of Carter’s car, he sees a picture of a soldier, clearly Carter’s husband. Guess he died in the line of duty.

New Girl 2.08: "Bad in Bed"

2012-01-29T23:34:00.003-05:00

“I'm not going to a black barbershop, Winston. I've seen the movies. I know how fast they talk. I don't need to seem any less cool than I already do.”
-Nick

While I wouldn’t call “Bad in Bed” one of my favorite episodes of “New Girl,” I would definitely say that it was superior to “Naked,” which dealt with similar themes. I appreciated that there seemed to be real reasons behind Jess’ sexual hang-ups in this episode beyond her innate quirkiness. It was a much more well-rounded take on the theme. There were also mildly amusing subplots involving the guys in the apartment, but neither of those subplots were at all thematically tied to what Jess was going through. They were more funny vignettes, especially Nick and Winston’s plot. The vignettes kind of relied a bit too much on race and gender stereotype-based humor for my taste as well. Somehow, though, I’ll manage to power through this blog post so we can get to superior episodes of “New Girl” like “The 23rd” and “The Story of the 50.”

The episode opens with Jess and Paul returning from what must have been a pretty good date, because they’re tearing each other’s clothes off as they try to make their way to Jess’ bedroom. Poor Nick just looks on bewildered, as the commotion woke him up from dozing on the couch. Things slow down a bit, and Jess has to take a moment to look at herself in the bathroom mirror and get psyched before actually entering the bedroom with Paul. Things don’t go well at all, and Jess and Paul decide they’re going to try again tomorrow after going out for a nice dinner. The next morning, Jess announces to the guys that she and Paul are going to have sex that night. From her tone of voice (and the fact that she is announcing this at all), they correctly surmise that she is freaking out about this, although they aren’t quite sure why. We find out in a later conversation between Jess and Cece that Jess is freaking out because she feels she’s out of practice and wasn’t that experienced in the first place. She explains to Cece that pretty much everything she learned about sex was from her ex-boyfriend Spencer or the Clinton impeachment trial. We were treated to a hilarious flashback of young Jess feeling guilty for listening to NPR, which greatly amused me.

Since this subplot started around the time that Jess was making her announcement to the boys, now would be a good time to get the subplot about Nick’s hair troubles out of the way in one paragraph. Basically Nick’s hair has gotten really long (something I noticed when I first watched this episode but didn’t realize would figure into the plot). Nick doesn’t want to go get a haircut, though, because he dreads the thought of having to make small talk with a stylist for an hour. Nick dreads this so much that he even tries to cut his hair himself, although that plan ends when the demonstrator in the YouTube video he’s watching cuts himself severely and starts bleeding all over the place. Winston finally convinces Nick to go to his barbershop. Nick loves the place, but he ends up with a ridiculous hi-top haircut, and nobody takes him seriously for the rest of the episode.

The other small subplot of the episode involves Schmidt’s work situation. He works in an office of all female coworkers, and his supervisor, Gina, is pregnant. Schmidt is in a sort of war with his co-worker Beth over who is going to get the nice corner cubicle that recently opened up, and Schmidt manages to get himself invited to Gina’s baby shower. The plan is to schmooze his way to the corner cubicle at the party. The baby shower itself is a quite impressive, unruly pool party, and Schmidt is most definitely the life of the party. Beth says Schmidt doesn’t understand women, and she keeps trying to one-up him, but Schmidt eventually prevails. He ends up pushing Gina into the pool, and for a moment, it looks like she might be in trouble, but she comes up for air and loves it.

Anyway, back in Jess World, Jess borrows Schmidt’s computer to look up the restaurant where she and Paul are going, and she stumbles upon Schmidt’s porn collection. Five-and-a-half hours later, she’s pretty freaked out, and she asks the guys for help. She wants to know how much of what she saw in the poor guys actually expect women to do. The guys don’t have much time to offer advice before Paul arrives, but they do get into a little competition about who is the best at sex. The general consensus is that Nick is the worst, although Nick, of course, disagrees. At dinner, Jess asks Paul if he likes porn, and she pretends that she loves porn. Understandably, Paul gets a little freaked out. Their later attempt at sex is similarly a disaster. Jess uses stupid voices (old timey newscaster and a lumber jack), and Paul has trouble untying the ridiculous starfish lingerie Jess bought with Cece. Paul really freaks out, so much that he runs out of the apartment, when Jess tries lightly choking him.

The next morning, Jess throws a fit in the kitchen, so Winston and Nick immediately set about finding out what is wrong. They advise Jess that in the future, when it comes to sex, she should just be herself instead of trying to be into things that she really doesn’t like. Jess says she’ll only listen to Winston, though. She can’t take Nick seriously because of his terrible hair. Paul stops by the apartment to apologize to Jess, and Jess apologizes too. She explains that she really isn’t into all the stuff she tried the night before, she just thought she needed to be more exciting. Paul makes it clear that he likes her just the way she is. Jess offers to walk Paul back downstairs, and now that the pressure is off, they end up having sex in the elevator.

Body of Proof 2.10: "Your Number's Up

2012-01-26T07:39:00.001-05:00

“What do you do when there are no answers? What do you tell people then?”
“Sometimes even the answers don’t help. Ultimately, it’s about giving comfort to the living any way we can.”
- Lacey and Megan.

We start this week with a group of kids playing touch football in the street when suddenly it’s raining money. Not surprisingly, everyone goes for the dough and a kid grabs a handful and finds a bloody bill. Across town, Lacey is chatting with her friends via webcam about the new hat she just bought. Megan walks in and promptly finds out it cost $300 and Lacey used Megan’s credit card to buy it. So on her way to the crime scene, Megan has to return it. And apparently while returning the hat, she got some new shoes. They head up to the apartment where the money fell from ($50,000) to find Walter, the tenant laying dead on the floor with a wound in his gut and defensive mark son his arms.

Back at the lab, Dani is helping Ethan studying for his pathology boards. Which seem to go fine until Kate shows up to drill him and starts with information he didn’t think was important. The woman he was discussing was young and aside from a burst appendix, had been relatively healthy. But obviously that didn’t last long since she’s lying on a slab in autopsy. Meanwhile, Megan and Curtis are examining the wounds on Walter’s body. Curtis is being helpful and Megan is being unusually quiet until Peter shows up and announces to the room about Lacey snagging Megan’s credit card. But Peter’s having trouble finding out anything about Walter. His fingerprints weren’t in the system and the name is too common to find accurate work records. But as they do the external physical exam it becomes clear that things don’t add up. He’s had elective surgeries, a deep tan and trip to the tropics. But his hands are callused and burned so he’s done hard labor. Eventually, Megan notices a coal tattoo (when coal seeps into an open cut) on his face and we learn that Walter used to work at a coal plant but left when he won $50 million in the lottery.

Walter’s former co-workers have mostly nice things to say about him. After he won the lottery, he lived a fast, lavish life but tried to help people and make them happy. His cousin was a little resentful because he always played the lotto and the one day he missed was the day Walter played. He also mentions that once Walter won, a whole slew of unknown cousins climbed out of the woodwork looking for handouts. Back at the lab, Megan is putting Lacey to work to pay off the hat. Lacey complains quite a bit but Megan snaps that she doesn’t like it either. It is now time for Ethan to talk to the dead girl’s family and he fails. The father is furious that Ethan can’t give them answers. Luckily he’s saved by Kate.

Walter’s internal exam turns up some strange things. His liver was enlarged from drinking and his heart was bigger than average, too. He had signs of anxiety and ulcers, even though he seemed to be living it up. And all the blood on the money tossed out the window was his. Bud and Sam are having some luck too. They found a mansion Walter rented for charity events and had a cooking lesson scheduled so they’re going to check it out. Meanwhile, Ethan is continued to exam his dead woman and finds some strange findings in her lungs. So he and Kate are going to investigate at the hospital in the morning. Turns out Bud takes Peter with him to the mansion and they find a big party ins wing for an Italian cooking lesson. Bud volunteers and flashes his badge once he finds a match to the knife that killed Walter.

Bud takes the chef down to the station for questioning and he explains that he does a knife trick where he tosses it in the air and when Walter tried it, he cut himself. That’s where the cut on his arm came from. He also says that the day before, Walter had been very angry and upset about a party crasher. The next morning, Peter drops by Megan’s office with invoices and mail for Walter for the past month. Everyone seemed to be hitting him up for money. Curtis has some new information, too. The bruises on his chest had traces of chemicals found at the place where Walter used to work. Plenty of suspects to go around.

We get a brief scene where Lacey tries to comfort the sister of Ethan’s dead girl. Things aren’t going especially well for Ethan. He’s kind of interrogating the doctor at the hospital and Kate tells him to head back to the lab. Honestly, Ethan cares about this girl; he just doesn’t know how to express it. Megan and Sam pay a visit to one of the coal miner guys because of the trace found on Walter’s chest. We get some more information about Walter’s behavior from his old friend. He was manic and impulsive after winning the lottery and pretty much stopped talking to his friends. Walter’s friend admits to confronting him the day before at the party and he says he didn’t think money could change someone so completely. Megan seems to be worrying about that with Lacey. It turns out Walter didn’t change because of the money. He had a tumor on his adrenal gland that was making things wonky. Meanwhile, Sam gets to do an exciting chase scene on a motorcycle and catches a young woman on it (it was Walter’s).

She claims she met Walter when he opened a nursing home and she was doing an article on it. They’d been together ever since. She says his moods were because he was so dedicated to his charity work. Yeah, not likely, sweetie. Over at the lab, Curtis and Ethan kidnap Lacey to the break room for a much needed donut break. Curtis gets called away, leaving Ethan and lacey to sort of bond over the case he’s been working. She gives him some encouragement as he gets a page from Dani. She has another body and it’s got similar symptoms to his first case. She runs off for a quick make out sessions with Peter, leaving Ethan to examine the body alone. We get a small tie in back a few episodes. He’s got the names of his birth parents but he’s afraid to open it.

Meanwhile, Megan has found something odd in Walter’s leg x-ray and she swings by her office to tell Lacey it’s going to be ten more minutes. Lacey asks what happens when there are no answers and Megan says they just do the best they can. Ethan brings his findings to Kate and they realize that there’s an infection in the OR at the hospital where both of their bodies were treated and race off to try and do something. They manage to find out the problem. Air bags used in the ER had been contaminated with mold. Good catch Ethan!

Back at the lab, Megan keeps poking Curtis with a plastic knife, trying to figure out the force used to imbed the tip of the knife in the spine. Curtis, in-between pokes, reveals there was glue on the knife point and Megan and Bud head back to Walter’s friend from the coal plant. They find him at work since his family has been low on cash and arrest him. He admits to going to Walter’s old place after the party to find Walter in a rage. He was cutting open stacks of money and tossing it out the window. He says stabbing Walter was an accident. Megan interrupts just as Bud is about to slap the cuffs on and says Walter was an accomplice when she touches the guy’s neck and he flinches. Megan shows that he has muscle atrophy that meant he couldn’t have stabbed Walter. He says that Walter lunged and they fell. He’s got a corresponding bruise to prove it. Ethan manages to bolster enough courage to talk to the dead girl’s family and lacey, after getting her first paycheck, goes and buys a locket for the girl’s sister. Bud wins $20 on a scratch lotto ticket (gotta put it away to pay for baby Bud’s future) and Peter finally opens to letter about his birth parents.

HIMYM 7.12: "Symphony of Illumination"

2012-01-26T06:44:00.002-05:00

“Mr. E. Looks like some little scamp just earned the right to put the Vikings helmet on Baby Jesus!”
-Marshall

“Symphony of Illumination” was a rather somber episode of HIMYM, especially for a fall season finale. I’m really not sure if I liked that. The episode dealt with the aftermath of Robin telling Barney she’s pregnant, and it also had some holiday storylines thrown in, too. I know the gimmick that was used in this episode caused quite a bit of uproar when it was first broadcast. Even now, I’m not really sure how I feel about it. I guess I’m used to Carter and Craig and the rest of the HIMYM staff teasing us and saving stories for later, so I don’t really get offended by twists like the one that ended this episode. I kind of expected something like that twist would happen, honestly, because Barney and Robin are most likely endgame, and something that would tie them together so fully as Robin being pregnant can’t happen just yet.

While we do get some minimal Saget!Ted narration in this episode, the bulk of the episode is framed by Robin telling the story to her “kids.” They’re sitting on the couch just like Ted’s kids usually are, and Robin says she’s going to start the story about their father by telling them his reaction when she told him she was pregnant. The resulting scene is pretty funny in what is overall a rather serious episode. Barney keeps saying accidentally insulting things like “I just thought you were getting fat,” and Robin keeps punching him out. Neil Patrick Harris taking a punch or slap, whether it’s from Robin, Marshall, or Captain Hammer, is never not funny. He’s just so good at it. When Barney is finally conscious enough to get a few more words out, he says he thinks it’s wonderful that Robin’s pregnant and he’s going to be a dad. Robin is the one to faint this time. Oh, and in other important news, Robin and Kevin haven’t had sex, so if she’s pregnant, the baby is definitely Barney’s.

We then move to MacLaren’s to introduce the other plot of the episode. Marshall announces that he wants to create a more impressive Christmas light display than one of his new neighbors out on Long Island. He’s going out to the new house for the weekend to accomplish this. Lily’s kind of upset because it means that she’ll be registering for baby products on her own. Barney volunteers himself and Robin to accompany her instead. Barney tells Robin this is to show her that kids aren’t so scary after all, but Robin doesn’t really seem to appreciate the gesture. She gets freaked out by the stuff she sees Lily buying, such as nipple butter and vaginal numbing spray. Barney gets quite freaked out himself. He sees his former best friend (before he met the current gang), Insane Dwayne, who now has a wife and kids and is no longer so insane. Now, neither Barney nor Robin want a baby anymore.

I’m just going to run through Marshall’s plot right here in a paragraph because it was kind of stupid. At the house, Marshall is met by a neighbor teenager named Scott. Scott is super-flattering and calls Marshall “Mr. E,” so Marshall is only too happy to let Scott help with the Christmas lights. Then Scott strands Marshall on the roof by taking away the ladder, and Marshall can see him “eating a sandwich” inside the house. To make things even worse, Scott invites a bunch of other teens over for a party. He puts a picture of his junk on Marsall’s cell phone to use as blackmail in case Marshall ever tells the police about what’s happening. Lily eventually goes out to Long Island too, and she meets Scott in the front yard. She gives him money for helping Marshall, but then she goes inside to find that the house is a wreck and Marshall is still on the roof.

Getting back to the main plot of the episode, Robin and Barney pay a visit to Dr. Sonya, and she tells Robin that she’s not pregnant. Robin and Barney do a really hilarious sort of victory dance. Later, however, when she is totally enjoying not being pregnant by drinking and watching Teen Mom, Robin is called back into Dr. Sonya’s office. Dr. Sonya tells Robin that she can’t have a baby. The definitiveness of this doesn’t really make sense considering Robin’s only gone through one round of testing and hasn’t even really tried to get pregnant yet, but the news really throws Robin. She didn’t realize that she might actually want kids some day until the option was taken away from her. Dr. Sonya suggests Robin talk to a friend about her feelings, and a really funny montage explains just why she can’t do that. My favorite is the explanation of why she can’t tell Marshall. She thinks he asks too many really detailed questions in response to problems, and I love this response because it’s a quintessential lawyer response to something.

At MacLaren’s Robin is clearly not herself, and when Ted asks what’s wrong, Robin decides to lie and say she can’t be an Olympic pole vaulter because she’s too tall. The rest of the gang (even Marshall, via phone) have the expected reactions, but presumably not as intensely as if Robin had told them she couldn’t have children. Later, the gang (minus Marshall, who is still on the roof) is back at the baby store, and since they aren’t having one, Robin and Barney both start thinking kids are cute again. Ted finds a maple leaf onesie, and Robin completely loses it, running out of the store. Back at MacLarens Ted and Lily try to figure out why Robin is so upset, and Barney is just worried that they’re going to figure out that he and Robin slept together. Luckily for Barney, Ted decides that the explanation is Robin being upset that she’s not going home for Christmas.

Ted buys a plane ticket for Robin to come home to Cleveland with him for Christmas, but Robin is not appreciative. She says it’s not Ted’s job to cheer her up. Plus she likes New York at Christmas because it’s peaceful. We next see her sitting on a park bench, and it turns out that the “kids” she’s been speaking to all episode were actually in her imagination. She goes home, still feeling down, and when she tries to turn on the lights, she discovers Ted has put together a rather spectacular Christmas light indoor display set to AC/DC. Shes incredibly touched by the gesture, and she cries on Ted’s shoulder. Saget!Ted informs us that Robin would never be a “pole vaulter,” but she would also never be alone.

New Girl 1.07: "Bells"

2012-01-22T14:10:00.002-05:00

“And my bar mitzvah was an amazing event! The theme was ‘Sports Jams!’”
-Schmidt

“Bells” was a pleasant enough stand-alone episode of “New Girl,” and surprisingly, it is one of the few episodes thus far that doesn’t deal with the gang’s romantic entanglements. Instead, we get some development of Winston as a character (we see and get a bit of an explanation for his hyper-competitiveness), and we get a funny B plot involving a fight between Schmidt and Nick. The B plot reveals character too, especially about Nick. We see that he isn’t really comfortable with being poor and sort of a “loser” after dropping out of law school. All of this is wrapped around a rather silly main plot involving Jess wanting to teach handbells to delinquents. I found this amusingly absurd, but I’m still kind of bitter over a handbell-related experience in middle school (yes, I hold a grudge for a very long time), so I kind of wish she had chosen different instruments

The episode begins with the guys bro-ing out on the apartment couch. Schmidt’s chowing down on a whole tray of sushi, and he’s trying to get Winston and Nick to eat some of it. They’re skeptical, to say the least. Schmidt tells Winston that now he has a job, he’s got to learn to like pretentious stuff like sushi. Winston reminds Schmidt that it’s just a temp job, and we see in a flashback what a boring job it is- pretty much just envelope stuffing. Winston has even tried to make a game out of how fast he can stuff envelopes, but it doesn’t do much good. Jess interrupts this conversation by bringing a bunch of students into the apartment. They look like middle or high school students, which doesn’t make much sense considering I thought Jess was an elementary school teacher, but I guess we’re supposed to just go with it. These kids have agreed to be part of a handbell choir to avoid early morning detention, and because they lost their space at the community center, Jess wants to rehearse them at the loft. She lays down the law with the guys (which was surprising), and they really don’t have a choice but to allow it.

The bell rehearsal is rather rough, to put it kindly, but the ever-optimistic Jess tells the kids they are great and gives them a “texting break” as a reward. While on a break, one of the students has trouble with the toilet (it won’t stop flushing), and Jess calls Nick into fix it. It turns out he has some MacGuyver-ed system to keep the toilet running properly which involves a plastic bottle in a hole in the wall. Schmidt is sick of the toilet not working properly want wants Nick to “fancy fix” it (aka fix it properly). This conversation is interrupted by actually really good handbell playing coming from the living room. It turns out it’s Winston. He’s got several bells in each hand and is really going to town. Jess wants Winston to help out with the group just until their next concert because she thinks he can be a good role model and inspiration, and he agrees.

Meanwhile, Schmidt is getting really impatient waiting for Nick to finish fixing the toilet, and he wants to call a plumber. Nick says a plumber is too expensive- he wants to finish the repair himself. While Nick is out of the apartment for a little while, Schmidt does indeed call the plumber. When Nick gets home to see Schmidt paying that plumber, he is really pissed off and says he won’t use the toilet. Schmidt reminds Nick of other stuff in the apartment he’s paid for, like the couch and the rug, and Nick says he’s not going to use those, either. Then he pulls the TV cable out of the wall because he’s the one who “stole the cable.” Now that I think about it, even though I really enjoyed watching it, this plot doesn’t really make a whole lot of sense. One of the advantages of renting as opposed to being a homeowner is that you have a landlord to do repairs for you for free. Nick (or a contractor paid by the gang) shouldn’t have to be doing repairs at all. Ah well.

Winston participates in the next bell choir rehearsal, and he says he wants to “win” the concert by having the group play “Eye of The Tiger.” As a native Philadelphian, I approve of that idea. Jess doesn’t like it, though, I think because she doesn’t believe the group has time to rehearse something new. She’s also feeling kind of threatened by Winston. Jess tells the kids that she can do fancy tricks with handbells too, but what she does ends up looking more like a cheerleading routine with bells replacing pom poms. The kids like Winston’s idea, and Winston suggests they skip class to practice the song. That doesn’t really meet with Jess approval, either. It turns out that it’s a bad idea for Winston, too. He gets fired from his temp job for trying to work out the notes to “Eye of the Tiger” instead of doing his work. He also gets really frustrated when the kids don’t play the song well at the next rehearsal. He goes on a huge rant and insults them, and Jess kicks Winston out of the group.

Jess is talking to Nick about the Winston situation as Nick is working on the basketball hoop in the living room. Schmidt gets home, Nick tosses him the basketball, and then it quickly apparent that Nick “unfixed” the hoop. The next morning, Nick wakes up with all of his frozen food in his bed because Schmidt was the one who purchased their apartment’s freezer. The fight only escalates from there. Nick puts all of Schmidt’s stuff (including the couch) in Schmidt’s room, then Schmidt gets really pissed about Nick using his conditioner. Schmidt says he wants to fight Nick, and Nick takes him up on it. As Nick approaches him, Schmidt starts running. They chase each other around the kitchen a bit, which was pretty darn hilarious. The fight takes a more serious turn, however, when Schmidt calls Nick a loser. Nick sulks off to his room.

The roommates clearly all have a lot of issues to work out. Jess and Winston stat by having a heart to heart about the bell choir situation. Jess tells Winston that the reason she got upset was because those kids don’t need one more person telling them they’re worthless. They seem to reach an understanding.
Then on the rooftop, Nick and Winston have a conversation about how they both seem to have reached low points in their lives. They both thought they would have accomplished much more by now than they have. They decide to go to the bell choir concert to support Jess, at least. Schmidt comes along too, but he has to get his cardigan first, of course. When the boys arrive at the concert, Jess calls Winston up to the stage and lets him participate. As they watch the concert, Schmidt and Nick make up too (and Nick insults Schmidt’s cardigan, as he should).

Body of Proof 2.09: "Gross Anatomy"

2012-01-21T20:42:00.001-05:00

“You’re committed. You have a good heart. You want to know how things work from the inside out. And I see the same things in Lacey.”
- Joan Hunt

We begin this week with what looks at first glance like a funeral. It turns out it is the close of the semester and an anatomy class is saying goodbye to their cadavers before cremating them. One girls opens up her body bag to say goodbye and instead of the guy she was expecting, finds a young woman. Over at the Hunt apartment, Megan finds Lacey ready for school and talking with a friend. But Megan’s got it a little wrong. Lacey has a club that meets at 7:05 and Megan’s not dressed yet.

We are back at the med school and the professor is insisting it was just a mix up and not a murder. Megan disagrees with him vehemently and finally gets custody of the body. She also brings the class with her back to the office so they can observe a real autopsy. The student who found the Jane Doe, Dora, is excited to go because she’s in awe of Megan.

At the autopsy, Curtis makes all the students stand on stools so they can’t touch anything and has them sign waivers and confidentiality agreements. Megan begins her assessment and when one of the guys makes a snarky comment she orders him to tell her what color the girl’s hair is. It appears blond but apparently, based on the roots, she’d dyed it red and brown previously. And when Megan asks what color Jane Doe’s eyes are, the guy (and the one standing next to him) immediately answer green. After going through some medical jargon, Megan agrees they were green the day before and wants to know they knew that.

Bud and Sam get their crack at the guys. The first one denies knowing the girl and he says he didn’t kill her. Bud makes the comment to Megan that if he ever got shot and jerk #1 was his doctor, to let him bleed out. Megan agrees. Bud takes a whack at jerk #2 and he admits to knowing the girl, but only because they met her at a bar once off campus. He and his buddy hit on her but she turned them down. Bud and Sam make the trip to the bar and after Sam gets in the bartender’s face about how Jane Doe changed her hair color a lot and had a really impressive full back tattoo of a dragon fly, they learn her name was Jackie and she worked for the limo service across the street.

Megan’s finding it harder than she expected having Lacey stay at her place more often. Lacey doesn’t like what Megan cooks and she is spending all her time on the computer video chatting with her friends. That night, Megan gets a call from Dora, thanking her for the experience. Megan invites her to observe the internal exam in the morning. Back at the office, Dani is trying to hit on Peter but he turns her down. Kate overhears and says he did the right thing. In autopsy, Megan finds an infection in Jackie’s body and siphons out some blood so Ethan can do blood work. She also observes that Jackie’s uterus is enlarged and lumpy. She has Kate take over the autopsy when Sam shows up. She and Bud hit up the limo service and found out that Jackie wasn’t the girl’s real name. Her identity is still unknown. The company had been paying her under the table. So now they’re off to check out the address they found. It’s a dump of a place but they find blood on the wall and the sheets.

Kate pays the professor a visit (she’s a former pupil). She wants to know if he killed the body on her table since she was his type. He denies it and says he was at a conference during the time of death presenting a new theory. Kate looks really annoyed by that. At the victim’s place, they find that she moved in after she quit her job at the limo service. Peter says he found some hairs in the kitchen and Megan hands off a bottle of generic pills for him to take back to the lab. Speaking of the lab, Dani is prying over Ethan’s shoulder as he’s doing the blood work and Dora appears, worried that Megan forgot about her. She’s still not supposed to touch anything and Megan is ripping mad when she gets back to find her and Ethan examining the body. But what they’ve found proves to be useful. Her lymph node is green with tattoo ink and with the ALS light, Megan finds a Celtic knot tattoo in green in with the name Ronan under her big dragonfly tattoo.

Bud and Sam pay Ronan a visit (and can I just say the accent and the look made me swoon a little). He says Jackie’s last name was O’Shea. They’d been childhood sweethearts but since he had kind of a bad time and quite the lengthy rap sheet, she up and left. He tried to find her once he’d cleaned up his act but it didn’t work. Sam believes him (as far as loving Jackie). She also sympathizes with him about his tough time. Meanwhile, Megan interrupts Lacey’s latest video chat to force her to have family time the next day. Meanwhile, Peter runs into Dani in the elevator and we get a little of her backstory. Her dad left when she was five and now he’s trying to get back in her life after finding God. She’s not pleased.

At the lab, Kate finds Megan sans protégée. Megan says she kicked her out for breaking the rules. Thanks to a little 4-person pow-wow of lab crew, we discover that Jackie had been pregnant and could have delivered 5-6 weeks ago. So now it’s a hunt for the baby. Bud can’t believe the medical team missed that Jackie had given birth. But he seems to forgive the oversight when they realize she probably had a home birth with a midwife. Soon enough, Peter tracked down the one Jackie used and we not only see a picture of Jackie and her baby, but find out she was going to give the baby up for adoption but had been having second thoughts.

Sam has called all the adoption agencies in the area but none of them had contact with Jackie. Just as Bud starts unloading the possible murder weapons he had collected around Jackie’s place, Curtis calls with a description. Luckily, Bud had a black baseball bat. Ethan is waiting for the results at the crime lab when Megan gets home to find her mother over. She’s not happy about Lacey inviting grandma for family dinner. Especially Joan is telling stories about what Megan was like as a teenager. But Dora calls and gets Megan over to school. Dora found her original cadaver and she figured out that someone had messed with the body. The knots on the Y incision were done with a sailor’s knot. Just like the one Jerk #1 uses. So Bud and Sam haul him in for questioning again and he denies sleeping with Jackie or getting her pregnant. He alibis out (he was at the library). Sam is digging into his buddy when Bud gets another call from Curtis. They found blood on the bat. It seems Jackie’s killer and the father of her baby were the same person, her ex Ronan.

The interrogation doesn’t go as hoped. Ronan says he gave Jackie the bat ages ago and didn’t know she was pregnant. He’s really worried about his baby. Bud believes and after a little arm twisting and digging, Sam does too. They both interrupt as Megan’s mom tries to apologize about the night before. Jerk #1 worked at the limo service and Megan figures out the guy that’s been there the longest is Jerk #1’s brother. He starts to run but Sam takes him down in an awesome running tackle. As soon as Megan gets in the interrogation room with him, he spills everything. He set up the adoption between Jackie and an older couple he drove for. But he freaked out when she said she wanted to keep the baby because it meant he wouldn’t get paid. He hadn’t meant to kill her. Bud and Sam find the baby and Bud manages to calm her down. And the look on Ronan’s face when he shows up with the baby is priceless. I have to say I’m glad he was innocent.

Peter runs into Dani again in the elevator and this time they don’t keep things professional. I’m not sure I like them hooking up but I suppose Peter needs some lovin’ too. When Megan gets home, she finds Lacey waiting, cell phone and webcam free with popcorn. They’re going to spend the night watching Twilight movies (and they are apparently Team Edward).

Ringer 1.10: "That's What You Get For Trying To Kill Me"

2012-01-21T20:29:00.001-05:00

“Besides, you said so yourself. You need me.”
“I don’t. You’re a glorified babysitter who got way too expensive.”
- John and Siobhan

Welcome to the mid-season finale and the episode of 4 storylines. It felt a little cluttered but for the most part everything worked really well and we leave with a really intense bow out until January. We pick pretty much right where we left off. Bridget calls Malcolm to make sure he’s okay. He’s fine and he grabbed Charlie’s cell phone but it’s dead. He’ll pick up a charger in the morning and they can meet to talk about it. When Bridget gets home, she finds white rose pedals strewn all over the floor and dozens more in vases surrounding Andrew in the living room. It is a really sweet gesture for their sixth anniversary the next day. They exchange “I love you”s for the first time in probably forever and proceed to have sex. I gotta say I was not complaining there at all. Ioan Gruffudd is a very beautiful man. The next morning Malcolm drops by for that previously mentioned visit and reveals the phone is not Charlie’s. It’s Gemma’s.

We hop over to Paris where the real Siobhan has tracked down Tyler at a bar. She tries to explain things to him (in an obvious lie). She says Andrew found her and so she went back to try and work things out. She claims she had no idea Tyler would be there. Then she pulls off her sunglasses to reveal a rather painful looking black eye (which she did with a bathroom mirror) and says things didn’t exactly work out between her and Andrew. She paints him as a really powerful and not nice man and says she used Tyler at first because he had insider information.

Back in New York, Bridget and Malcolm are trying to figure out why Charlie would take Gemma. They ultimately decide to call the police and tell them just enough of the truth to make them suspicious enough to check out Charlie’s place. The cops do show up but Charlie’s not stupid. He sweet talks them with being a former cop and casts doubt on Malcolm (being a drug addict who has only been clean 6 days). He lets them search the place and obviously Gemma’s not there. Malcolm is not happy when the cops relay this information. They’re still checking prints on Gemma’s phone but at the moment they have no real proof. They take Malcolm down to the station for some questions, leaving “Siobhan” scrambling.

Meanwhile, Charlie is on the phone with the real Siobhan and he is flipping out. He wants to kill Gemma because she knows too much. Siobhan says no and offers to pay him (he wants double) but he decides since she can’t come up with the money right away, he’s doing it his way and she no longer has a say in what happens. He’s going off the rails and that is not going to end well (or pretty). In the third storyline of the episode, we’re back in Wyoming with Victor and he’s found a dead stripper, Mary Curtis (played by Buffy alum Amber Benson). We get some flashback of her and Victor talking about Botaway and his dirty cop. He’s called Matador but that’s all Mary knows. She always is worried about Bridget. Our pal Jimmy is at the crime scene and is not happy to find out just now that Mary was Victor’s CI. Victor wants Jimmy to look into “the Matador:” That won’t be hard. Just look in a mirror!

And we’re back in New York and Henry is spiraling out of control a bit. He doesn’t understand why everyone around “Siobhan” keeps turning up missing or becomes a bad guy. He wants “Siobhan” to back off and let the police handle things. But I can’t see her doing that. For one thing the show would be really boring if she did. We now have the worst storyline in the entire episode so I’m going to cover it in as little space as possible. Juliet is helping Mr. Carpenter out after school clean up trash with a bunch of other kids. She tries to put the moves on him once they’re done and he shuts her down (with good reason). His good judgment ends there when he tells Juliet’s friend to leave the room so he can talk to Juliet. The next morning she’s talking to her friend and Juliet cries rape.

Back in the land of not-awful plots, “Siobhan” comes home to find Charlie and Andrew talking. Not a good sign. Andrew leaves to run some errands and Charlie blackmails her into agreeing to pay $250,000 to let Gemma go. I guess if he can’t squeeze the cash out of one sister, eh might as well try the other one. Despicable human being! He leaves the building just as Henry walks in and as soon as Henry realizes Charlie just left the Martins he chases after him but loses him in the crowd.

In Wyoming, Victor gets a call from Jimmy about a lead he has on “Matador”. He wants to meet with Victor that night. Thankfully Victor isn’t as clueless as he looks. He has two uniforms tail her the entire day, including when he meets up with Jimmy. They get to a very isolated part of the shipping yard when Victor recalls a story about this big guy Jimmy took down called “The Bull”. So at least Victor’s got his dirty cop and escaped unscathed.

Things aren’t going well in New York. Andrew finds “Siobhan” scrambling to count cash and when she finally fills him in on what’s happening, he shows her the real present he got her: a really beautiful diamond ring. He was going to propose again (can this guy be any sweeter? I swear if Siobhan doesn’t want him, I’ll take him!). More importantly, the ring is worth over $200,000 so they can pawn it for the rest of the ransom money. They get to Penn Station and wait for nearly half an hour before Charlie calls. He thinks “Siobhan” called the cops because one of the detectives is sitting outside so he’s not going to show. He’s in what looks like a parking garage or something and he shoots Gemma. The detective and Henry show up inside and things just start moving really fast. Bridget hands over the bill for a storage unit that Malcolm found in John’s mailbox as a place he could have taken Gemma. It also turns out John’s prints were on Gemma’s phone (duh). We hop over to the storage unit and John goes to get Gemma’s body out of the trunk but it’s gone. He’s apparently a bad shot. She almost reaches the keys in the car when he rounds on her and kills her. He’s got her body halfway into the unit when Siobhan shows up. She is furious that John killed Gemma and shoots him in the head with the same gun he used to kill Gemma to make it look like a murder-suicide. Malcolm, Andrew and “Siobhan” are all together at the loft when Andrew gets the call. And thus ends the first portion of Ringer’s freshman run.

HIMYM 7.11: "The Rebound Girl"

2012-01-21T20:18:00.002-05:00

“Why wouldn’t I be alright? Barney’s single again. It’s what America’s been clamoring for!”
-Barney

So I’m back in my own country’s capital now (instead of Morocco’s), and it’s high time I finish wrapping up MTVP’s coverage of the fall TV season. We begin with HIMYM’s penultimate fall season episode, “The Rebound Girl.” When I first watched it, I found the ending quite shocking, and I wasn’t quite sure what to make of it. It certainly seemed to take Barney and Robin in an entirely new direction. Even though all is not as it seems, I have to believe that the twist at the end of the episode will have some sort of repercussions going forward. It’s patently obvious that Barney and Robin are endgame now, nd it only remains to be seen how they finally, ultimately get back together for good. I only hope that the rode there isn’t too unbearably tedious. As for other events in this episode, I still find Marshall and Lily’s desire to move to Long Island improbable. Well, maybe for Marshall it’s believable. He’s a country boy at heart. But Lily is most definitely not, and I didn’t really see a baby changing that. I did like that we got a brief appearance from Wayne Brady as Barney’s brother James in this episode, along with Jai Rodriguez as James’ husband.

The major plot for this episode is that Lily and Marshall’s Realtor has finished staging the Long Island house Lily’s grandparents gave them, so Lily and Marshall want to take a trip out to see it. When they get home, Dowisetrepla seems quite small and cramped in comparison. This leads Marshall and Lily to think they might really want to move to Long Island after all. When they tell Robin this news, she is not at all pleased. Marshall offers a compromise. He and Lily will let the universe decide whether or not they should move. To Robin’s chagrin, that sign comes quickly. A rich neighbor shows up at Dowisetrepla wanting to buy Lily and Marshall’s apartment so he can turn his own into a duplex. It looks like the Eriksens are moving to Long Island.

Meanwhile, Barney and Ted are both in a rather bad place relationship-wise, which leads them to make a rather rash decision. At the beginning of the episode, they’re commiserating at MacLaren’s about how they’re done with women. They have a hilarious conversation about how it would be awesome to be gay, and they’re both kind of sad to confirm when a really hot chick walks by that they are definitely straight. The conversation evolves into talking about how awesome it would be to co-parent with your best bro instead of a woman, and of course this leads to Ted and Barney thinking it might be a good idea to adopt a kid together. They realize that they’re drunk, so they decide to sleep on the idea and it still sounds great the next day. Ted and Barney then go on an adoption website and start filling out an application. This leads to the first airing of differences between the two. They work out some things fairly easily, like where they’re going to live (in NYC during the week and Ted’s Westchester house on the weekends), but then Barney mentions that he thought Ted would quit his job once they adopted the baby. I know this was supposed to be like a parody of a bitter married couple, but it was too much and didn’t work for me.

Ted and Barney do end up getting past that first fight (they would get two nannies, and Barney would get to have sex with both), but then Barney starts really going off the deep end talking about pet cobras and week-long parties and ninja stars and swords lying about the house. Ted finally realizes that co-parenting a child with Barney would be a really, really bad idea, and he calls of the plan. Barney isn’t one to take no” for an answer, though, so later he shows up at Ted’s apartment with a baby strapped to him. When Ted asks where the little girl came from, Barney just gives his trademark “Please” in response. Barney takes the baby (named Hurricane) outside and places her in a stroller. Ted is amazed at how much of a chick magnet a baby can be. He and Barney are swarmed by adoring women.

Meanwhile, Robin is kind of desperately trying to convince Marshall and Lily to stay in Manhattan. She rattles off a whole list of things she can only get in New York City (and brings examples along too). There’s also a funny sequence about the last time Marshall wanted a sign from the universe, and the sign told him he should be a Ghostbuster. There was even an Ernie Hudson cameo, which was pretty great. Later, Marshall, Lily, and Robin all arrive on Long Island to prep for Thanksgiving, which is to be held at Marshall and Lily’s new house. Robin completely can’t deal with the fact that her friends are probably going to be moving, and she locks herself in the bathroom. She says she won’t come out until Marshall and Lily say they won’t move to Long Island.

Barney and Ted (and the baby) show up at the Long Island house, but it isn’t long before Hurricane needs a diaper change. There are no diapers at the house, so Barney goes off in search of some. While Barney is out, Ted tells Marshall and Lily the whole story about why they have a baby, and just as he’s wrapping that up, James and his husband arrive. It turns out that Hurricane is actually their daughter, whose real name is Sadie. The fact that the mystery baby was his niece makes Barney’s behavior somewhat less disturbing. James tells Ted that he once thought about having a child with his best friend too, but hes glad he waited and so is she. Just as James is finishing up this speech, Barney comes back. He ended up getting products for Sadie from a pet store. It’s probably a good thing Barney doesn’t actually have children yet. Barney and Ted agree that they aren’t going to adopt a baby after all. Barney is kind of upset about this, and he goes to talk to Robin about it. He has to climb in the bathroom window to get to her. Much to his surprise, Robin says she’s pregnant.

Fringe 4.07: "Wallflower"

2012-01-13T17:40:00.002-05:00

“No, it’s okay. The Olivia you’re talking about? That’s not my Olivia.”
-Peter

So I’m coming to you all the way from North Africa! I’m in Morocco on a short-term winter study abroad course with my graduate school program. I have a little down time here and there, so I figured I’d get a write-up done when I could. So let’s get on with it! “Wallflower,” while a kind of forgettable episode of “Fringe” overall, did some good work in deepening the Amber universe characters (not that I could really care less about them, though). We got the most character development for Amber Olivia, although I’m pretty sure I don’t like the direction that character is going. I did appreciate Peter’s commitment to Blue Olivia, though. After all the Olivia/Alt-livia craziness last season, I’m glad to see that Peter seems to have learned some lessons about people not being the same in multiple universes. This seems to be paving the way for an Amber Olivia and Amber Lincoln relationship, although I’m not really sure how I feel about that, either. They don’t really have very good chemistry. I found Alt-livia and Alt-Lincoln to be a more satisfactory pairing. But you probably don’t want to hear me drone on and on about my shipping preferences for a thousand words.

The episode opens with Olivia awake in the middle of the night. She doesn’t look good, and she heads to her dresser to get some pills, only to find out that she is out of them. So it looks like Amber Olivia is a bit of a junkie. Her lack of pills leads to a late night trek to the pharmacy, where the pharmacist tells her she is on her last refill. As Olivia seems to down a handful of the pills. Typical TV pill junkie behavior, really, and I honestly expect more from “Fringe.” On her way home (at about 3 AM), she passes by a diner and sees Lincoln through the window sitting at a table. She goes inside to talk. It turns out that all the Fringe stuff has actually freaked him out, and he hasn’t slept in days. Olivia starts wondering if it’s weird that Fringe stuff doesn’t her out. Memo to Olivia: if you’ve become a pill junkie, it’s probably because you’ve freaked out.

Elsewhere in the city, a man is also walking home at night. Using his cell phone, he tells his wife that he thinks he’s being followed. He thinks he’s safe when he gets home, but some unseen force pulls him inside the house. Police later find him dead and drained of all color. It appears he has been killed by some sort of invisible person. We next get a bit of an update on what’s going on with Peter. An FBI handler is taking him shopping, and it’s extremely obvious that Peter is not at all happy with his lack of freedom. He wants to get back to the Blue Universe as soon as possible, and that’s pretty difficult when a handler is following his every step.

At Fringe headquarters, Broyles briefs Olivia and Lincoln on the invisible man case. They then interview the cop who responded to the scene. He is very reluctant to say anything because the situation was so weird. I guess he doesn’t want to be branded as crazy in his department. After he is assured multiple times that the Fringe team doesn’t find much of anything to be completely crazy, the police officer kind of implies that he felt more than saw an intruder in the victim’s house. Sort of like a ghost. Walter takes a look at the victim’s body, and he thinks that the victim might have been scared to death. To make things even more complicated, Lincoln finds blood at the scene. So definitely not a ghost. Meanwhile, a strange guy wakes up in what looks like a bathtub of cloudy water. We next see this mystery man wearing a suit in an elevator. Curiously, the other elevator passengers don’t seem to notice him. We’ve found our invisible man.

The Fringe team learns that there were three other deaths similar to the one they’ve been investigating, but those deaths hadn’t been reported to Fringe because the police just thought the victims were all albinos and nothing was strange about their deaths. Walter finds strange residue on the victim’s body. The residue turns out to be cells that can move pigment around to change color- the type of cells a chameleon has. Astrid analyzes a blood sample from the scene, and somehow she is able to determine that the DNA matches a baby who supposedly died four days after birth.

With Astrid’s information, Olivia and Lincoln review the medical history of the person to whom the blood belongs, and they also talk to a nurse who attended his birth. She says that when the body was taken away after the baby “died,” she could have sworn she still heard the baby cry. It turns out that the organization which took the baby to “do an autopsy” was a Massive Dynamic subsidiary. This, naturally, leads to a patented “Fringe” insta-trip to New York so Lincoln and Olivia can talk to Nina about this development. Nina says that yes, Massive Dynamic did give this person the chameleon-like cells, which offset a life-threatening condition he was born with. There was a big fire at the lab where he was kept, and everyone at Massive Dynamic assumed the boy, who was called Eugene, died. Obviously, he didn’t.

Back at the apartment building with the elevator we visited earlier, a woman enters her apartment and begins her routine for winding down after a long day. Eugene is in the apartment, which is more than a little creepy. The woman goes into her bedroom and sees leaves all over the bed. She is shocked, and Eugene leaves the apartment without being seen. In other sort-of romantic tension news, Lincoln stops by Peter’s house to drop off the plans for the universe bridge machine. Peter is still hoping to figure out a way to get back to the Blue Universe. Of course, the guys have to talk about Olivia. Lincoln makes it clear that he’s figured out Peter and Olivia are an item in the Blue Universe, and Peter makes it clear that Lincoln is free and clear to pursue Olivia in the Amber Universe (here’s hoping he has better luck than Red Universe Lincoln). Amber Olivia is not “Peter’s” Olivia, and he wants to get back home to her, not start something with another Olivia. He learned his lesson from the Alt-livia debacle for sure.

Back at the lab, Walter shows Lincoln and Olivia his new pet octopus. Apparently it uses the chameleon-like cells too. While they’re looking at the creature, Olivia has a bit of an epiphany and asks Walter if Eugene might be stealing pigment from his victims. Walter thinks that’s probably the case. We then quick cut to Eugene killing his next victim in a parking garage. This makes things a bit more urgent. At the lab, we see Walter running a mouse through a maze, and he talks about how Eugene is committing suicide. The scene, thanks to the mouse, maze, and dire predictions, kind of reminds me of my favorite episode of television, “Lost’s” “The Constant.” Both “Lost” and “Fringe” are produced by Bad Robot (J.J. Abrams’ production company), so the similarity is probably not consequential. Anyway, Walter reveals that there’s a second mouse in the maze that can be seen by UV light. This gives the team a way to find Eugene. They head to the parking garage, and Eugene is potentially still there.

The team (with lots of backup) searches the parking structure with dogs and UV lights. While searching, Olivia falls through the floor, and Eugene helps her get out of her predicament. Olivia offers to take Eugene to Walter to see if Walter can help him, but Eugene is not interested. He’s done with labs, even if it means he’s going to die. He gets away from Olivia, and the team can’t find him. The team, does, however, find Eugene’s lab in the basement. It becomes apparent that he really, really wanted to be seen. Mostly because he wanted to experience romantic love and human contact. When we next see Eugene, he gets in the elevator and talks to the girl from earlier in the episode. Her name is Julie. They introduce themselves to each other, and then Eugene dies.

At the end of the episode, Nina and Olivia have yet another chat. I’m not sure what I this newfound closeness between Amber Universe Olivia and Nina. It provides almost too convenient a platform for exposition. Olivia tells Nina that she’s worried the Cortexiphan has stunted her emotions, but Nina assures her she’s just fine. Lincoln and Peter are also having a little heart-to-heart. Peter got Lincoln a pair of glasses he thinks will make Lincoln more attractive to Olivia. Olivia and Lincoln make plans to meet at the diner at 3 AM again, and Olivia is getting ready for the “date” when all of a sudden, gas comes flooding into her apartment. Then a menacing-looking guy gives her some sort of injections as Nina watches. I guess Nina didn’t think Olivia was so okay after all.

Person of Interest 1.08: "Foe"

2011-12-29T20:53:00.002-05:00

“I was you, Kohl. Revenge won’t help.”
- Reese

This week finds us in a train station with an older man (played by LOST’s Alan Dale), looking around nervously. He spots a younger man who keeps glancing up from a photo and manages to get away. At HQ, Reese has arrived with coffee and tea for Finch and learns they have a new number. It belongs to Wallace Negel, a German national who came to the US in 1980. But Reese picks up on all the oddities in Negel’s background. He’s a spy. On the street, we see Negel pull a piece of the handle off of his suitcase and disappear out of view. Reese also noticed that there weren’t any electronic transactions in Negel’s name after 1987. It turns out around that time; he bought a cemetery plot which is still there. So while Reese goes to check that out, Finch pays a visit to a guy who sells German books (and other things like submarine schematics illegally). Reese finds the cemetery plot dug up. Negel stashed a kit there. So Negel The Spy is back.

Mr. Bookseller reveals he knows things about the East German intelligence community from back during the Cold War. Negel’s real name is Ulrich Kohl and he was party of a team that went around “neutralizing” East German defectors in Europe and the US. He fled in 1989 when East Germany collapsed with his wife, Anja, but she was killed in a car accident. Since then Kohl went underground. Kohl (in present day) shows up at an old man’s apartment, shows his wife’s picture and shoots the occupant.

We’re in for another Reese flashback this week. We find Reese in what looks like maybe Paris in 2006. He’s meeting a woman named Stanton and it turns out this is right after he saw his ex-girlfriend in the airport. He tries to introduce himself but Stanton says his alias didn’t pass muster so he’s no one and she’s going to decide what name he gets. Honestly, that’s a little disturbing to me. Plus she’s kind of pushy.

Finch is examining the coin Reese found in the cemetery and discovers it is East German currency but has been out of circulation for years. And Kohl just sold an entire collection of them to a rare coin dealer, used the phone and left. Finch sends Reese to the address and we find the old man, dead in a chair with lots of needle pricks in his neck. After a little digging, Reese figures out the old man was the case managers from Kohl’s 4-man team. Too bad the young guy from the train station shows up. Reese deals with him easily enough and makes a call to Lionel. He tells Lionel that there’s been a homicide and he thinks the killer will do it again and fires his gun so that the cops will get called.

Reese and Finch figure out that Kohl is going after the forger, Wernnick next. He finds Wernnick in a café and doses him with some kind of poison. Kohl explains he got captured in 1987 and put in a hole for years. He didn’t have the luxury of forgetting what happened to his wife. It seems her accident is what is motivating his vendetta. But Reese is sure it was a staged accident. He gets to the restaurant in time commandeer the ambulance with Wernnick in it. Reese keeps Wernnick alive long enough to learn the team sold Kohl out and were responsible for his wife’s accident (or so they think). There’s still one more member of the team left for Kohl to kill.

Over at Police HQ, Lionel and Carter are leaning on our German intelligence guy that Reese knocked out at the first crime scene. He gives us a nice little info dump about Kohl being a killer and how he’s not supposed to exist. But before they can get much further, a guy from the German Consulate shows up with orders from the State Department to extradite him back to Germany. So much for that lead.

So Kohl has found the fourth member of his team. Finch found him too, through a German heritage organization. In an attempt to keep Kohl from killing him, the fourth member reveals that Anja is actually alive. She was terrified of her husband and that’s why she ran. Unfortunately for member #4, he gets tossed off a ledge. It looks like Kohl is going to find Anja and add her to his list of betrayals that need to be taken care of. Reese and Finch are on the hunt for her too, to try and keep her safe. Lionel texts Reese the make and model of the diplomat’s car and in a rather impressive shot, he takes the hood off the car with a sniper rifle. The diplomat passes Reese Anja’s alias (Anna Klein) and they’re off to find her.

Kohl shows up at Anna’s place to find Reese waiting for him. Reese acts like his typical bad-ass self until Kohl grabs him by the throat and incapacitates him. Kohl thinks he can torture Anja’s location out of Reese. Yeah, that’s not happening dude. Reese slips back into the flashback from before and we see two guys who are CIA that likely got paid off by a terrorist to slip out of the country unnoticed. Stanton kills both of them. Meanwhile, Finch is trying to get Anja into police custody but she insists she has an important phone call to make first. And Carter’s just gotten the call about Reese shooting the diplomat’s car off the road. Finch calls up Lionel to tell him to do something since he hasn’t heard from Reese. Lionel really isn’t happy about them calling him at the station.

At Anja’s place, Kohl and Reese have a little heart to heart about the nature of killing. It is always a little creepy when Reese can identify with the bad guys. But I guess he did what he had to. And Ulrich is back to torturing Reese. In the car, Anja explains that she knew her husband was a spy but not that he was a killer, until the Americans grabbed her as she was escaping to the Soviet Union and showed her pictures. Unfortunately, Ulrich has now figured out he has a daughter and he’s going to find her. He is about to shoot Reese when Lionel shows up. Time for the big showdown.

He grabs his daughter at school and demands that Anja meet him in Central Park, alone. As he and Marie (his daughter) are waiting for Anja to show up, she tells him that her father had been a war hero and died getting her mother to freedom. The cops are in the park too thanks to an anonymous tip (from Lionel) and are searching for both Ulrich and Reese. Anja begs Ulrich to forgive her for what she did and as he raises his gun, Reese shoots him. Ulrich’s gun was empty. He was prepared and ready to die. The cops finally find him but Reese is gone.

We finish up our flashback with Stanton telling Reese to clean up the two dead bodies and get rid of the gun. She also tells him that what he’s doing is right and that his country needs him (the same thing the East German government told Kohl). Back in the present, we find Reese at Ulrich’s burial plot. He and Finch muse about whether people will know and care about who they are when they’re dead.

New Girl 2.06: "Thanksgiving"

2011-12-29T07:52:00.002-05:00

“And the turkey is named Hank. Hank Sgiving. And we are going to eat him.”
-Jess

I would say that “Thanksgiving” and “Wedding” pretty much tie for my favorite episode of “New Girl” thus far this season. The episode has its sweet moments, but it also has some macabre humor. The comic sensibility of the climax of the episode kind of reminds me of one of my favorite episodes of the classic British sitcom “Fawlty Towers” called “The Kipper and the Corpse.” People acting stupid around dead bodies in a clearly fictional context is always funny in my book. Maybe that’s why I like Bryan Fuller shows so much. I think he really shines as a writer when he goes to that macabre sense of humor he does so well. Liz Merriweather and crew manage to achieve much the same thing here as Bryan Fuller did in “Dead Like Me” and “Pushing Daisies.” Somehow, even with a dead body thrown in, I still definitely felt the holiday warm fuzzies from this episode. It takes real talent to cover the macabre with a sweet candy coating like this episode does.

We begin the episode at the school where Jess teaches. It’s Thanksgiving Pageant day, and Jess is helping her friend and coworker Paul (played by Justin Long) with the big production. It quickly becomes apparent that Paul is in every way as quirky and musical as Jess. He mentions that he usually spends Thanksgiving with his grandmother, but she recently passed away. Jess ends up inviting Paul to Thanksgiving dinner at her apartment, much to the chagrin of the guys. The guys had just been planning to spend thanksgiving watching football and drinking beer, then heading out to the Black Friday sales. Schmidt, of course, calls it “Dudesgiving.” When Jess comes home with a turkey and announces that they’re having a real Thanksgiving and she’s invited Paul, there’s more than a little chaos among the roommates. The tide starts to turn in Jess’ favor when Schmidt, who is apparently quite the chef, gets tempted into cooking the meal. He says he’ll cook the turkey and all the sides if Jess promises to pretty much just stay out of the kitchen.

The next day, which happens to be Thanksgiving, there’s just one tiny problem. The turkey (named Hank Sgiving) is still frozen. And good old Hank doesn’t quite fit in the oven either. Schmidt makes a comment about that aspect of the problem that results in his having to pay the Douchebag Jar. I was so glad to finally see a return of the Jar! Schmidt is much easier to take when his friends constantly call him on his douchiness. Jess has decided to defrost Hank by laying on him (body heat, you know) when Cece arrives. She thinks Jess is being stupid, but the new solution to the turkey problem isn’t much better. Next we see Hank, he’s tumbling around in the dryer. Paul arrives early, while Jess is still all disheveled, but it doesn’t really matter. They sing a quirky Thanksgiving song together, and Nick is shocked as he exclaims that there’s “two of them.”

Like all proper holidays, the awkwardness starts quite soon after things get rolling. First, Jess takes Nick aside and asks him to be nice to Paul. She wants him to keep the Grumpy Old Man act and the “turtle face” to a minimum. Meanwhile, Winston decides to play a word association game with Paul using words like “boundaries.” He basically wants to know if Paul would be okay as a de facto fifth roommate. The two guys end up bonding a bit over their grandparents. Winston’s got a bunch of really funny pictures of his late grandfather on his cell phone. The shenanigans briefly pause for yet another “Jess is actually kinda hot” moment when she steps out in the living room finally dressed in her Thanksgiving outfit.

One of the more fun plots in this episode is the flirting that’s going on between Schmidt and Cece. Cece decides to help Schmidt in the kitchen, and he gets really upset when she touches the bowl of walnuts before washing her hands. According to Schmidt, this compromises the entire bowl of walnuts, and Nick and Paul get sent to buy more. Predictably, that car ride is plenty awkward. Nick’s doing his best to be nice to Paul, but it’s kind of difficult when Paul decides to pass the time by pointing out the chain store where he gets copies made. Back at the apartment, Cece continues her torture of Schmidt by putting mashed potatoes on his nose. Of course, Schmidt completely freaks out about that, too. Just as Paul and Nick return from their walnut adventure (and Paul tells Jess he doesn’t think Nick likes him), there’s a huge explosion from the laundry room. The turkey is in jeopardy! Schmidt rips off his shirt and rushes into the laundry room to rescue the turkey. When he emerges from the smoke with the turkey, he gets Douchebag Jar’d again. Which was awesome.

The guys want to give up on Thanksgiving dinner, but Paul really wants to eat the food Schmidt has been slaving over, and he rallies Schmidt to keep cooking. Jess says they can use the apartment next door to continue the party, because the tenant, Mrs. Beverly, is out of town and gave Jess a spare key. Everyone starts to pile into Mrs. Beverly’s apartment, but Jess pulls Nick aside in the hallway to yell at him about Paul. Everyone inside the apartment hears the argument, which involves Jess saying how much she’d like to have sex with Paul. Can we say it again? Awkward! Winston pokes his head out into the hallway to let Jess know that everyone can hear her, and she tries to play it off like she and Nick were rehearsing a play called “Big Time” (which is how Jess described how much she wants to have sex with Paul). Of course nobody actually believes that, but they kind of pretend for Jess’ sake.

The gang quickly settles in at Mrs. Beverly’s apartment, and the Thanksgiving preparations continue. Cece tells Jess that she’s kind of into Schmidt now that he’s actually showing some backbone (yelling at her about being messy and such), and she most definitely keeps up the torture. This time, she sticks her hand in a bowl of putting, which Schmidt finds disgusting. Meanwhile, Paul asks Jess if anything ever happened between her and Nick, and Jess denies it. Paul says that’s a good thing because he definitely wants to see her again. Over on the couch, Winston explains to Nick why he likes Paul. Unlike Nick, Paul actually bothered to ask about Winston’s grandpa’s name.

It’s finally time for dinner, and after a request for a song to open the festivities, Paul and Jess decide to perform the duet from their Thanksgiving pageant. Paul decides to make a big entrance, so he goes into the other room while Jess begins to recite the introduction. Instead of Paul chiming in with the song, though, he screams. Apparently Mrs. Beverly never made it out of town for Thanksgiving. The rest of the group runs to see the body, and they’re pretty horrified too, although not quite as freaked out as Paul. Then the episode goes a bit “The Kipper and the Corpse.” Paul decides to go home because of the trauma, but he winds up stick in the apartment building elevator with the coroners and Mrs. Beverlys body.

We next see the gang, minus Paul, waiting in the Black Friday line outside of Best Buy. They’re sniping at each other a little bit, but all of a sudden, they hear violin music. It’s Paul, who has apparently recovered somewhat from his trauma. And he comes bearing turkey hoagies (I’m Philadelphian…I refuse to call a hoagie a sub), which certainly endears him to the guys. The rest of the mob in line starts to get a little unruly about Paul cutting in line, so Nick offers to go to the back of the line to calm them. Jess is touched by the gesture, and the rest of the group decides to join Nick at the back of the line, too. Jess and Paul dance off into the sunset as Paul plays his violin. And the sweetness is cut by a perfectly grumpy Nick yelling “Where the hell are they going?”

Body of Proof 2.08: "Love Bites"

2011-12-26T18:31:00.000-05:00

“Oh don’t you worry. Lacey is never going to feel the way about me that I feel about you.”
- Megan

This week we find ourselves with a young man who appears to be drowning. He reaches out to a woman only to realize she’s dead. Meanwhile, Megan is at home trying to pick a color to paint the room Lacey will be staying in. Megan’s mom stops by and seems a little skeptical of Megan insisting on spending more time with Lacey. Lucky for Megan, she’s saved by the crime scene. She runs into Dani (the new morgue driver) and introduces her to Peter. Peter seems kind of sweet on her, or at least a little defensive of her name to Bud. Th victim doesn’t appear to have any obvious causes of death, though she does have a broken arm, complete with bone stick through the skin. Peter collects some river water samples to check to see where she went into the water and if she drowned. Back at the lab, Kate arrives, even though it is her day off. By the look of things, she and Todd aren’t doing so well (though he’s not going to California anymore). She and Megan have words but Bud and Sam insist on getting on with the case. Their victim’s name is Amy Green and she was a pharmaceutical representative (her prints were in the FBI database).

Ethan is trying to get a blood sample from Amy’s ephemeral arteries but there is no blood in her body. He has a cute little conversation with Dani about maybe Amy being a vampire. But Peter shows up with diatom analysis of the river water. Ethan pulled some diatoms from Amy’s bone marrow. They don’t match. He calculates that she drowned in the Gulf of Maine. That night, Sam and Bud are checking the address the drug company had on file for Amy. There’s a huge party going on and Bud and Sam quickly learn that a bunch of reps were sharing the apartment. Two of the women explain that Amy flew out to Denver two days ago for a conference. When Sam mentions she was in Maine, the two other reps mention she had been seeing a guy but they thought she broke it off.

Back at the lab, Megan discovers that Amy didn’t drown. All the other signs aren’t there. And Curtis has the answer to how the diatoms got in her bone marrow. She ate a rare kind of oyster. And he knows a guy who flies them in fresh. Turns out this guy is at the airport. Bud and Sam get the security footage from two days earlier and see Amy’s assistant, Beth, (one of the women they talked to already) pulling her away from the bar. Meanwhile, Megan and Kate are talking to Amy’s mom. She says her daughter was a nice person and that she hadn’t wanted Amy to take the rep job.

The next morning, Megan has Lacey over before school to show her what she’s doing with the bedroom. Lacey said it was fine the way it was and there’s a little tension as to whether Lacey wants to spend more time at Megan’s place. Over at the precinct, Beth explains that she took Amy to a big wig cardiologist to try and get his account for the company. Beth kept quiet about it since it was a very competitive account. Over at the lab, Kate shows up to share the x-ray information. There were a bunch of hairline fractures to various parts of Amy’s body before she died, but the broken arm was done postmortem. Still not explanation for the blood loss. Based on Megan’s examination of some of the organ tissue, it is possible Amy had a reaction to a drug. So Bud, Sam and Peter head over to the cardiologist to have a chat and run in to the other woman they talked to at the apartment. The doctor said he went with Molly’s company instead of Amy’s because Molly’s was bigger. Peter sweet talks to receptionist in to telling him that the reps often left food. The doctor confirms that Amy brought oysters every time they met.

We’re back to the oyster guy. He was Amy’s boyfriend but they broke up a month ago. He denies he had anything to do with her death. Megan says she might have been given a drug and asks if she had any she had to be careful with. Bud escorts her out of interrogation, mainly because she was giving the suspect information. He also was annoyed she was on her phone. But it was about Lacey so as we know, Megan kind of gets tunnel vision. She gets back to the lab and Ethan tries to give her an update on the case but she blows him of. Her mom and Lacey are waiting in her office. And Kate gets dragged in. The little family meeting doesn’t go far as Kate ushers Ethan off for the update and Megan sort of blows her mom off. But they have a breakthrough in the case. Still not cause of death but possibly a location. The trace found under Amy’s fingernails is likely from old wallpaper. The gang finds an old house thanks to the forensics team and it appears they have found here Amy died. And with some serious luminal spraying, they find where all of Amy’s blood went.

At this point Bud is kind of freaking out with how much blood there was. Megan explains that they didn’t is anything in autopsy and it is possible she bled out from every pore in her body. A horribly painful way to go. She tasks Peter with rushing blood samples to the lab and leaves him to photograph the room. Kate tells Curtis to put a rush on the drug samples Amy left at the cardiologist’s office for anticoagulants. Meanwhile, she’s dodging all of Todd’s calls. While photographing the room where Amy died, Peter finds the impression of the flowers that get sent to the cardiologist’s office every day. And the gang goes to confront him about the fact he had a party at the old house the night Amy died. Megan accuses him of having access to drugs that would cause Amy to bleed out. He admits he was there but that he went to make a call to his wife (he and Amy were having a fling) and when he got back she was already dead. He took her to the river and cleaned up the scene. Megan calls Peter to tell him to check for all the anticoagulants that the cardiologist used and he delivers the news that interior designer her mother insist she hired has been fired. So Megan goes to her mom’s chambers and rips her a new one. They really have a bad relationship.

Peter can’t get a list of the anticoagulants from the cardiologist’s office but Ethan say none of the drugs currently approved by the FDA would cause Amy’s systems. So we get a funny scene with Peter using his actual Aussie accent and it pays off. The rival drug company was about to roll out a new anticoagulant. Bud, Sam and Megan track the rep down but she doesn’t have any of the drugs on her and she says she didn’t kill Amy. And she denies knowing anything about Amy’s affair with the doctor. At this point, I’m not even sure who the killer is. While all that is going on, Kate finally takes Todd’s call and breaks up with him. Good move if you ask me. I find Todd annoying and it was tiresome with the Megan/Kate drama.

Back at the lab, Megan and Peter run into the drug rep. She’s decided to be helpful and gives them the specs on the new drug. She also says that Amy was in love with the cardiologist. Unfortunately, the drug reactions listed on the spec sheet don’t match Amy’s symptoms. So Megan suggests they bring the doctor in again and he says she found Amy on the ground in the fetal position, holding herself. Megan angrily tells Bud to get the doctor out of autopsy and she finds fang marks in the vein in her left arm. Megan find out it was a snake bite. She ends Ethan and Curtis to find the snake at the house and we get some great physical comedy from the pair of them when they spot the snake. It’s only a baby, but apparently that is when this type of snake is most deadly. And we’re back to the bartender/oyster guy. He admits to putting the snake in Amy’s bag as a joke because he was jealous she was seeing the cardiologist.

Later, Amy’s mom comes to take Amy home and shares some choice words of wisdom with Megan. You can’t hold on to your kid too tight or else they just start slipping away. And Kate shares the news about her break up with Todd. So things are looking good on the Megan front, especially when she shows Lacey the bedroom is empty and blank, ready for Lacey to do with it what she wants.

Ringer 1.09: "Shut Up and Eat Your Bologna"

2011-12-26T18:28:00.001-05:00

“Oh My God! I’m falling in love with Andrew.”
- Bridget

We begin this week with a bit of a new scenario. It’s obvious Bridget is starting to really like playing wife. She and Andrew are having a little make out session in the closet and he tells her that they should take a vacation after everything they’ve been through and promises to book something that morning. And he’s gotten “Siobhan’s” wedding dress back from the cleaners. In a funny line, Andrew tells her if she wants to take out a little revenge on Juliet, he’ll turn a blind eye. But she stops him when he tries to put it away. The gun is still hiding on the top shelf. And as she picks it up (once Andrew’s out of the room), we get a flashback to before she went to New York.

It’s dark in Bridget’s hotel room and she cold cocks Jimmy, the Fed who is staying with her for the night. She thought he was an intruder. Things go sideways fast when he tells her that she’s not safe and that half the FBI is on the Botoway’s payroll. He tells her to run to Siobhan and tries to force his gun on her for “protection”. We jump back to the present with Bridget calling Charlie for help in disposing of the gun. He offers to take care of it for her as he makes a bologna sandwich. It’s unclear at first where he is. He tells Bridget he’s at the public library looking at Gemma’s phone records but he’s really in a house with Gemma tied up in the basement. The bologna sandwich is for her. He is a really despicable human being.

We find Malcolm at NA and he seems to be doing a lot better than the last time we saw him. He’s thankful for Charlie opening up his home and offering his help. Without it, Malcolm probably wouldn’t have been clean the past week. Bridget shows up and hands the gun off to Charlie, telling him that she just wants it out of the house. We get a quick flashback that shows up Jimmy hid the gun in Bridget’s bag. I really don’t trust that guy. Over at Martin-Charles, Andrew has asked Henry to sign a few forms. We also learn Henry’s father-in-law (the client that Olivia really wants the firm to sign) isn’t doing well health-wise.

After NA, Malcolm and Bridget are having coffee. Apparently coffee is Malcolm’s recovery substance. Better than heroin. He doesn’t think it was such a good idea to give away the gun, even though it would lead back to Bridget (and therefore, “Siobhan”). He also doesn’t like it that Bridget is starting to get used to being with Andrew, playing house. But Bridget is adamant about not leaving until she knows who was after Siobhan. So she goes on a hunt through her room and finds a prescription bottle with the name Dr. Anabel Morris as the prescribing doctor. So she makes an appointment.

The therapist seems nice enough but freaks Bridget out a little when she asks why she (Bridget) called herself Siobhan Martin. It turns out she always booked under the alias of Cora Ferrell. And that clicks with the Tyler meeting. She tells Dr. Morris that things are better with Andrew, she broke things off with Henry and Juliet doesn’t hate her anymore. Dr. Morris is impressed that she made such huge strides outside of treatment. She prompts “Siobhan” as to why after all that success, she’s back. As Bridget thinks it over, she realizes she’s falling in love with Andrew. I don’t know why it took her so long. The man’s gorgeous!

Back at Martin-Charles, Andrew is trying to book something for he and Siobhan to get a way when Olivia steps in and insists that if they don’t sign Gemma’s father, the company is going to collapse. And she’s disappointed with how soft Andrew’s become. Bridget is just getting started about how great things are with Andrew when Dr. Morris says their session is over. Bridget does a little fishing for information and learns that the anti-depressant meds she found weren’t for depression. Of course she has to steal the notes from Dr. Morris’ notebook to find out that Siobhan was paranoid. She also gets caught by Dr. Morris and their relationship sort of ends. Malcolm is starting to suspect bad things about Charlie. He looked around the apartment but didn’t find anything incriminating, except that Charlie only has 4 pairs of clothes. And the batteries in the TV remote haven’t been used.

Olivia is still trying to twist Andrew’s arm about using Henry to get his father-in-law as an investor. And Andrew’s still avoiding it. She questions where he’s going in such a hurry when “Siobhan” shows up for lunch. It is a really touching scene and I can see just how much Bridget cares for Andrew. He asks her, hypothetically, if they lost everything, would she stay with him? She says she would and the look on his face is so happy. She asks how he’d feel if she said she was going to spend the afternoon in church. He doesn’t believe it. She brushes it off as just a hypothetical. But she’s really going. That’s where Dr. Morris’ notes indicate Siobhan found her answers.

Charlie gets home to his apartment and Malcolm confronts him. But it’s not as obvious as it looks. He tells Charlie he wants to apologize for the morning when he complained about the mouth wash in the bathroom (it had alcohol in it). Charlie tells him not to worry about it and heads for a shower. Malcolm finds a PO Box key and finds mail for a John Delario. Meanwhile, Bridget heads to church. It’s kind of a secret bar and she finds Charlie (aka John) at the bar. She freaks out and gets sort of caught by a bouncer. She pays him off and finds out that Charlie is there a lot drinking and on his cell. Probably where he’s talking to the real Siobhan. Bridget ducks out and calls Malcolm, telling him to meet her at the apartment ASAP, just as the real Siobhan calls Charlie/John. Apparently he hired Jimmy to give the gun to Bridget. The conspiracy just keeps getting more twisted and complicated.

Andrew’s made his decision about Henry’s father-in-law. He’s not pursuing it. He actually doesn’t care if the company goes under, now that he knows Siobhan will stand by him. Olivia is rather disgusted and in a somewhat HG Wells-esque move, she rips up the statement Henry signed that morning. She’s going to do things her own way. Meanwhile, Malcolm and Bridget are trying to figure out the deal about John. Malcolm found a second address and is going to check it out. Olivia ends up at Henry’s place and tells him that he missed a page in signing it. She’s probably changed all the language. Henry goes to get them a drink and she checks his phone and finds a picture of him and Siobhan. She puts two and two together.

Bridget is keeping Charlie/John busy while Malcolm does a little breaking and entering. Bridget left a voicemail that was urgent just to get him to the coffee shop. She says she’ trying to figure out why Charlie’s been so helpful. He says he’s just a good guy. Unfortunately, things start to slip. She asks for the gun back and he freaks a little, telling her that he doesn’t have it and he gave it to a guy to get the serial number filed off. Malcolm finds a key ring and after some searching finds the locked door to the basement. Gemma hears his footsteps but being tied to a chair and blindfolded, can’t do much. She topples over as he tries as many keys as he can to fit the padlock on the door. But Bridget texts him that Charlie is taking off. Charlie makes a call to Siobhan telling her that Bridget suspects him.

HIMYM 7.10: "Tick, Tick, Tick"

2011-12-26T17:32:00.002-05:00

“I'm such a mess. Why do you even like me?”
“I guess ‘cause you're almost as messed up as I am.”
-Robin and Barney

“Tick, Tick, Tick” was a generally funny, but also quite bittersweet episode of HIMYM. The plot involving Ted and Barney was especially funny, but the same joke repeated so many times that it kind of got tiring. I liked that more attention was paid to Robin and Barney, but the way that played out was kind of devastating. I wasn’t quite in tears at the ending like a lot of online commenters were because it was kind of cliché, but I’m always kind of a sucker for Barney in pain. I guess I just like when the writers remember that he’s supposed to be a human being, not a cartoon. Poor Barney really went through the wringer in this one. I hope that when the whole series eventually plays out in a couple years his journey will have all been worth it and he and Robin will be an awesome, unconventional globetrotting committee couple who still find the time to return to New York once in a while to catch up with their friends. See! It is possible to write Barney and Robin together in an interesting way!

Anyway, the episode opens with Barney and Robin indeed together. Their make out session in the cab turned into stumbling into Barney’s apartment and having very ill-advised sex. It’s now the morning after, and they’re trying to deal with the fact that they each just cheated on their significant others. Robin seems a bit more freaked out about this than Barney is, harping on the fact that Kevin is such a “nice guy” and doesn’t deserve to be hurt. To make matters worse, the company where Robin and Nora work is hosting a booze cruise that evening, and Robin, Kevin, Nora, and Barney are all supposed to be there. It promises to be quite the awkward event given what just happened. Robin just wants to pretend that her an Barney’s night together never happened because she really wants to avoid hurting Kevin. While Barney doesn’t seem entirely happy about this idea, he goes with it.

Meanwhile, Ted has scored tickets to “Groovapalooza” for himself, Lily, and Marshall. This event is a concert featuring all the gang’s favorite smug 90s bands. Sounds like the type of thing Ted’s subversive college radio DC alter ego “Dr. X” would love. I do love pretentious college Ted. To complete the college throwback theme of the evening, Ted has also managed to score some “sandwiches.” Regular HIMYM viewers know that “sandwich” is a code word Ted uses when telling pot-related stories to his kids. Although they’re teenagers, so they probably see right through it. Anyway, Lily is up for the concert, but not the sandwiches. She thinks that she and Marshall shouldn’t have any, considering they’re going to be parents soon and all.

Barney and Robin meet up at the cruise before their dates arrive. The cruise is hosted by Robin’s boss, Sandy Rivers (played by Alison Hanigan’s real life husband, Alexis Denisof), mostly so he has a setting conducive to banging interns. Barney sort of implies that he’d like to run away with Robin rather than face this evening with Nora. Robin seems kind of surprised and asks Barney if he’s saying he wants to get back together. It’s sort of hard to tell what Robin thinks of the idea. Robin doesn’t get an answer because Nora and Kevin appear. Barney, who had been convinced he was going to act cool for the evening, kind of freaks out. He acts like a complete fool while they’re all eating dinner, accidentally slipping cheating-related words into the conversation. Luckily, Kevin just writes it off as Barney being nervous about meeting Nora’s parents the next day.

At Groovapalooza, Ted breaks out a “sandwich” and tells Marshall that he’s not getting the $60 he contributed towards his purchase back, whether he smokes it or not. Even though he’s sure Lily will be furious, Marshall takes a hit. When we next see the guys, they’re both pretty high, and Marshall is acting paranoid. First, he’s worried that the “sandwich” was laced with something stronger. Then he’s worried that Lily will know he’s high and be upset. When Lily joins them, she hears Marshall tell Ted that he’s high. Surprisingly, she isn’t all that angry. She just asks that if she has to spend the concert sober, the guys get her some nachos. So Ted and Marshall head out to the arena concourse, ready to go on their quest.

On the cruise, Barney and Robin are dancing with Nora and Kevin respectively. The band leader starts to sing this really hilarious song about how Barney and Robin are both scum and should tell the truth right away. After the song, they mutually decide that they are indeed going to tell the truth right then and there. Their resolve doesn’t last long, though, and neither ends up coming clean. Before Robin could tell Kevin, Kevin accidentally had a drink thrown in his face. The drink was thrown by a female intern, and it was actually meant for Sandy. After falling in surprise, though, Kevin hit his head and may have a concussion. Robin didn’t feel like that was the right time to tell him about her cheating. Barney tries to come up with an excuse, too, although his isn’t as good. Nora got a small wine stain on the sleeve of her blouse. Barney makes it clear he wants to be with Robin, though. He has a cute little speech about how maybe their cheating wasn’t a mistake but the story of how they got back together. He suggests that after the cruise docks, they each do what they have to do, then meet at MacLaren’s at midnight. Robin wants to know why Barney wants to be with her, and Barney says it’s because she’s almost as messed up as he is. Score points for honesty at least, right?

Ted and Marshall have quite the nacho-retrieval adventure. They accidentally wait in the ladies’ room line instead of the food line, then they appear to walk around the entire arena. And they still can’t find the nachos. Marshall worries that Lily won’t think he’s a fit parent if he can’t find nachos, and he imagines her making out with the creepy guy with nachos who made Lily crave the food in the first place. The same stoned concert antics continue throughout the episode. Ted and Marshall appear to do more laps around the stadium and wait in the ladies’ room line a few more times before all is said and done. That’s when the joke started to get a little old. Eventually, Ted gets nachos from a creepy guitar-playing guy, and Marshall sees the guitar-playing guy have a heart attack. Both guys realize they still need to lean on each other as friends, but they also realized that they’ve missed the entire concert.

Meanwhile, both Robin and Barney continue to find it more difficult to tell their significant others about the cheating than they thought it would be, even once they’re off the boat. At the emergency room (because of the possible concussion), Kevin tells Robin he loves her. When Barney and Nora arrive at Nora’s apartment, they find that Nora’s parents have arrived early. Nora’s dad goes on about what it’s like to find true love and be with your soulmate, and Barney (in a really sweet montage) can only think of Robin. He knows he needs to tell Nora the truth because Robin is actually his soulmate. I thought this bit was kind of sweet. When Nora’s parents go into the other room, Barney does indeed tell Nora the truth. She doesn’t fly off the handle right away, but she does ask if Barney can tell her that it meant nothing. He says he can’t, and Nora leaves the room.

Back at Groovapalooza, Lily finds Ted and Marshall sitting out in the hallway. It turns out they were only gone for about two minutes, and we see a funny CCTV version of their adventures. They kept walking from one side of the hallway to the other, the creepy guitar guy was actually a cardboard cutout, and Ted got nachos out of a trash can. They end up leaving the concert early, and they arrive at MacLaren’s to find Barney already there. Barney says he and Nora broke up, but he thinks the worst part is over. Robin then walks into MacLaren’s too, followed by Kevin. It’s quickly apparent that everything is not going to be okay. Barney gives Robin a questioning look, and she quietly nods “no.” It turns out that at the emergency room, Kevin had this whole long, elaborate answer when Robin asked why he liked her, so she’s staying with him. Barney is devastated and leaves the bar as quickly as possible. Ted turns out to not be as sober as he thought he was, so he decides to go up to bed to sleep it off. In the apartment, he sees Barney cleaning up rose petals and candles he had left in Robin’s room.

Fringe 4.06: "And Those We Left Behind"

2011-12-26T08:34:00.002-05:00

“I was important to you, wasn't I? I mean, the other version of me? Because I see the way you look at me when you think I'm not aware.”
-Olivia

While “And Those We Left Behind” wasn’t an especially stand-out episode of “Fringe,” I did appreciate that it seemed to signal where the rest of the season is going. It’s pretty clear that Peter needs to go back to his (adopted) universe. There isn’t going to be a place for him long-term in the amber universe. And I think that’s for the best. “Fringe” became what it was because of the relationships between the three main characters. In the early days of the series which were filled with questionable Monster of the Week stories, Walter and Peter’s relationship in particular gave the show depth and an aspect that was worth watching. Last season, I appreciated the many creative risks the writing team decided to take. Some of them were a home run, and others struck out, but I applauded the moxie all the same. Peter’s disappearance and reappearance in the wrong universe without any way to check back on the characters we got to know for three years is just one twist too far. The case of the week in this episode could have been emotionally affecting, but it was just overpowered by the wrongness of not having seen two-thirds of the main characters of the series all season.

The episode opens with an idyllic scene of Peter and Olivia having the “perfect day.” They’re outside in a grassy area, and the colors are all saturated. Because this is actually a happy scene, it’s obvious that it’s a dream. It turns out to be Peter’s dream, and we see him wake up in his FBI holding cell. Soon enough, the “real” (Amber universe) Olivia appears at the doorway. The Fringe team has a case that Olivia thinks might be related to Peter’s appearance in the Amber universe. It involves time distortions. We then get our introduction to the actual case of the week. A mom and daughter are having some bonding time in an apartment kitchen while the mom washes up dishes. All of a sudden, the building looks burned out and the daughter is suddenly one year old. The mom, clearly confused, rushes her daughter out of the building. As soon as they’re safely outside, the daughter looks five years old again.

On the way to the burned out building, Olivia and Peter talk a bit, but Olivia is going out of her way to be cold and professional. At the scene of the incident, Astrid runs a test with a very strange device and confirms that there has been no bleed-through from the Other Side at this location. So this isn’t related to Walternate and his minions. It turns out that there was a fire in this particular building four years ago, and the team thinks that the building may have temporarily flashed back to that time. Walter wants nothing to do with this investigation because Peter is involved (and he’s still refusing to talk to Peter), but Broyles orders him to help out anyway. A surly Walter is certainly not going to be a fun Walter to work with, that’s for sure.

A surly Walter is also not a very effective scientist. He does an extremely quick and cursory exam of Peter because he really doesn’t want to spend a second more with Peter than he has to. Peter, who thinks there may be something to the theory that his reappearance is connected to the case, is pretty incredulous that Walter didn’t do a more thorough job. Peter therefore decides to start working the case on his own, breaking out Walter’s clear markerboard to start running some equations. He thinks his appearance may have caused time displacements to start happening, and he also thinks the problem is going to get much worse very quickly. As if on cue, a group of hipster teens almost run into a train that magically appears across a road on their way to a concert.

Olivia and Peter bond a bit while investigating the burned out building, but Walter is still being incredibly stubborn about not wanting to help with the case. Lincoln interrupts all this with the news of the train incident. I was kind of enjoying Lincoln in the early episodes this season when Peter was missing, but now that Peter is back, I see how superfluous Lincoln is and how his chemistry with Olivia doesn’t hold a candle to Peter’s. Anyway, things start to go wonky time-wise when the team starts to investigate the train. Peter is gathering stuff at the lab to help with the investigation, when all of a sudden, he skips ahead in time and is at the train site. His investigation of the scene is all out of order because he keeps slipping around in time, and it’s really starting to worry him. Peter does manage to detect a type of radiation that can only be man-made, though, which means that there must be an actual person behind what is going on.

We soon get an idea of just who this person behind the time distortion might be. A woman, Kate, is sitting in her living room furiously scribbling equations while her husband, Raymond looks on. Raymond seems to bending over backwards to help Kate with her work. He also has a watch that is counting down, and when the countdown ends, there is a time jump. All of a sudden, Kate is sitting in a different chair by the window. She seems sick, and she doesn’t recognize Raymond anymore. At Walter’s lab, the team is looking at a map of where the last two time events took place. Lincoln gets a call about two more events and adds them to the map. This leads Walter to finally jump in with a theory. He thinks the time events are patterned in a Fibbonanci’s Golden Spiral, and the center of the spiral is Brookline. Raymond and Kate’s house just happens to be in Brookline. Just to make them seem even more suspicious, we see that Raymond has some complicated machinery set up in his basement. The machine seems to allow Raymond to turn back time to a specific day so Kate can keep working on her equations before getting sick.

Raymond notices the abundance of police and FBI vehicles that have turned up in his neighborhood, and he knows it’s time for some drastic action. He finally shows Kate the basement and tells her the truth about the machine and her future condition. She has early onset Alzheimers. He needs her help in finishing the equations and making the machine more stable. As it is, it can only turn back time in short bursts, and Raymond essentially wants to live in Kate’s last healthy days forever. Outside the house a police officer accidentally walks through the time bubble surrounding Raymond and Kate’s house, and the Fringe team notices a snapping sound when this happens. All of a sudden, the police officer screams and disintegrates. Walter says this happened because you can’t just walk through a time bubble. Before he can finish his explanation, Peter jumps in to say they need a Faraday Cage. Walter begrudgingly agrees to build one.

When Walter’s “Walter Bishop Faraday Harness” arrives at the scene, both Peter and Olivia volunteer to be the one to wear it into Kate and Raymond’s house. Peter wins that argument, because he has a better chance of knowing how to shut down Raymond’s machine. Just as Kate is telling Raymond that she solved the equations to fix the time machine (but she conveniently hasn’t written down the solution yet), Kate and Raymond hear Peter enter the house. Peter decides to venture down into the basement, and once he does, Raymond knocks him out. Things are looking pretty dire for the Fringe team. Lincoln is on site at a tunnel that is predicted to be the next time distortion site. The tunnel is less than four years old, so if time is turned back, the tunnel will collapse, killing all passengers left inside. Way to add a ticking countdown clock, guys. Lincoln is trying to clear people out of the tunnel before it disappears, but it appears to be too late. A distortion has already started.

Peter regains consciousness in Kate and Raymond’s basement, and he explains what’s going on with the other distortion sites. Kate explains that the machine can be shut down, but it has to be done in a specific way to avoid mass destruction. She’ll only agree to do it if Raymond won’t be prosecuted. While Peter is outside trying to negotiate immunity for Raymond, Kate appears to finish writing down her equation. Raymond says he’s going to use it to rebuild the machine elsewhere and bring Kate back for good. When Peter gets back with assurances that Raymond won’t be prosecuted, Raymond turns off the machine. The water pouring into the tunnel where Lincoln is suddenly stops. As the FBI is taking the time machine equipment from the house, Raymond opens Kate’s notebook and sees that she crossed out all of the equations in it. She also wrote a note telling Raymond to go on with his life. He won’t be building that second machine after all.

Back at the FBI, Broyles congratulates Peter for a job well done. As a reward, Peter isn’t going to have to live in a holding cell anymore. Broyles discovers Walter has access to Harvard campus housing, and Broyles gives Peter that house. As Olivia shows Peter his new abode, we see that it’s the same house Peter and Walter lived in back in the Original Recipe blue universe. Olivia seems to have newfound respect for Peter following this mission. She tells him that she knows “his” Olivia must have been very special to him, because she’s noticed how he looks at her when he thinks she’s not paying attention. She says she hopes Peter finds “his” Olivia again. Even better, she’s going to try to convince Walter to finally help set things right. Maybe we’ll actually get back to the blue universe before this show is cancelled after all!

Holiday "Classic" Recap: Community: "Abed's Uncontrollable Christmas"

2011-12-25T10:23:00.002-05:00

“The meaning of Christmas is that we give it meaning. To me, it used to mean being with my mom. Now, I guess it means being with you guys. Thanks, ‘Lost.’”
-Abed

It’s been a while since I covered the clever sitcom that is “Community” here at MTVP, so for Christmas, I thought I’d to a write-up of last season’s holiday episode, “Abed’s Uncontrollable Christmas.” The episode is memorable because the whole thing is stop-motion animated, in the tradition of classic Christmas specials like “Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer.” What makes this even more clever is that there’s actually an explanation within the episode’s plot for why everything looks this way. Of course, since it’s “Community,” the reason behind the strangeness is Abed. The stop-motion-ness of everything is actually inside his head. And for Abed, who will commit to a fantasy like nobody’s business, this makes perfect sense. Besides having a clever plot, the episode has plenty of the warm fuzzies that should come with any good holiday episode of television. The warm fuzzies are also well-distributed amongst lots of the pop-culture realted allusions and jokes for which “Community” is known.

The episode is stop-motion animated fright from the beginning. The study group is sitting in the cafeteria eating lunch and discussing winter break plans when Abed suddenly mentions that he’s been seeing everything in stop-motion since that morning. The group is a little worried because, even for Abed, this is strange. Even Abed himself admits to being a little worried. Abed decides to sing a song to stick with the stop-motion theme. This seemed like a good idea, and singing a Christmas version of the “Community” theme song while jumping across cars was cool, but in “real” life, Abed gets tasered by campus police and winds up in Professor Duncan’s office for a therapy session. Duncan mentions wanting to get at the real meaning behind Abed’s delusion, and for some reason, this makes Abed think that if he can somehow find the real meaning of Christmas, everything will go back to “normal.”

We next see Abed making a snowman, which actually turns out to be Chang (how creepy and gross is that!). Britta tells Abed he’s needed in the study room. The gathering in the study room turns out to be a group therapy session, led by Professor Duncan. I’m wondering why Duncan hasn’t really been on the show that much this past season. I’m a big fan of John Oliver, so his absence makes me sad. Duncan wants to do hypnosis on Abed (mostly because he thinks he could publish a journal article about it), so he says he’s the “Christmas Wizard,” and he’s going to take Abed and the rest of the study group to Winter Wonderland to find the true meaning of Christmas. The group goes with it, I guess because they don’t want to see Abed get expelled from school (and Pierce wants the cookies that are in the study room). When they “arrive” on Planet Abed (aka the most Christmassy planet), everyone but Abed transforms into Christmas toy versions of themselves. For instance, Britta is a robot, and Annie is a wind-up ballerina. Duncan wants to go to the “Cave of Frozen Memories,” and Abed agrees as long as it’s just a stop on the way to the North Pole.

As they walk, things start getting very “Charlie and the Chocolate Factory.” Abed warns the group that the journey will test their commitment to Christmas. Shirley gets too sanctimonious about being the only one to know the “true” meaning of Christmas (because she’s the only devout Christian in the group) and says they’re actually in a therapy session, so Abed ejects her from Winter Wonderland. He also sings her out, Oompa-Loompa style. Next on their journey, the gang encounters a swarm of “humbugs.” Jeff is eaten by them for being too sarcastic (they’re attracted by sarcasm), and Annie takes care of his Oompa-Loompa sing-out.

The remaining members of the group arrive at the Cave of Frozen Memories, and Duncan attempts to demonstrate how to access a frozen memory. It’s a memory of his tenth Christmas, his last in England before he had to move to the United States. He gets a little too emotional and leaves out of embarrassment. Abed sets the Cave to self-destruct, and he says that to actually find the meaning of Christmas, the gang needs to catch a train to the North Pole. He lets everyone left join him except for Britta. He ejects her from Winter Wonderland for tricking him into therapy. Abed thinks Britta should have more faith in herself and her friends. Normally, I’d think he has a good point, but I think Britta had the more defensible position here. She didn’t want Abed to get expelled, and he’s freaking seeing everything in stop-motion!

On the train to the North Pole, Pierce decides to leave because the cookies are gone. Annie starts talking about how before her parents divorced, the holiday season was a “minefield of rituals” because her mom is Jewish and her dad is Episcopalian. Abed mentions that his family was similar before his parents divorced, because his dad is Muslim and his mom is Polish. He and his mom have a tradition of watching “Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer” together every December 9. Annie points out that today is December 9, but Abed says that since his mom isn’t there, it can’t be. It must be December 8. Duncan reappears, informing the group that he’s been to Abed’s doom room and has figured out what happened. Abed is pissed about this and calls Duncan a “Christmas Warlock.” Then Abed climbs out the train window and on to the roof of the train (I can only imagine what this must have looked like to the rest of the study group). Abed starts jumping along the train to the first car. Annie unhitches the first car from the rest of the train while Troy holds Duncan back. Abed isn’t going to be alone for the rest of his journey, though. Pierce returns because it was too depressing to go home.

Pierce and Abed arrive at Santa’s Workshop, and it looks abandoned. Then Pierce points out a sparkly box with a tag that says “Meaning of Christmas.” Abed excitedly opens the box, but it just turns out to be “Lost” season 1 on DVD. Abed says this is a “metaphor for lack of payoff,” which cracked me up, even though I didn’t think the “Lost” series finale was all that bad. Professor Duncan reappears, and he reads from a Christmas card Abed received from his mom that morning. The card says that she has a new family now and won’t be seeing Abed for Christmas this year. Suddenly, Abed is frozen. The rest of the gang then reappears, and they shoot Duncan with Christmas weapons (like Nerf guns and such, I presume), while singing about the meaning of Christmas. As they sing, Abed starts to thaw. After Duncan is vanquished, Abed says that he realizes now that Christmas can mean whatever you want. He used to think it meant being with his mom, but now it means being with his friends. Abed is better now, but the group decides to keep the stop-motion thing going through Christmas just for fun. They all cozy up together and watch “Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer.” Happy holidays everyone!

Ringer 1.08: "Maybe We Could Get a Dog Instead?"

2011-12-23T16:50:00.004-05:00

“And just so you know, I want this marriage to work. Baby or no baby.”
-"Siobhan"

We begin this week back where we ended last week. Bridget is in the hospital after seeing Malcolm at Gemma’s opening and fainting. The doctor is going to do an ultrasound to check on the baby. And since Bridget isn’t actually pregnant, the doctor doesn’t find an embryo. So she’s lost the pregnancy. The doctor says it was likely an ectopic pregnancy, which is rarely viable anyway. Andrew is devastated. Even Juliet is nice and sympathetic to “Siobhan”. As soon as Andrew and Juliet leave Bridget to get some rest, she gets a voicemail from Malcolm telling her where he is staying and that he needs to see her. So she sneaks out of the house and shows up on his doormat.

Bridget’s pretty happy to see Malcolm, though he’s clearly a little out of it. He tells her that Botaway grabbed him and tried to get her location out of him, but he never gave her up. He leaves out the part about being hooked on drugs again. He tells her that he led them to think she was in Seattle before he managed to come to New York. He refuses Bridget’s offer to move to a nicer hotel, but he accepts the wad of cash she gives him. In return, he hands over her six-month chip. She gets home and we see a flashback of her first NA meeting. She’s not very talkative.

Bridget tells Andrew she has a follow-up doctor’s appointment but that she wants to go alone. He’s not too happy because he took the day off to be with her, but doesn’t fight it. At school, Juliet still has problems with Tessa, and she begs Mr. Carpenter to do something about it. He says he will handle it. She dumps her problems on him, expecting to have a willing listener, but he is clearly not interested. And I really hope they don’t go down the teacher/student romance road. It’s just creepy.

Since “Siobhan” gave him the brush of, Andrew has gone in to work, and he is a little fired up and pissed off. He fired the head of European operations because a bunch of files went missing. He doesn’t know it, but he has his wife to thank for that. Olivia isn’t entirely hip to the idea, but she does pick up on his sour mood. He tells her about the miscarriage and how “Siobhan” doesn’t want him around. Even though he had been set on not having children, he’d been warming up to the idea. The poor guy is just so heartbroken. We get a quick scene of Malcolm coming back to his hotel room and shooting up and Henry catching Juliet when he calls the apartment. She tells him about the baby.

Meanwhile, Bridget is in fact meeting Charlie for some support and an update on the search for Gemma. She zones out again, remembering the end of her first meeting where Malcolm offers to be her sponsor. Charlie snaps her out of it, and she admits that Malcolm is back in town and it is throwing her off a bit. She assures Charlie that she still wants him to be her sponsor and rushes off. Charlie makes a call to Siobhan in Paris, telling her about Malcolm’s sudden presence. She tells him to take care of Malcolm, she doesn’t care how. She hangs up on her end and we see she is still shacking up with Tyler. He’s flying off to Rome for business and asks her go with him, but she declines. That evening, as he is on his way to the airport, Andrew calls and asks him to change his flight to New York. He wants to make Tyler the the new head of European operations.

Back in New York, Henry shows up at the apartment and runs into “Siobhan”. He’s not happy that he heard about the miscarriage secondhand. He had hoped that when “Siobhan” had the baby, she would realize she wanted to be with him but now that isn’t going to happen. I really don’t get what Siobhan saw in Henry. He’s annoying and needy and not nearly as pretty as Andrew. Across town, Malcolm is watching infomercials when the cops show up and haul him in to the station for a chat with Victor. Nothing really earth shattering is revealed, but Victor wants to let Malcolm go so he can lead them to Bridget.

“Siobhan” and Juliet are having a little bonding time while watching TV, and Juliet says she was starting to like the idea of having a little sibling. “Siobhan” says she doesn’t’ think they’ll try again and she just wants things to go back to how they were. Juliet suggests they get a dog (I guess they needed something for the episode title). “Siobhan” doesn’t know that Andrew is listening in on the conversation. He is just getting emotionally trounced on in this episode. The next morning, he is pretty frigid with her. He shouts at her that he overheard her conversation with Juliet and he doesn’t know where they stand. He leaves in a huff just as she gets a call from Malcolm. She’s going to meet him at a coffee shop, but on her way out of the building she gets ambushed by Victor. He tells her he wants her to wear a wire when she sees Malcolm and threatens a little blackmail about her and Henry if she doesn’t help.

So she goes in wired, and Malcolm is more than a little confused when she acts like they’ve never met before. She takes off for a minute after dumping coffee on her blouse but returns, a waiter hot on her heels. He offers a menu to Malcolm with a note inside telling him that Bridget is wearing a wire. Their conversation turns up nothing useful for Victor, and “Siobhan” storms into the van, furious that he didn’t tell her Malcolm was a drug addict. Guess she figured out he was using. She catches up with him on the street and they have a big argument about how Malcolm wants to beat using again. But, he doesn’t want Bridget’s help.

Juliet is furious with Mr. Carpenter for how he handled the Tessa situation. He transferred Juliet out of his class. He says he does like her, but not the way she wants and his decision is for the best. That night things appear to be going well at Andrew’s business dinner with Tyler and Olivia. Until “Siobhan” shows up. Tyler is obviously thrown for a loop to see the woman he thinks is Cora sitting down and referring to Andrew as her husband. And she spends the entire dinner acting like she doesn’t know him (because she doesn’t!). We also get a brief moment of Malcolm stealing some money from an outdoor restaurant. He really needs help.

Andrew and “Siobhan” have a sweet bonding moment on the drive back from the dinner. She wants to stop playing games and not go back to the old Andrew and “Siobhan”. And she wants their marriage to work. I think Andrew needed that. He’s been so down the rest of the episode. When they get back to the apartment, Malcolm is waiting for them. He admits he needs help and “Siobhan” immediately agrees to let him stay in the apartment overnight. She takes him to see Charlie the next day.

Tyler is understandably pissed, and he calls Siobhan to rant at her or not telling him she was Andrew’s wife. She tries to deny it but obviously she can’t. He’s not interested in excuses or apologies. He doesn’t want to see her again and she needs to get out of the hotel because Martin-Charles isn’t covering the tab anymore. It looks like her little plan is starting to unravel.

New Girl 1.05: "Cece Crashes"

2011-12-22T23:39:00.000-05:00

“You tell anyone we held hands, I have 2 people in my phone who will kill you.”
-Cece

While I don’t think I’ll ever consider “Cece Crashes” a classic episode of “New Girl” like “Wedding” was and the Thanksgiving episode I haven’t written up yet was, it was still mostly entertaining and enjoyable. I liked that we got some exploration of Jess and Nick’s relationship and significant character development for Schmidt and Cece. In this episode, I started to see that Cece might actually have a place on the show. Up until this point, she would just show up for an obligatory scene or two and be fairly inconsequential. In this episode, however, she’s important to the plot, and it’s a lot of fun to see her interact with the other characters on a more sustained basis. I think it’s important that the show finally started trying to work out how Cece’s interactions with the other characters will work on a regular basis. We saw some evidence of why she and Jess are friends despite their very different personalities (they’ve been friends since childhood and have a deep shared history). We also saw a foundation for a potential relationship with Schmidt that could be quite sweet. Additionally, it was made clear that despite her physical beauty, Cece isn’t perfect. She’s generally a good person at heart, but sometimes she takes advantage of her looks a bit too much to manipulate guys. But hey, at least she’s aware of it.

The episode opens with Jess walking into a club while still dressed in her pajamas. She’s rescuing Cece from her tool of a boyfriend who is a DJ and has face tattoos. Since she and the boyfriend are now pretty much broken up, Cece asks if she can stay with Jess and the guys for a few days. The boyfriend has been staying at her apartment, and she doesn’t especially want to see him. Jess isn’t sure if this is okay, because the guys might have big plans for the weekend. We then cut to the apartment, where Winston and Nick are just chilling on the couch, and Nick is playing an old school video game, complete with 8-bit music. Guess they don’t have such big plans after all. Schmidt wants them to have plans, though. He’s gotten a friend to invite them all to a party, but Winston and Nick don’t seem especially interested. They’re getting into a really silly fight over the ridiculous kimono Schmidt is wearing when Cece arrives. Of course, when the model walks into the room, the guys all have to act chill. Soon enough, Schmidt has given the apartment a club vibe, and he and Winston are dancing with Cece. He’s then all excited when he successfully directs Cece to sleep in his bed. Which is kind of creepy.

When Cece wakes up, Schmidt is all oiled up (more creepiness) and strapped into this ab crunch thing that is attached to the doorway. Later, the guys are all in the bathroom waiting to watch Cece get out of the shower. They really aren’t making a good impression at all. Jess is a little pissed at Nick for being involved in this, even though he kind of just walked into it inadvertently. After they eat breakfast, Cece tells Jess that she thinks Nick is into her. For some reason, Cece is super set on getting Jess a new boyfriend. Jess tries to brush it off, but Cece mentions that guys point their feet towards something they want, and Nick’s feet tend to point towards Jess. Nick interrupts to ask if Jess needs anything from the drug store, and Cece pushes Jess to go along with him.

Jess and Nick’s trip to the drug store is super awkward. Nick is trying to be serious in telling Jess that she doesn’t always need to take care of people, but Jess is too busy trying to make Nick not attracted to her. Specifically, she tells him she doesn’t use toilet paper, which was just strange. She also tries to keep moving whenever she sees Nick’s feet pointing at her. Then he grabs her arm while trying to make a point, and that just makes her freak out more. The final straw happens when Jess and Nick are stuck in heavy traffic on the way home from the store. An enterprising vendor is selling roses by the street, and when Nick buys two for Jess, she freaks out so badly that she boltss out of the car and runs away, leaving Nick sitting in the car, kind of dumbfounded. I’ll admit I’ve used “the runaway” before (albeit not from a car), quite possibly circa 2009. I don’t recommend it.

Back at the apartment, Schmidt braves an encounter with the cat on the roof (I guess he’s afraid of cats or something) to try and flirt with Cece while she’s sunbathing. His plain is foiled by Winston, however, who calls Schmidt’s phone to throw Schmidt of his game. I did love the picture of Winston that showed up on Schmidt’s phone when Winston called, though. It was grumpy and hilarious. Cece has quite a lot of fun ordering the boys around. When they’re all back downstairs in the apartment, she orders Schmidt (who is now sunburnt, poor thing) back up to the roof, and she orders Winston to make her a sandwich. She’s completely lost control of herself.

Jess arrives back at the apartment, closely followed by Nick. Nick is really upset, because he was very worried about Jess and where she might have gone. Cece tries once again to get things going between Nick and Jess, but Jess physically grabs hold of Cece and stops her. Finally, Jess and Cece reach an understanding, and Cece realizes that she’s been obnoxious while staying with Jess. Then poor Schmidt screams from up on the roof. The cat is on one of the lounge chairs. Jess goes up and gets Schmidt off the roof, and she encourages him to stand up to Cece. Because he’s in pain, Schmidt really wants his bed back (he had been sleeping on the couch), and he and Cece both end up sleeping in his bed while holding hands. And of course Schmidt has to ruin the cuteness to call Winston to brag about “closing”…sort of. Jess and Nick sort of reach an understanding, too, while they brush their teeth. Jess apologizes for acting so strange, and Nick’s feet no longer point towards her. Guess this “will they, won’t they” is going to go on for a while longer.

HIMYM 7.09: "Disaster Averted"

2011-12-21T22:37:00.000-05:00

“I think I need to go home and reevaluate how I make life decisions.”
-Barney

“Disaster Averted” was a fun little episode of HIMYM that showed how the gang weathered Hurricane Irene. I personally spent that hurricane cooped up in my apartment watching the Pepco outage map on my computer and waiting for the power to go out (which, amazingly, it never did). This story was a bit more interesting, thankfully. It also marked a turn in Robin and Barney’s relationship, which I approved of. I’m a sucker for anything Robin and Barney, really, as long as Barney is acting like a human being and not a cartoon. Barney act in a rather idiotic and mean-spirited way at one point during the episode, but he apologized by the end, so it’s all good in my opinion. I liked that, in the tradition of New York-based sitcoms like “Seinfeld,” this particular episode put the gang in a fairly run of the mill situation (waiting out a bad storm) and took advantage of the little stories that arose from character interactions.

The episode opens with a fantastical, almost Indiana Jones-like scene of Barney being heroic in the streets of New York. Barney ends up using his Ducky Tie to rescue a kid who is hanging off the side of a building. It turns out, of course, that this story is meant to be an elaborate lie Barney told to explain why he isn’t wearing the Ducky Tie despite his bet with Lily and Marshall. The lie is quickly proven false, however, as Lily found the tie in the trash outside MacLaren’s. Kevin has joined the group for the evening, and he asks why there’s a “No Boogie Boarding” sign in front of MacLaren’s. This serves as the framing device for the episode, which, as I mentioned, takes us back to August for Hurricane Irene.

Ted, of course, was in Boy Scount mode, and he was super-prepared for the storm. He had an emergency kit and pink rubber rain boots, and he wanted to take the rest of the gang to his house in Westchester to ride out the storm. Instead, the gang ends up at Barney’s apartment. Marshall is especially freaked out because his health insurance from his old job has just expired and he can’t be added to Lily’s plan for two more weeks. Marshall wants Lily to personally protect him from harm until he’s insured again, which is kind of bizarre. He doesn’t want to leave Lily’s side at all. The one good thing about this particular plot line is that all of Marshall’s paranoid fantasies of injury involve him being attacked by a guy in a bear suit. That was pretty darn hilarious.

The gang sees a rather dire news report showing Irene touching down in North Carolina, and they decide that maybe it’s a good idea to leave New York City after all. The plan to leave for Ted’s house gets delayed because Ted goes out into the hall to take a phone call from his mom. Robin is kind of upset that everyone’s parents, even Barney’s until recently estranged dad, is calling to make sure their children are okay. Except for Robin’s dad. When Ted comes back into the apartment, he said that Barney can’t come in his car to Westchester. It turns out Ted picked up a hot chick out in the hallway, and she’s going to be taking Barney’s seat in the car. Lily offers to stay instead because she desperately needs some alone time. Marshall has been really super clingy, after all. Just as the situation descends into complete chaos and Ted is about to leave with nobody, Mayor Bloomberg appears on the television and says that the time for evacuation is over. Thanks to the shelter in place order, the gang is stuck at Barney’s apartment. Then, to make things worse, the power goes out.

Throughout the episode, we flash forward to the present day, where Barney is still trying to get out of having to wear the Ducky Tie. He says that the tie has hurt his quest to be taken seriously at work. Marshall reveals that he may be willing to make a deal with Barney if the deal involves slaps, but he doesn’t want to use up his final original Slap Bet (circa season 2) slap. Kevin, however, realizes what’s actually going on. It turns out Barney is supposed to meet Nora’s parents in two days, and he wants to make a good impression. A good impression doesn’t involve wearing a Ducky Tie, apparently.

Back in August, the gang makes the best of being stranded. Marshall draws Lily a bath in Barney’s bathroom as an apology for being so clingy. Lily appreciates the gesture, and it turns out that is where their baby was conceived. This, of course, leads Ted to suggest that “Hurricane Eriksen” would be an awesome name for the baby Marshall approves, but Lily doesn’t, which I found amusing. The next morning, when the worst of the hurricane has passed, the gang stands in front of MacLaren’s. The bar is closed, but Ted has beer, so it’s all good. Everyone starts goofing off in the rain, and Marshall decides to boogie board on a trashcan lid in spite of having no health insurance. He eventually crashes through the MacLaren’s window, hence the “No Boogie Boarding” sign.

In the present, Marshall offers Barney a chance to rid himself of the Ducky Tie in exchange for three additional slaps. Barney quickly agrees, and almost as quickly, Marshall uses up two of those slaps. This means that Marshall has two total slaps remaining. I guess this was a move by the writers to accommodate the show going on longer than they originally planned. I’d bet they have the final slap planned for the final episode, which doesn’t appear to be happening any time soon. Robin gets into a cab with a kind of dazed Barney, and they reminisce about how they almost kissed after the hurricane when Barney apologized for calling Robin and pretending to be her dad. Then, they start actually kissing. And the Robin and Barney shipper in me rejoiced, even if I’d really rather they didn’t get back together by cheating.

Fringe 4.05: "Novation"

2011-12-19T23:15:00.000-05:00

“I can't explain it Walter. I don't know why he's here, or where he's come from. But, maybe, you've just been given a second chance.”
-Nina

“Novation” explored the implications of Peter suddenly blinking back into existence after the machine that joined the two universes erased him. The Fringe team doesn’t quite know what to make of him, and Peter doesn’t quite know what to make of his situation, either. He is surrounded by all these people who look like people he knew and loved, but they all act completely differently. In that sense, it’s appropriate that the mystery of the week (sort-of…this was a more mythology-based episode than stand-alone) involved the shapeshifters. These aren’t run-of-the-mill shapeshifters, though. They’re the shapeshifter-human hybrids we saw earlier this season. One of them is still running around and causing all kinds of trouble for our Fringe team.

The episode opens with Peter being taken to an FBI holding facility. He knows way too much classified information to be allowed out in the wild. Peter demands to speak with Walter, and Olivia goes back to the lab to try and make that happen. She finds Walter in a rather scary situation. He is hooked up to a machine that is pumping him full of powerful barbiturates. Walter is hoping it will allow him to sleep. Olivia puts a stop to it and tells Walter he has to get ready to go to the FBI holding facility. Peter has said that Walter is the only person he will talk to, and they need Walter to try and interrogate Peter.

Meanwhile, we get our first glimpse of the case of the week. A shapeshifter is causing quite a bit of havoc in a Vermont home. This particular shapeshifter is disguised as a man’s wife, and when the man comes home, she gets violent and demands that he tell her where he hid certain files that she has been unable to find. The place has been torn apart from her search. The man has no clue what she’s talking about, and it’s pretty clear that the shapeshifter is not going to take no for an answer.

Once he gets himself together, Walter is brought to the FBI holding facility, and despite being given a list of questions from Broyles, the “interrogation” does go well at all. Peter does more questioning than Walter. Peter has figured out that he was supposed to be deleted after he activated the machine, and he desperately wants Walter’s help in figuring out why he’s back. Walter just gets freaked out, though, and he runs out of the room. I guess being freaked out is understandable considering his son, who he lost twice, seems to be back yet again. Before the scene sends, there are some significant glances between Peter and Olivia, which made me happy, of course.

Lincoln calls Olivia to the scene of the shapeshifter incident from the beginning of the episode. It turs out that the shapeshifter killed both the woman she was impersonating and her boyfriend. The shapeshifter had been targeting the woman’s estranged husband, a former Massive Dynamic employee, but screwed up. The Fringe team begins a race to find the husband, Dr. Truss, but the shapeshifter gets to him first. He lives in rural Vermont, and the shapeshifter convinces him to come with her by saying that his cellular replication research has been used to cure her cancer. The treatment isn’t quite holding, and she says she needs his help.

Olivia and Lincoln pay a visit to Nina. In this universe, Nina apparently acted as Olivia’s mom once Olivia’s mom passed away. I thought that was a kind of interesting tiny change, although I’m not sure what larger implications it might have. Nina tells Olivia and Lincoln about Truss’ cellular replication research, and she says that William Bell ended up personally shutting it down. Back at Fringe HQ, Olivia hypothesizes that the shapeshifters want cellular regeneration technology because they were flawed and need to be repaired. Peter has messed with the intercom in his cell (which was a very “Lost” circa season 3 Hydra Island arc moment), so he has heard everything Olivia said. He uses the intercom to tell the Fringe folks that he knows about shapeshifter memory disks. He offers to help the team in exchange for a second meeting with Walter.

Meanwhile, the shapeshifter and Dr. Truss need to stop at a gas station. Dr. Truss tries to have a heart to heart with the shapeshifter about the fact that they both have children, but the shapeshifter is not feeling it at all. While Dr. Truss is inside the convenience store paying for gas, a state trooper pulls up and recognizes the license plate on the car. He calls for backup, but before help arrives, the shapeshifter kills him. Dr. Truss exits the convenience store and returns to his car, unaware of the violence that has taken place in his absence.

Olivia and Lincoln are having a bit of a heart to heart about Peter (Olivia is kind of thrown by the fact that this man from her dreams has suddenly appeared for real) when they get word about the sighting of Dr. Truss’ vehicle at the Vermont gas station/convenience store. Using the same kind of magical rapid transportation that allows the Fringe team to travel back and forth between Boston and New York on a whim several times in one episode, Olivia and Lincoln immediately appear at the Vermont convenience store in the next scene. They are watching the CCTV footage of Dr. Truss paying for gas in the store. They realize that Dr. Truss looks like a willing accomplice and probably doesn’t realize he’s with a dangerous shapeshifter. Meanwhile, the shapeshifter shows Dr. Truss the lab where he’s going to work. After a little investigation, Dr. Truss thinks he can solve the shapeshifter’s problem. Her genome is currently not propagating fully in the artificial tissue. Whatever that means.

In Boston, Nina pays Walter a visit at the lab. Apparently, in this universe, they don’t get along nearly as well as they did in the Original Recipe universe. Walter kind of blamed Nina for Peter’s death for a while, then when he started blaming himself, he got buried in a whole heap of self-loathing. Now Walter doesn’t think he deserves to be reunited with our Peter. Nina tries to change his mind about that. What’s interesting is that despite all the paranoia the FBI-affiliated characters are exhibiting, Walter has no doubt that the person he met is actually Peter from some universe or another. He sees it in his eyes. Which I guess is supposed to make us think about how Peter couldn’t recognize that Alt-livia wasn’t his Olivia, even when he looked in her eyes.

At Fringe HQ, Peter gives Broyles an update on his research. These new shapeshifters store the information of everyone they have been. They can shift back to any form they have taken in the past. This leads Peter to warn that pretty much anyone can be a shapeshifter now. That observation struck me as a big, honing Chekhov’s gun. Speaking of shapeshifters taking past forms, over at Dr. Truss’ new lab, he gives the shapeshifter an injection, but instead of feeling better, she turns into the form of Dr. Truss’ estranged wife (the woman from the beginning of the episode). Dr. Truss understandably freaks out about this, and the shapeshifter’s response is to attack him.

Meanwhile, Peter has discovered that he’s going to need a bigger computer to properly study the memory chips from the new shapeshifters. He figures out that the memory chips are broadcasting something, and when he gets that bigger computer, he discovers that the “something” is essentially shapeshifter Lojack. The signal can tell him where the shapeshifter is located. Before the powers that be can discover he’s broken in, he finds the location of the shapeshifter we’ve been following in this episode at Truss’ lab. At the lab, Truss is still really freaked out. He tries to inject the shapeshifter with something that will destroy her, but she recognizes what it is and stops him. The FBI raids the lab, but the shapeshifter manages to get away by disguising herself as one of the agents who participated in the raid. So I guess she’s still at large and will most definitely be back in a future episode.

After all the excitement has died down, Walter pays another visit to Peter. He tells Peter that he’s not going to help Peter get back to his proper universe. He feels like he’s meddled with the universes quite enough for one lifetime, and he paid for that dearly. Meanwhile the shapeshifter gets a hold of a typewriter. She sends word back to the Other Side that Truss fixed the cellular replication problem. More shapeshifters are going to be sent between the universes as soon as possible.

Person of Interest 1.07: "Witness"

2011-12-12T21:04:00.003-05:00

Hey everyone, it's Sarah. Jen has given me the privilege of posting directly to More TV, Please! So from now on, I'll be posting my Body of Proof and Person of Interest recaps, along with a few Ringer or New Girl come January while Jen is out of the country (lucky girl). So here's episode 7 of Person of Interest. Enjoy.

***

“The machine found the man who was targeted for death. We just didn’t know he was also a killer. John we have limited information. We knew when we began this that we might make mistakes.”
- Finch

This week we begin with a phone call where two guys, one sounds Eastern European, set up a hit on an unnamed target. Through surveillance footage we see a guy get shot twice in the chest at close range in a convenience store. Carter and Lionel are on the scene and it turns out the victim was Benny Degastino, a member of the Italian mob. There’s a gang war going on between them and the Russians and this murder was likely payback for a slew of murders a few weeks earlier. And it turns out our mysterious Elias is the head of the Italian crew. But, the cops think they’ve gotten lucky. There is a witness. Meanwhile, Reese is busy snapping photos of Charlie Burton, a high school history teacher living in Brighton Beach (Russian mob territory) (played by the wonderful Enrico Colantoni of Veronica Mars fame). Just as Finch relays that there’s nothing really special bout Charlie, Lionel calls tell Reese about the missing witness. Turns out the witness and Charlie are one in the same. And a Russian hit team has just showed up at Charlie’s apartment to finish what they started. Reese has no choice but to go in.

In typical Reese fashion, he just appears in Charlie’s living room. I have to admit I would be a little freaked out too. But he gets Charlie to go with him. They get out of the building without being spotted and Reese takes out one of the guards but his phone gets smashed in the process. So he and Charlie are on their own. Reese steals a car to try and get Charlie back to Manhattan to tell the cops what he knows but the Russians shoot up the car and one of the bullets hits Charlie. Another exciting casting choice about this episode is that one of the Russian is played by Enver Gjokaj (Victor/Anthony from Dollhouse). And his character kind of reminded me a little of some of the imprints he had as a doll. Anyway, Reese and Charlie head in to the Double Bs, an apartment complex run by a Bulgarian drug lord. Even the Russians are scared to go in.

They wander through the building, spotting some drug dealers, before finding an empty apartment that is pretty disgusting. But it will work. Reese gets Charlie’s story and it seems credible. He was grading papers late and went to get something from the store when the Russians showed up. He claims Benny had a message for Elias that Vinnie would finish the job. But Charlie says he doesn’t know anyone named Elias. Reese inquires as to why he didn’t’ call the cops and Charlie says that the Russians own the neighborhood and you never know which side they are on. Back across the river, Lionel, Carter and their gang task force buddy are talking to Benny’s wife. She tells them that it doesn’t matter if they find the Russians that killed her husband because Elias will and he’ll kill them all. She says that Elias is on the war path and is going to reunite the five families and wipe the Russians out.

Near Charlie’s apartment, we see Finch fiddling with an ATM camera, likely to hide the footage from the shooting so that they can’t find Reese or Charlie. But a bystander caught some of it on her phone and they find out one of the guys that were after Charlie is the son of the head of the Russian mob. Apparently, Finch didn’t wipe the ATM footage; he just made it so he could remote access it from HQ. He’s checking the footage and finds a silver SUV pulling up in front of Charlie’s building and a cop getting in. He calls Lionel to have him the license plate and says the Russians might not be the only ones looking for Charlie. Speaking of the Russians, Lazlo (Enver) wants to bust in to the Double Bs and hunt down Reese and Charlie. But his brother, Peter, tells him they have to respect the agreement with the Bulgarians. They will cover all the exits so that Reese and Charlie can’t get out.

Inside, Reese is trying to bond a little with Charlie, asking how he got involved with teaching. It’s not nearly as complicated as his own change in career. Charlie is trying to help his students, many of whom are descendants of Russian mob members, to get out of the life. It doesn’t always work. Reese outs down to the guys we saw earlier to get some drugs to help Charlie with the pain. It wouldn’t be an episode of Person of Interest if he didn’t get to beat some people up while spewing witty banter. Meanwhile, Finch pays a visit to Lionel and tells him to report the car (which could belong to Elias) stolen and to send the report to an email address.

At police HQ, things are starting to fall into place. Carter makes the connection that Elias’ father last ran Brighton Beach before he got locked up. So junior is trying to clean it up and claim what is his. Reese returns to their crappy hiding place with the drugs (cocaine) and some crazy glue to numb the pain and seal the wound. Unfortunately, the Russians and the Bulgarians are going to hunt them down together since Reese beat the Bulgarian boys up and stole their drugs. Reese goes all MacGyver and finds a still-working landline to call Finch. He explains the situation and tells Finch to get a message to Lionel that they will be on the East River ferry to Pier 11 at 7am. And Finch finds them an escape route. Unfortunately, they don’t get to use it. But one of Charlie’s students, Will, let’s them hide out in his apartment. He’s even tough enough to make the Russians go away.

Finch gets the vehicle report from Lionel and calls Vehicle Recovery to get the GPS locator and microphone in the car turned on. He’s going to do a little surveillance of his own. He tracks the car to a parking garage and snaps a bunch of photos of the cop he saw before. He speeds off pretty quick when he gives a report that the Russian have Charlie trapped in the Double Bs. Finch thinks this cop could be Elias. Reese and Charlie are still hiding out in Will’s apartment when he tells them they should use the old entrance to the building. So, they head back the way they came and end up having to hide out in the same apartment to keep from being spotted. And they manage to snag Lazlo as a sort of hostage.

Back in the city proper, Carter and her gang buddy are paying a visit to Peter’s dad, the head of the Russian mob. He denies knowing anything about the convenience store shooting and alibis his son a being in the house all day. He also says that he didn’t start the war. Elias did by coming into the Russians’ territory and making trouble. Back in the Double Bs, Reese gets a message to Finch to let Carter know where the Russians and reminds him to let Lionel know where to meet them. Things are starting to look up when Finch overhears a conversation in the silver SUV in which someone says they got a tip that Charlie and company would be a pier 11. Finch thinks Lionel is the leak. Unfortunately for Lionel, the other cop shows up and knocks him out when he’s on the phone with Finch. We see the cop take Lionel’s gun as the ferry is approaching.

On the ferry, Reese is trying to get Charlie to agree to testify but things take a turn for the weird. We get intercut between the ferry and the interrogation room with Carter and Peter and we learn that Charlie is Elias. I have to say I thought Elias would be younger. And I’m not sure I like that it was sort of wrapped up in this episode as to his identity and what he wanted. But, he makes Reese flex cuff himself to the railing and he shoots Lazlo in the leg. Elias tells Reese that if they stay out of each other’s way, they won’t have any problems. Elias gets away clean and Reese is not happy that because they saved this one man, more number could come up. We see the cop shooting the Russian mob boss in his office before meeting up with Elias on the pier and walking away.

Ringer 1.07: "Oh Gawd, There's Two of Them?"

2011-12-12T19:08:00.002-05:00

“I had two beers. It’s not like I was doing coke.”
-Juliet

This episode of “Ringer” was a little plodding at first, but boy did it bring the cliffhangers and shocking twists by the end. It was so twisty and shocking that it took all my willpower to switch over to Word and start writing this instead of just diving right into the next episode. These twists made me so sad for Bridget, because it looks like the little life she’s built for herself is going to come crashing down around her very soon. I guess I shouldn’t feel too sad because she basically stole that life from her (seriously evil) twin sister, but Bridget seems to genuinely care about the people in Siobhan’s life and wants to take care of them as best she can. Certainly beats her sister, who only seems interested in murdering all of them. Speaking of, we need some more real Siobhan character development post haste. She’s way to moustache-twirling and pure evil at the moment. There must have been something to turn her to the dark side (most likely involving the little kid from the photograph in the pilot), but without knowing that, her trying to kill multiple people back in NYC just seems silly.

The episode opens showing the crazy media frenzy that has taken place over Gemma’s disappearance. Henry’s being mobbed by photographers and reporters as he tries to get into a car. Over at the Martin apartment, Bridget has been watching the craziness on television. Before Bridget and Andrew can have much of a conversation about it, police arrive at the apartment with Juliet in tow. Juliet’s not in trouble, though. The police want to talk to “Siobhan.” Bridget goes into her dressing room, presumably to collect herself, but she actually makes a phone call from her old cellphone to Siobhan’s cell phone saying she thinks she really messed up. By the time she emerges from the dressing room, the police are saying they want to talk to Andrew too, because Gemma’s last phone call was from him. While this is going on, Juliet is also campaigning to be allowed to stay with a friend in Connecticut for a weekend. Andrew eventually relents.

At the local police precinct, Henry, Andrew, and Bridget are all being questioned about Gemma’s disappearance. Cops show both Henry and Andrew Bridget’s mug shot and ask them to identify the woman in the photo. Surprisingly, both correctly identify her as Bridget Kelly. This was quite the WTF moment, as up until now, we were lead to believe that nobody in Siobhan’s life knew anything about Bridget’s existence. After the opening credits, we get an explanation for this in the form of flashbacks to “Siobhan” (really Bridget) telling both of the guys about Bridget. Between this and the phone message se left herself, it’s obvious that she has some sort of longer game in mind with regards to keeping her new friends and family from being implicated in Gemma’s disappearance. Bridget seems to have all the pieces in place until Victor tells her that Malcolm is missing. This news makes her crack just a little.

Speaking of Malcolm, the crime lord and his minions have him hooded and in a van, presumably somewhere in middle-of-nowhere Wyoming. Malcolm manages to escape from the van by making his captors think he’s more high than he really is. They let their guard down and leave him alone in the van, and he escapes. We see him grab something from a house (presumably his own house in Wyoming), and then we see him at a truck stop. In the truck stop rest room, Malcolm recognizes a pair of boots that he can glimpse from below the stall. The boots belong to one of the crime lord’s minions. The minion tries to attack Malcolm and warns Malcolm that they’re going to keep following him, but Malcolm knocks the minion out and runs off.

Back in New York, Bridget is flashing back to the day she was three months sober. Bridget and Malcolm are celebrating with cake, and things go way too far. As in making out and sex too far. Apparently it’s taboo for NA folks to have romantic relationships with their sponsors. Which makes sense, really. Malcolm says he doesn’t regret it, but it absolutely cannot happen again. He assures her that while they can’t have romantic relationship, he’ll still be there for her whenever she needs him. Pulled back into the present day, Bridget has to listen to Andrew complaining about how she didn’t tell him the truth about having a twin sister sooner. Andrew is really, really pissed about this and believes that the omission could have put the whole family in danger. If only he knew who the really dangerous sister was…

Not feeling like she can really trust anybody else, Bridget meets up with Charlie at the coffee shop. She wants him to use his former cop skills to investigate Gemma’s disappearance more. She tells him that she’s certain the police have the wrong suspect. Charlie agrees to help only after Bridget tells him her “name” (she gives Siobhan’s name). After some digging, Charlie reports back that he hasn’t really been able to find out anything new. He thinks, however, that Gemma’s car might hold clues, and Bridget tells him the car’s location- JFK long term parking. She doesn’t tell him, however, why it’s there. This plot had quite the crazy ending. At the end of the episode, we see Charlie checking out Gemma’s car. He sees some blood inside it, and he makes a phone call. The phone call is to the real Siobhan! We see through a flashback that Charlie attacked Gemma on Siobhan’s orders. How twisted can this show get?

Backtracking a bit, instead of being in Connecticut, Juliet is at a party. Her friend Monica is really drunk, and Juliet is actually being responsible and trying to figure out the safest way to get her home. Juliet is going to hire a car to take them home (the best option, really), but Monica is really freaking out about how her parents will react if she doesn’t bring her car home. Meanwhile, back at home, Bridget and Andrew are having a heart-to-heart about all the lies they’ve told. Andrew is finally starting to get over not knowing Siobhan had a twin. Andrew also admits that at first he wasn’t happy to hear Siobhan was pregnant, but now he’s really happy. They’re in a much better place now, and they start making out when Andrew’s phone rings. It’s Mr. Carpenter (aka Logan from “Veronica Mars”) saying Juliet has been in a car accident. I was wondering what the heck he was doing there. It seemed kind of inappropriate to me. Andrew arrives on the scene and finds out that Juliet tried to drive Monica’s car so the car would be home and Monica wouldn’t get in trouble. Andrew has had it with Juliet’s antics and completely cuts her off from her trust fund. Needless to say, Juliet is pissed at Monica.

Over at the FBI, Victor gets some pretty major information. There has been ATM activity on Malcolm’s debit card, and there is video of him withdrawing cash from an NYC ATM. According to Victor, this means Bridget is probably still in NYC, instead of in Europe like the fake voicemail had said. Elsewhere in NYC, there’s a big swanky party to celebrate the opening of an art pavilion Gemma designed. Bridget and Henry are there and talking. Henry’s not doing well because he’s so upset about Gemma, and he wants to go home, so Bridget puts him in a cab. She turns around from the cab and sees Malcolm. This is such a shock that she faints. She wakes up in the hospital thanks to Malcolm calling an ambulance. Andrew is there, and he is insistent that Bridget have an ultrasound to check on the baby. This can’t possibly end well.

Body of Proof 2.07: "Hard Knocks"

2011-12-10T23:43:00.000-05:00

It's time for another "Body of Proof" write-up courtesy of Sarah. Enjoy!

***

“I’m the child and you’re the adults. You’re supposed to be worried about my happiness. I’m not supposed to be responsible for yours.”
- Lacey

This week finds us with a young guy calling 911, but it doesn’t do much good. He passes out before the operator can get much useful information. Jump to Megan’s apartment where Lacey is bugging her mom about what guy she (Megan) is seeing. Megan tries to brush it off but finally tells her it is the FBI agent from the kidnap case. They have a coffee date. Unfortunately, Megan gets called to the crime scene of the 911 caller. He died before the EMTs arrived and Ames cancelled their date. Turns out the caller is 17-year-old Jake Brady. Megan finds bruises on his stomach and he smells like alcohol. She also finds black light paint on his cheek and Peter leads them on a trek to a rave spot. Bud and Sam go to notify the parents.

At the lab, Ethan announces that there was some kind of drug in Jake’s system but none of the party drugs they were expecting. Peter finds some strange yellow pills and Megan snatches them up and takes them to Ames since he has access to the federal drug database. When she gets back to the lab, Ethan shows that there were ligature marks on Jake’s wrists and Megan finds a spot on his side that determined time of death. Apparently when the 911 call was made, Jake had already been dead for four hours.

Over at the police station, Bud and Sam find a website for the woman who holds the raves, and they pick her up at the airport. She denies knowing Jake or anything that happened to him at the rave. As Megan is cutting up some body part, Curtis reports that Jake had no broken bones and Peter adds he had nothing in stomach to absorb the alcohol. Signs still point to an overdose. And then Agent Ames shows up with the yellow pills. Megan had told him to call with the results. He tells her that she could have found out what the drug was from her own database. It’s an ADD drug. They have a slightly awkward flirty moment when he asks her out to dinner that night before he hands over the evidence. Later, Bud and Megan head back to Jake’s parents’ house as Bud hasn’t heard anything from the dad. He’s got serious anger management issues. But he swears that Jake never took the easy way out (i.e. using drugs of any kind). They do manage to get a name out of him, Patrick.

Bud and Sam haul him in to interrogation and he admits to giving Jake the drugs and says he made the call because he freaked. But he didn’t put the sign on Jake. When Bud and Sam look confused, Patrick pulls up a picture on his phone. Jake is sitting on the ground with a sign that says “Dead Meat” on it. And from the picture they determine cause of death. Jake’s hands were bound and the sign was propped under his chin in such a way that it closed off his airway and he suffocated. So Ethan and Curtis are sent back to the rave spot to find whatever bound Jake’s hands. And we get a pretty funny scene with them breaking it down to Ethan’s sort-of techno beat boxing before they actually find the cable that they’re looking for.

On a wholly unrelated plot point, Todd is thinking of accepting a professorship at a law school out in California. Lacey is obviously not pleased about the possibility of moving. They’re going to fly out in a few days so Todd can meet the Regents, and he’s taking Lacey along. Back at the lab, Megan is running DNA on the skin cells found on the cable. It pops but it is a restricted profile. That means it is from a parent who submitted their child’s DNA in case the child got abducted. So Megan’s off to pump Ames for more favors, except he says no, especially since they aren’t dating. Megan offers to change that, and they end up at her apartment drinking wine. Just as things are getting a bit sexy, Lacey interrupts in a rather Ethan-esque fashion.

Lacey says she doesn’t want to move to California but she didn’t want her parents to divorce and it happened anyway. Poor kid. The next morning, Bud and Sam confiscate the computer of the editor of the school newspaper and with Megan’s help and the information that the person they’re looking for as a rare chromosome disorder, find the kid who tied Jake up. Bud and Sam bring the boy in, but he says he moved the sign when Jake started to move and went home. So the sign position didn’t kill Jake. Megan continues to check the body, but Todd shows up and they have another argument (Megan certainly does a lot of it). Kate interrupts, and it’s even more awkward since she doesn’t know about the California move yet. She’s not pleased when he does dump it on her and she gives him a “are you kidding me?” look when he asks if Kate wants to go with him.

Megan is ranting at Peter about how she is going to lose Lacey when she realizes what killed Jake: a punch to the heart. She’s back to exam the body, taking out stitches from the Y incision over Jake’s heart when Ames shows up with roses, likely to apologize. She kind of sends him away though, because the flowers could contaminate the area, and Kate walks in. Kate turned Todd down for the move to California, and it’s obvious Megan is a little happy. The rest of the crew gathers and Megan finds the impression of a Greek Sigma. Looks like Jake’s dad punched him. As with the rest of the investigation, it’s not exactly as it seems. And Bud blurts out that he and his wife are expecting. And Megan determines why Jake’s dad isn’t responsible when Kate pops by to tell her to call Ames. She and Megan were both in honor society and pre-graduation they wore the ring one way and after they turned it around. Jake’s dad’s ring was facing the wrong way. Maxine, the editor of the newspaper, is the real culprit. She tutored Jake and when she saw the photo of him with the sign she went to go help him, but he didn’t even remember her.

Later that night, Megan and Ames are sharing another glass of wine when she tells him that she needs to focus on Lacey if she stays. Todd shows up frantic because he doesn’t know where Lacey is, only to find her hiding out in Megan’s apartment. Lacey doesn’t want to go. But she doesn’t want to ruin her dad’s career or Megan’s love life. When Megan and Todd finally get their heads on straight and ask Lacey what she wants, it becomes clear that she wants Todd to go to California and she can move in with Megan.

New Girl 1.04: "Naked"

2011-12-10T23:28:00.000-05:00

“We grew up together. Locker rooms, swimming pools…penis fights. It just happens.”
-Winston

“Naked” was the first episode of “New Girl” after a long baseball playoff hiatus (since my Phillies didn’t make it out of the NLDS, baseball hiatus got real old, real fast this year). While this episode was decent, it was a bit of a whimper of a return. I adored “Wedding,” but this episode just seemed more immature than funny. It took Jess just a touch too far on the quirkiness spectrum. Slow-motion chicken dancing with a peck instead of a clap is fun quirkiness in my book. An inability to say the word “penis” is just kind of sad. I’m not going to gripe too much about this one, though, because I’m far behind enough in my blogging here to know that some amazing episodes come after this one. The slight misstep that was “Naked” was not at all a trend. And there was still some genuinely funny stuff in this episode, too. Winston’s sub-plot about needing to catch up on pop culture after living in Latvia for several years really cracked me up.

The show opens with a brief vignette that isn’t really connected to the rest of the episode. I think it’s meant to illustrate how Jess still hasn’t really completely fit in with the guys yet. Schmidt, Nick, and Winston are lounging on the couch watching a scary movie, and Jess interrupts. She flops down on the couch and starts talking about movies she’d rather watch like “Fame” and “An American Tale.” The final straw, though, is when she spoils the movie by telling the guys that a character is going to blow himself up. She had seen the movie already in theaters, but she had neglected to tell the guys that.

Nick has a date scheduled with a coworker, a really odd fellow bartender named Amanda. It’s the first time he’s really put himself out there since the big break-up with Caroline, and Schmidt and Jess are just full of advice. Unfortunately, some of Schmidt’s advice (to suck in his gut), which is backed up by Jess, makes Nick feel kind of fat. This leads Nick to start dancing in front of his bedroom mirror, just to get a sense of how he really looks. To continue this process (and maybe gain some confidence?), Nick also starts taking off all his clothes as he dances. Jess is bothered by the loud music and barges into Nick’s room to tell him to turn it down. She gets a view of the goods and lets out a little laugh-scream as she runs out of the room. Which really doesn’t help at all.

Meanwhile, Winston’s having a bit of a crisis because of a bad job interview. He had the skill for the job, but he failed at the pre-interview pop culture chit chat. This was because he lived in Latvia for several years. The interviewer blabbering on about TwitPics and Jersey shore folks was just gibberish to him. Schmidt decides he’s going to help Winston with this and starts rattling off a bunch of pop culture facts Winston is going to need to know. My favorite part of the exchange is when Schmidt mentions that Betty White is back, and Winston asks what happened to the rest of the Golden Girls. Winston’s little sad face when Schmidt informs him that they’re all dead is just too much! Winston’s pop culture education continues throughout the episode. For instance, we hear him watching the “Double Rainbow” video at one point.

Jess rushes out to the living room to try to tell Schmidt and Winston what happened. Before she can get out the whole story, Nick, now all hoodied-up in hiding from the world mode, tries to leave the apartment. After Jess tells the rest of the story, Schmidt is a little upset that he’s the only person in the apartment who has never seen Nick’s penis. Winston has seen it because he and Nick grew up together, and apparently that sort of thing is rather difficult to avoid in the locker room. Schmidt keeps trying to sneak-attack a peek at Nick in the bathroom throughout the rest of the episode. It’s super creepy, but it’s pretty damn hilarious, too. Which pretty much describes Schmidt all the time.

Nick’s date with Amanda doesn’t go well because Nick is super self-conscious about taking off his clothes. They end up spooning fully clothed all night. When Nick returns from his date the next morning, Jess really wants to talk to him about what happened. Nick has no desire to talk about it, and Jess ends up chasing him around the building, including on and off an elevator a couple times, trying to have the conversation. When Jess accuses Nick of being immature for refusing to talk, Nick calls her on the fact that she can’t say the word “penis.” Jess really desperately tries to say it for a while, but she just can’t manage it. Nick believes this proves his point (and it kind of does).

Winston has another job interview and he’s pretty bummed out afterwards. When Schmidt asks what happened, Winston explains that while he totally nailed the pop culture stuff, he struggled when the interviewer asked “Why do you want to do this job?” Winston hasn’t known any career other than playing basketball, so he’s not really sure why he would want another job (other than the fact that he needs money, obviously). Schmidt suggests they go for a run so Winston can blow off some steam. This turns out to be a great thing for Winston, but Schmidt doesn’t get very far before he can’t run anymore. He claims he has exercise asthma. Later, as Schmidt is recovering, he and Winston have a bit of a heart to heart. Winston said that he learned from the internet that everybody eventually has their time in the sun. He’s certain that his time and Schmidt’s time will come someday. I thought that was a nice sentiment.

Jess discusses the Nick situation with Cece, and Cece suggests Jess make it even by letting Nick see her naked. I’m pretty sure this has been a plot point in many sitcoms before. So much so that Abed even pointed it out in an episode of “Community” where Jeff and Britta were having some awkwardness once. Meanwhile, Nick apologizes to Amanda, and she accepts because she appreciates his honesty. Jess decides to take Cece’s advice, and she’s waiting in Nick’s room clothed only in a towel when Nick returns from a date with Amanda. Jess tries hiding behind the bed, but when Nick and Amanda start undressing, she just can’t take it anymore. Awkwardness and screaming ensue. And Nick gets a good view of Jess when she accidentally drops the towel.

This latest drama results in a big apartment meeting where Winston and Schmidt happily use Jess’ travel size feelings stick (Nick broke the regular size one) to basically tell Nick that he needs to lighten up. And that he should let Schmidt see his penis. Which kind of defeated the purpose of the feelings stick session, I think. Jess and Nick do eventually make up after Jess works really hard at finally being able to say the word “penis.” But she is still, apparently, unable to use anatomically correct terms for lady parts. Nick agrees with me that calling her vagina her “gumbo pot” (when asking Nick how much he saw) is just gross.

HIMYM 7.08: "The Slutty Pumpkin Returns"

2011-12-08T18:43:00.000-05:00

“I want Scotch. American Scotch. From Scotland!”
-Barney

“The Slutty Pumpkin Returns” was a follow-up to a beloved episode (“Slutty Pumpkin”) that could have threatened to kill my love for the original. “Slapsgiving 2: Revenge of the Slap,” I’m talking to you. While some aspects of the episode certainly did sink to that level, the episode was saved by a hilarious Barney and Robin subplot. It was a reminder of why they work so well together as a comedic duo. Throw in some classic HIMYM Canadian jokes, and this particular plot was right up my alley. On the other hand, I was kind of disappointed to see that the HIMYM powers that be once again felt the need to sink to stunt casting. The Slutty Pumpkin is kind of iconic in HIMYM mythology, and I was so disappointed when I learned she would be portrayed by Katie Holmes. Holmes wasn’t terrible in the role, but she wasn’t spectacular either, and because of that, the show didn’t really accomplish anything creatively by finally introducing us to the woman inside the (hilarious in description but kind of lame when you actually see it) costume.

The gang is all hanging out at Ted and Robin’s apartment, and Robin reveals something awesomely hilarious that she learned by being Facebook friends with Barney’s dad. It turns out Jerome’s mother was Canadian, which makes Barney ¼ Canadian. Barney doesn’t take it well at all. He has a bit of a freak out and ends up leaving the apartment in a huff. This definitely made me chuckle. Robin spends the rest o the episode torturing Barney about his heritage, which was amazingly hilarious and so something I’d expect Barney to do in a similar situation. She has a bar maid deliver Canadian whiskey to him instead his usual Scotch, and that’s only the beginning of the torment.

Meanwhile, in the main (kind of annoying, mostly because of Katie Holmes) plot, Ted is walking down the street and sees the infamous Slutty Pumpkin costume in a shop window. He gets the shopkeeper to look in his records and find who rented the costume in 2001. It’s a woman named Naomi, and against his better judgment (and mine), Ted soon shows up at her door. I find this plot kind of disappointing, mostly because the Pumpkin was funnier when its sluttiness was left to the imagination. “It was carved in strategic places” is hilarious. The actual costume? Not so much.

The final plot of this episode centers around Lily and Marshall. Lily’s grandparents want to move to Florida full time, and they give Lily and Marshall their Long Island house. Surprisingly, Lily, always the city girl, is kind of happy about it and potentially wants to move there. Later, Marshall discusses this with Robin, and Robin warns Marshall that Lily’s change in opinion about the suburbs is likely due to “pregnancy brain.” I really found this whole plot to be kind of ridiculous and borderline offensive, honestly. As soon as Robin makes the pregnancy brain suggestion, we see Lily looking like she’s barely able to function or string together a coherent sentence.

Ted and Naomi go on a date, and while it’s very well planned by Ted (he arranges dinner on the apartment building rooftop where they first met at the Halloween party), the date ends up being incredibly awkward. Even hand holding and cuddling on a lounge chair on the roof his horribly uncomfortable. Unfortunately for Ted, Naomi seems to be really into it. The second date is even more awkward. Naomi tries to come on to Ted by singing the Barenaked Ladies song “One Week,” which was popular when they first met in 2001 (oh how I miss 2000-2001 era music). I approved of the singing and of Naomi declaring it their song” because I first really got into music in 2000 and 2001, so the song has some nostalgia for me. Ted, however, thought it was just really strange and awkward, and he runs into the bathroom of Naomi’s apartment to escape. The bathroom has a pretty awesome lavender and black color scheme going on, by the way. Must file that away for when I actually own my own place someday.

Lily finally claims to agree with Marshall that now is not the best time to make any major life decisions like deciding to move to the suburbs. She says she’ll call a Realtor to start looking into selling her grandparents’ house. When she takes Marshall out to the Long Island house to meet the Realtor, though, she ends up having been manipulating Marshall all along. She arranges for super cute Trick-or-Treaters to show up to the door in a bid to convince Marshall that he really does want to move to the suburbs immediately. Lily continues to try and convince Marshall to move, even though he’s staying strong. Eventually, Lily realizes that she really shouldn’t be making big life decisions while pregnant when she accidentally gives objects that aren’t candy (like a stapler) out to some Trick-or-Treaters. The fact that the candy-less Trick-or-Treaters proceed to egg the house doesn’t help, either.

Leading up to the big rooftop Halloween party at Ted and Robin’s building, Robin and Barney make a deal. If Barney wears a Mountie costume to the party, Robin will drop the Canada jokes at Barney’s expense. Also, Ted shows up at Naomi’s apartment and tires to break up with her, but she’s wearing the Slutty Pumpkin outfit and has made him a Hanging Chad costume. Instead of saying they need to break up, Ted pulls a classic “Schmosby” and says he loves her. This, of course, results in the relationship very much continuing, as much as Ted doesn’t really want it to.

Of course, Barney can’t show up to the Halloween party in a Mountie costume. He ends up going as far in the other direction as possible- shirtless with American flag shorts and an Uncle Sam hat. It’s rather glorious, in typical Barney fashion. Robin, dressed in a Vancouver Canucks uniform, isn’t quite so impressed. Ted and Naomi show up at the party as well, and Robin and Barney are very surprised to find out they slept together, considering Ted wanted to end the relationship. Robin keeps checking both guys with her hockey stick when they say stupid things, and I found that very amusing. By the end of the night, Naomi ends up breaking up with Ted. She had been feeling things were awkward, just like Ted had been, but she had been too nice to say anything before getting a little tipsy at the party. And so the legend of the Slutty Pumpkin has reached its rather disappointing conclusion.

Person of Interest 1.06: "The Fix"

2011-12-06T07:26:00.000-05:00

For your reading pleasure, here's the latest "Person of Interest" write-up from Sarah.

***

“I never thought I would know what happened to her. And now I also know the man responsible.”
- Finch

This week we begin with a woman, Zoe Morgan, walking out of her apartment and Reese greeting her at the car. He’s obviously not who she’s expecting and she even calls to verify his story of her usual driver being sick (she gets Finch on the other end of the line). As Reese drives off, Finch appears. Looks like he’s going to do some leg work this week. He complains about not being able to pick the lock as Reese arrives at the location he’s supposed to be taking Zoe. Finch gets inside and finds nothing personal at all in the place. And from Reese’s perspective, it appears Zoe has just done a drug deal with some shady kids. Finch finds a gun in her living room under the sofa. Only problem is, it wasn’t drugs she got from the shady guy. It was a gun. Zoe has Reese drop her at a swanky party. Reese isn’t so sure it’s a good idea to stay in the car so he follows Zoe inside and sees her hand over the gun to a cop. Apparently his nephew (also a cop) left it in a subway bathroom. Woops. Turns out Ms. Morgan is a fixer.

We also have a case of the week for Detective Carter. She’s got a 70-year-old dead guy who happens to be an enforcer and gangster. And he skated on the murder of Marlene Elias (she was stabbed multiple times in the chest with a kitchen knife). So I guess we know why the crew a few weeks back wanted that knife. Out in the city, Zoe has another meeting. She’s going to make a blogger shut up about a high-powered executive’s affair so his CEO father-in-law doesn’t find out. She pays the blogger 40 grand. He’s creepy and a blackmailing jerk but not capable of killing Zoe.

Carter has asked the cop who worked the Elias murder to come in to fill in some of the blanks. It seems a pretty typical case. Cocktail waitress has an affair with an upper level mobster, and when she keeps begging him to leave his wife; he has his knife man off her. Too bad Mr. Mob and Elias had a kid together. Seems likely, now that he’s all grown up, he could be the killer. Meanwhile, Reese is driving Zoe to another meet, and he gets the vibe that things are off when there are two guys waiting. She brushes him off and tries the make the hand-off of the recording she got from the blogger when a third guy appears and they try to grab her. Reese intervenes and gets Zoe out of there without too much damage (well the back window of the car is shot out). They need to find out what was on the recording. Zoe made a copy, but it’s not very high quality. They pull up to find one of the businessmen dead from heart failure. Someone’s cleaning house. Unfortunately, Zoe’s taken off in the minute Reese left her alone in the car.

Back at HQ, Finch is working on cleaning up the recording from the flash drive, and he discovers the woman’s voice belongs to a woman named Dana Miller. She worked for the company that hired Zoe to fix the problem. She was having the affair with the heir apparent to the empire, and she died six months earlier from a brain aneurysm. Finch knows this because she was one of his numbers before he met Reese. And now Finch is off for a very important business meeting. He’s just bought stock in the company, and he uses the opportunity to meet with Lawson (the heir and the one who had Dana killed) and plant a bug in his office. Lawson’s muscle reports in about getting the flash drive and killing the other guy but Lawson says they need to get rid of both Zoe and Reese.

Back on the Elias case, Carter gets a call from the former cop. He found some information on Elias’s son. He was a runway except for one woman who looked after him. He sent her Christmas cards. So Carter is going to swing by to get them. I’m not sure I trust this guy. But then again, maybe I’ve seen too many cop drama. Anyway, Finch manages to clear up the audio a bit on Dana’s recording. She was going to blow the whistle on an unsafe drug. Reese hasn’t had any luck finding Zoe until she turns her cell phone back on. He meets her at fancy restaurant, and she explains that Dana worked in clinical trials and five days before she died, she was transferred out and her access suspended. So now Zoe and Reese are going to team up to do something illegal. Apparently Zoe’s got connections on the force because she strong-arms a cop into making sure no one responds when there’s a break in at the company that night.

The break-in is going fine at first. They find that the new migraine drug that has just been FDA approved was altered. Well, the report anyway. Six people died and were dropped from the list. Finch also manages to clean up the rest of the recording. It turns out Dana was going to go to the CEO about the drug. Unfortunately, Lawson’s muscle and the cop that Zoe strong-armed show up, and Zoe and Reese get taken hostage.

We get a little moment where Reese and Zoe bond. We find out why Zoe became a fixer (she met one when her dad got caught up in a corruption case). Things start spiraling out of control as Finch tries to reach the CEO. He gets to hear the rest of the recording. The CEO was in on the whole thing. Back at the offices, Zoe bargains her way out of handcuffs (she says she sent a copy of the report to a friend and she’ll take them to the person who has it. She also slips Reese a way to get out of his own cuffs. They could make kind of a fun team. Reese manages to stab his captor with a syringe (so his body count for this episode is 1). And while on the road, Zoe calls Finch with a location; the navy yard. Reese swoops in to save the day as Finch has dinner with the CEO and ruins him quite spectacularly. Finch takes all of the CEO’s money. Zoe obviously gets a portion, and Dana Miller’s family does as well. And Zoe’s cop finds himself facing corruption charges. All in all, not a bad haul. I really do hope they bring Zoe back. We end with Carter showing up at the former cop’s apartment to find him dead. She exchanges fire with who she assumes is the killer, and she nails him enough to leave some blood.

Body of Proof 2.06: "Second Chances"

2011-12-03T07:40:00.000-05:00

Once again, Sarah's back with another "Body of Proof" write-up. Enjoy!

***

“You can’t convince someone you’ve changed if they don’t want to believe you.”
- Zoe

We begin with a rather disorienting image of a beaten young woman being dragged through the forest. She finally stops moving and sees a very blurred figure leaning over her. Cut to Megan and Lacey at Megan’s apartment. Megan is quizzing her daughter on Latin phrases. Do people really still study Latin in high school? [Ed. note: my high school offered Latin when I was a student there ten years ago, way back in the olden days of the early ‘aughts] Lacey complains that Megan promised they could watch a movie, but their argument is cut short by Todd’s arrival. Apparently he and Kate are taking Lacey to Boston for the weekend. And cut again to the crime scene. Megan and Peter are going over the body while Bud talks to a meth addict who was apparently caught rifling through Jane Doe’s pockets. The girl suffered lots of trauma, including a broken tibia. Bud suggests that the girl was out there with the druggie to get high and things went south. Megan’s not sure she’s a user. As she and Peter leave the scene, Kate arrives and says she wants to consult on the case. Megan’s not exactly thrilled (she’s still put off about Boston).

Bud’s brought meth head back to the precinct, but the interrogation goes nowhere. He’s too strung out, and he keeps saying he didn’t know the girl and he didn’t kill her. Over at the lab, Megan, Ethan and Curtis are going over the body, and they find a tattoo of 4 horses on her wrist. Peter shows up with a new suspect from the bloody handprint on Jane Doe’s body: a young woman named Zoe Brandt doing 4-7 years for beating her drug dealer nearly to death. Bud and Megan make the trip out to see Zoe and we learn that she was doing work release two days a week at the stables where the Jane Doe (Brinn Walker) worked.

As Kate and Megan continue to examine Brinn’s body, they discover through x-rays that she had a lot of old riding injuries. And Peter discovers she was a champion equestrian. Kate is trying to determine the cause of a spiral fracture in one of her ankles when Megan points out that it would be consistent with the injuries if Brinn’s foot got caught in one o the stirrups and she was dragged along by a horse. At the stables, the manager says that Brinn was a pro, didn’t ride without a helmet and only rode one horse (which was all tucked away in its stable). Megan’s not so sure she trusts the manager. The horse Brinn rode flinched when he touched it and apparently horses are very sensitive to people (I’m not a big horse fan myself. I’m allergic to hay). So Megan decides to use Lacey as a resource since her daughter rides, too.

Back at the lab, Kate gets into autopsy by dissecting Brinn’s lungs since Megan is gone and so is Ethan. She’s trying to be helpful to make up for taking Lacey to Boston. She and Curtis find a foreign piece of matter in the tissue. Strange. Peter and Ethan have been sent back to the forest to see if they can prove Megan’s theory that Brinn was riding a horse before she died. Peter finds hoof marks in the dirt so it looks like Megan was right. It also helps that Ethan finds horse manure and Peter finds the horse. Megan has Lacey swing by the lab to look at safety vests and finds out that she really doesn’t want to go to Boston. Her friend’s birthday party is that weekend, but Todd doesn’t care. I think Megan is a little happy about this development. And she’s even more excited when Lacey points out that Brinn’s foot couldn’t have gotten caught in the stirrup because most riders use ones that release if you get caught. So it’s time for a field trip back to the stable with Lacey in toe. Lacey shows how the stirrup should work, but she also finds the one that Brinn was riding was tampered with. I really dislike the stable manager. He’s creepy.

Apparently I’m not the only one who finds him creepy. Brinn’s boyfriend, James, thought so, too. Apparently Mr. Creepy kept making passes at Brinn. Megan and Peter keep him talking while Bud inspects Brinn’s storage shed. Bud finds all kinds of trophies and ribbons and Lacey sneaks up on him. When Peter pops in to tell her that Megan is looking for her, Lacey remarks that she doesn’t understand how Brinn could have fallen off her horse. That is indeed the question of the hour. Megan gets back to the lab to find that Kate did the lung dissection. She’s a little short with her, but they do uncover an injection point in her hip (being drugged is the only way she could have fallen off the horse and gotten a blow to the stomach to force her stomach contents into her lungs). They head upstairs so Kate can take a sample to the lab for analysis when they find Todd waiting. He’s really pissed that Megan took Lacey to a crime scene, but he refuses to let Megan have Lacey for the weekend. Way to use the kid to make your ex hurt. Jerk.

Peter also swings by with some results from a white powder they found under Brinn’s fingernails. It was a mixture of horse feed and a compound used to treat pain in horses. Apparently her boyfriend’s horse was disqualified for having too much of it in its system. Now he’s not looking so grief-stricken after all. Turns out Brinn’s boyfriend amped up his own horse for an edge in the competition, but he denies killing Brinn. As Bud tells Megan he thinks Lacey wants to spend more time with her, she gets results from the lab. Someone shot Brinn up with horse anesthetic. So now it’s back to Zoe. Zoe denies she did anything to Brinn and that the argument a guard saw shortly before Brinn died was Zoe begging Brinn to stop calling her (Zoe’s) mom. Bud still wants to know how Zoe’s fingerprints ended up on the box of horse sedatives (with one vial missing). She says she was putting the sedatives away because Brinn asked her to. Some guy was trying to put a white horse down.

In the lab, Ethan is going through the horse’s waste and finds out that the horse was sick with an injured leg and Mr. Creep from the stables sold the horse to a guy who returned it when the horse couldn’t compete. Poor horse. So Brinn was trying to take care of it. On a coffee break, Kate is trying to convince Todd that Megan has changed. He doesn’t want to accept that and denies he invited Lacey to go with them because he’s afraid of losing her. Before Todd can counter her too much, Kate gets called back to the lab. The horse has all kinds of problems including arthritis, splints and someone filed its teeth down with silver nitrate to make it look younger. All signs once again point towards Mr. Creep.

Ethan and Peter find an empty bottle of the sedative that was in Brinn’s system and the syringe. Mr. Creep claims he got caught by Brinn and that he would stop and she could have the old horses for her prisoner program. The last time he saw the syringe, Brinn had it. I still don’t trust him. And I really don’t like Todd either. He lets Megan have Lacey for the weekend but balks when Megan says she wants Lacey every other weekend. He doesn’t stay long. Lacey calls Megan, complaining that Todd is late picking her up. And so, Megan goes and after some beating around the bush apologizes to Kate for be being so bitchy and thanks her for nudging Todd into letting Lacey stay. Unfortunately their happy moment is ruined when Curtis brings in the results of the syringe. There wasn’t enough in Brinn’s system to kill her.

So it’s back to the body to try and find more evidence. It comes in the form of glitter. And the manure at the scene didn’t belong to the horse Brinn was riding. Her boyfriend thought she was cheating on him with Mr. Creep and so he killed her. Later that evening, Peter stops by the morgue to tell Megan some of the prisoners who worked with Brinn were taking up a collection for a memorial service. And the program will still continue so Zoe can get a job when she gets out of prison. And Bud brings by her daughter. I think he finally believes people can change. We end with Megan and Todd telling/asking Lacey if she wants to spend more time with Megan, she can start with alternating weekends. Finally, some progress in Megan’s favor.

HIMYM 7.07: "Noretta"

2011-12-02T22:52:00.002-05:00

“I can turn this around!”
-Barney

“Noretta” falls among my less liked episodes of “How I Met Your Mother,” mostly because I found the central theme of the episode to be rather juvenile, and the resulting jokes were mostly just pretty gross. I’m sorry, but characters picturing their significant others as their parents just isn’t funny to me. It’s just awkward. I like comedy just fine, but I prefer witty comedy as opposed to comedy that just goes for the cheap laugh. And I’d classify Lily and Marshall’s dads looking like they are about to have sex as cheap laughs. Granted, Barney’s plot in this episode was also more cheap laughs than wit, but I didn’t mind it quite as much. Maybe because the cheap laughs weren’t really gross? I was feeling more sorry for Nora than grossed out as Barney desperately tried to salvage their ruined several times over date night. I’ll also do my best not to start ranting about how this episode made Ted extra pathetic. He’s supposed to be the optimistic romantic, not the clingy loser.

Anyway, the episode opens, as they often do, with the gang sitting around a table at MacLaren’s. Barney’s brother James is in town, so they have a bigger booth than usual to accommodate the extra person. Wayne Brady was kind of wasted in this episode (because he’s only in the opening scene), but I know he comes back in the most recent episode, so I’m not going to complain too much. Barney’s super excited because he thinks he’s going to get lucky with Nora later that night. She told him earlier that she had a special treat for him. Nora herself appears and starts to tell Barney more about the actual treat. They’re going ice skating, which, needless to say, doesn’t interest Barney a whole lot. Then Nora says they’re going to shag afterwards, and Barney is feeling much better.

After Barney and Nora leave the table, James begs the rest of the gang to ask him what he thinks of Nora. After being prompted several times, James lets loose with the truth. Nora reminds James of his and Barney’s mother. Apparently Loretta Stinson has a thing for Julie Andrews and would often affect a British accent and act like Maria or Mary Poppins. Barney and Nora return to the table to get Nora’s raincoat, and instead of seeing Nora, James starts seeing his mom instead. After Barney and Nora leave, the conversation at the table turns to Lily not feeling sexy anymore because she’s putting on pregnancy weight. Marshall desperately wants to change her mind with compliments, but he keeps sticking his foot in his mouth instead. Finally, continuing the theme of honesty, Robin asks Ted how he feels about Kevin. Ted likes Kevin overall, but he feels weird about this one time he saw Kevin standing in the living room of the apartment in his boxers. Robin assures Ted she’ll talk to Kevin about it.

At the ice rink, Nora skates around while Barney happily tells a kid getting ready to skate that he’s going to get lucky with Nora that night. It looks like Barney’s hopes might be dashed, though, when Nora falls on the ice and loses a tooth. Barney vow to turn the night around, and he takes Nora to a really shady 24 hour dentist who gives her a gold tooth. That’s not the end of their terrible night, though. Just after Barney convinces Nora to go out for another drink, a rat jumps on her head. Once again, Barney vows to turn it around. He does so by offering to draw Nora a bath at his apartment so she can relax. Nora agrees. The night is starting to turn, and after her bath, Nora and Barney go out on the balcony of Barney’s apartment. When an upstairs neighbor decides to commit suicide by jumping, falling right by Barney and Nora. That ruins the mood for sure, and Barney has to comfort a crying Nora. Later, while they’re sitting on the couch, Nora says that now she wants to turn the night around. She starts singing “My Favorite Things,” and all of a sudden Barney realizes the resemblance to his mother.

As promised, Robin tells Kevin that he needs to be fully clothed in the apartment common areas. What Ted told Robin wasn’t the full story though, and Kevin thinks Ted is nuts. Which is probably not something a psychologist would actually say, but whatever. Ted was wearing a loose-fitting bathrobe, and Kevin caught a glimpse as Ted went to the kitchen. Startled, Kevin dropped coffee on his lap, and that’s why he didn’t have his pants on when Ted saw him standing in the living room. Robin tells Kevin to be nice to Ted because Ted is the only one in the gang not in a relationship, and he hasn’t exactly gotten any in a while. Kevin sort of makes an effort at this, but he breaks and throws a fit when Ted ruins a movie at home night with Robin. Ted was pretty obnoxious, switching their movie to a coin documentary, getting a backrub from Robin, and inviting Robin to a concert. After Kevin throws his fit, Robin explains that she wouldn’t have been the first person Ted would have invited to the concert (Weird Al Yankovic) by a long shot, and we see a really funny montage of Ted calling different random characters to prove it. Kevin feels bad for Ted and pretends to be a huge Weird Al fan. He offers to go to the concert with Ted, and Ted is really excited about it. At this point, Kevin’s striking me as a little too perfect and desperate.

Marshall has a new strategy for trying to make Lily feel sexier. It’s a board game called “Chutes and Lilies.” Instead of having the intended effect, though, it unfortunately makes Lily think of her dad. We learned in season 5 that Mr. Aldrin is always making board games. It gets worse when Marshall draws a nice bath for Lily, but she keeps seeing her dad instead of Marshall. The whole storyline is just gross, really. And it gets even more obnoxious from there. Lily finally admits to Marshall that he’s reminding her of her dad. Marshall responds by saying he thinks Kevin’s theory about how people gravitate towards romantic partners who remind them of their parents is bunk because Lily’s not like Marshall’s mom at all. Lily’s finally feeling better and is about to make a move on Marshall, when all of a sudden Marshall realizes who she is actually like. His dad. The climax of the whole thing is a really unfunny scene of Marshall and Lily in bed picturing each other as their dads and getting completely grossed out and backing off.

The episode wraps up with the gang back at MacLaren’s. Barney admits that Nora is like his mother, but he has a different spin on it than the rest of the gang. He thinks that if Nora is at all like his mother, he’s lucky, because his mom is the best person he knows. Marshall expresses the same sentiment about Lily and his dad, and they leave the bar much happier, presumably to go have sex. Ted realizes that he’s been intrusive to Robin and Kevin, and he tells them to go home and enjoy their movie while he hangs out at the bar a while longer. A woman approaches Ted, and it turns out she’s a massive Weird Al fan. Just as Ted is really liking where things are going, the woman starts to remind him of his mom. He decides to just go with it.

Person of Interest 1.05: "Judgment"

2011-11-26T08:55:00.001-05:00

Now that you've all hopefully recovered from your post-Thanksgiving turkey comas, here is another "Person of Interest" write-up courtesy of Sarah.

***

“Finch, I think I found a way to hurt these guys.”
- Reese

During our usual jumble of surveillance video that serves as transition, we see a man run over by a white car in a parking garage and a phone call between two men stating they have a problem. Then we find Finch in a diner, and Reese shows up, asking what’s good. Finch is paranoid that Reese is trying to find out where he lives by determining if he’s come to the diner often. Really, Reese just wants to know what’s good. It doesn’t appear he’s got much time for breakfast, though, because the machine has spit out another number. This week’s person of interest is Samuel Gates, widower with a young son who happens to be a judge in the criminal court, and he’s hearing the case of the driver who hit the man with the white car. So clearly he’s not going to be on the perpetrating end of the spectrum this week. While court is in session (yay for following proper admissibility rules. My evidence professor would be pleased), Reese infiltrates Gates’ chambers looking for anything that might lead to why someone is after the judge. He finds a bunch of hate mail and sends it to Finch for analysis. While the judge finishes up lunch, Reese follows him and some shady looking white guys with crew cuts and manages to recover a phone. It looks like these guys are going after Sam Gates, Jr. Reese gets to the house as the perps are kidnapping the boy and he takes a couple of them down, but Reese gets shot and they get away with the boy.

Reese grumbles about how he can’t be there in time if he has bad information, but Finch assures him the machine spit out dad’s number not the son’s. Before Finch can say much, Reese heads out, gun in hand. He’s not a happy guy (then again, is he ever?). Court is out, and Judge Gates is heading out of the courthouse when the kidnappers call. They say he can’t go to the cops or the feds or else his son will die. He hastily calls his son’s cell phone, his nanny, and a family friend, but no dice. Just as he sinks to the steps, Reese appears (reminds me of Parker from “Leverage”) and tells the judge they’re going to get his son back. They head back to the judge’s house, and Reese taps the phone and sets up a camera to cover the street outside the house. Finch hasn’t had much luck with the burner phone Reese recovered, and the cell phone company firewall is giving him trouble. Reese tells him to hurry up anyway, as the nanny is dead.

Over at police HQ Lionel is going through Carter’s desk. It looks like he sees a photo from when Reese was still a bum, but he scurries back to his own desk before Carter gets back. Before they have much time for Carter to question about why Lionel was transferred, Reese texts. He needs to see Lionel. In the coffee line, Reese hands over the bullet that killed the nanny, leaving Lionel to talk to himself in line. Meanwhile, Finch finally cracked the cell company’s firewall and gives Reese an address. The kidnappers need to sleep somewhere, and Reese manages to knock out one off the guys. He figures out very quickly they are an Eastern European gang. Definitely bad news. The cops have found the nanny’s body and are looking into questioning her clients. Carter’s on the scene because she got a call that the super at the building spotted Reese. Later that night, an officer shows up at Gates’ house to deliver the news. He feeds the officer a convincing story about the nanny not being home when his son got there, so he (the Judge) came home early to be there. The office leaves and we pan back inside to see Reese hidden just out of view. Reese assures the judge that he will find Sam Jr. And he can do that better than the cops or the FBI because he can be invisible. Well not if the super at the nanny’s building spotted him!

Judge Gates starts to say he should call the cops back and hand Reese over when the phone rings. It’s the kidnappers. It’s not your typical kidnap-ransom. They Eastern Europeans want the judge to throw the hit-and-run case in exchange for his son’s return. So now Reese and Finch need to figure out why the defendant (Angela) is so important. Turns out Angela is an account executive, and the man she mowed down was a CPA. Reese tells the judge to stall to give him more time to figure out what’s really going on. Finch has found more information on the gang. They’re not so much a bunch of thugs as a multi-national organization in over eighteen countries. While Finch digs more into Angela, Reese is going to try and wring some information out of the gang member locked in his trunk. No dice, though. Back at police HQ, Lionel spots Carter looking at the nanny crime scene photos. At about the same time, he gets a call from Reese asking about the ballistics report. The gun that fired the bullet didn’t have any matches in the system. Reese tries to the end call by saying he’ll be in touch but Lionel insists he can help. All Reese wants from him is to keep Carter out of the way.

In court, Finch clones Angela’s phone and keeps an eye on the judge. He reverses himself on the admissibility issue and continuously sustains defense objections during the prosecutor’s witnesses. He calls a recess until the next morning, but whoever has eyes in the court room for the gang calls and tells the judge to stop stalling. Reese drives around a bumpy, muddy parking lot to try to loosen the gang member’s tongue. Eventually, he gives Reese the address where he went to get paid. He also explains that they work in cells of four people. Finch is still at the courthouse as Reese heads for the address. He overhears a conversation between Angela and the head kidnapper. Whatever’s going on, it’s bad for the kidnapper’s business. But good for our dynamic duo. At the address, Reese finds another of the kidnappers and a whole lot of fake money.

We now have the real link between the gang and Angela. She installs software that detects money laundering. And she installed it at one bank, and if she still has access, she can turn it off with the click of a mouse, allowing the gang to clean their dirty money. Reese pays another visit to his two gang members in the trunk and uncuffs one to get the name of their boss out of the other. Meanwhile, Lionel did some more work and found the long-haired guy getting into a car. He ran the license plate and found it connected to a company Coldfield Holdings. Reese gives Finch the boss’s name and gets a text from Lionel about the company. We have a winner. It also seems the gang is laundering money for other people. Lots and lots of people. Finch sends Reese an address that’s only ten blocks from the judge’s house. Worth a shot, but Reese needs to hurry. The jury in Angela’s case is back with a verdict. The judge’s throwing the case worked because the jury finds her not guilty.

Finch calls Reese with the bad news, but Reese is already on it. He snags Angela at the courthouse as the judge goes off to meet the kidnappers. It isn’t looking good for the judge and his son until Reese shows up. He tells the leader that he’s transferred all the funds in his clients’ accounts to an offshore account. If the kidnappers don’t let Sam and the judge go, the clients will be notified of the missing money. Reese gets to be the hero and wound all the baddies and dump them at the house where he found the money. On cue, the cops show up and arrest everyone. The next day, Reese pops in for a final visit to the judge while he plays soccer with his son. The judge thanks Reese for his help but says he won’t be able to protect Reese in the future when the cops find out who he is. We end back at the diner. Finch asks what the judge said, and when Reese says he knows he judge will help them in the future, Finch says he was listening. Reese explains he was reading between the lines. Finch leaves, but not before giving a breakfast recommendation.

Thanksgiving "Classic" Recap: How I Met Your Mother: "Slapsgiving"

2011-11-24T12:36:00.002-05:00

“Relapse five! That’s where we high five, then it’s awkward for a little bit, and then we high five again!”
-Barney

We’re celebrating Thanksgiving here at MTVP with one of my very favorite episodes of “How I Met Your Mother.” In fact, it’s such a favorite that it made the 15 Most Legendary Episodes series that I did way back in the first months of this blog (those crazy days when I was unemployed and had time to write over twenty posts a month…let’s hope that doesn’t become the case again after I graduate this May). I love this episode because it’s genuinely funny throughout, and the found family friendship of the gang gives me the Thanksgiving warm fuzzies. I love my family’s Thanksgiving that is often so Norman Rockwell it shocks people, but gatherings like the one in this episode are lovely, too. At my undergrad, we’d have a Thanksgiving dinner served by faculty, and it was wonderful to gather with my very close group of friends (I always say that if we all lived in the same city after graduation, we would have been like the HIMYM crew) to celebrate. I think part of why I love this episode is because it reminds me of my friends and those special times we’ve had.

The episode opens on a rather awkward note for Ted and Robin. They’ve been kind of just going along with the gang’s usual activities since their break-up six months ago, but things are seriously awkward under the surface. They used to have a joke where they would salute every time somebody said a word that doubles as a military rank (like major or general), but they don’t do it anymore. They also take great pains not to be alone together. They don’t have to be alone at the beginning of the episode, because the gang is all at MacLaren’s discussing the upcoming Thanksgiving. It’s going to be the first Thanksgiving the group is planning to celebrate together and the first time Marshall and Lily get to break out the good wedding china and entertain. Robin’s planning to bring her new, significantly older boyfriend Bob because he has nowhere else to go for the holiday. This kind of irks Lily, who thinks Bob will seem out of place when they look back on their first Thanksgiving as a group. Lily’s going to have bigger problems than that, though. Marshall has started calling the holiday “Slapsgiving,” which makes Barney nervous, because Marshall still gets three more slaps from their slap bet. Marshall’s gone all out for this one, even creating a website called slapcountdown.com.

The gang is supposed to meet up at Robin’s to bake pies on the night before Thanksgiving (Marshall can’t be trusted not to eat them ahead of time if they’re in his apartment), but only Ted shows up. This means it’s more awkward Robin and Ted alone time. Ted tries to call Barney to get him to help, but he’s in the middle of hitting on a woman at MacLaren’s, and he just turns the call into part of his game by pretending it’s the President calling to give him a commendation. At Thanksgiving the next day, we find out what happened when Ted and Robin are left alone. Ted tells the story to Marshall and Barney, and Robin tells the story to Lily. There was awkward pie baking for a while with Robin dishing out fun facts and Ted saying awkward things about their past relationship. Then they start fighting over Bob. Ted thinks Bob is a loser, obviously. This of course results in sex, which the rest of the group, when they hear about it, thinks was a very bad idea.

Robin wants to talk about what happened, but Ted doesn’t. This results in them fighting again, and Lily throws them both in Ted’s bedroom to work it out. They have a rather sad discussion about how since the break-up, they’ve really just been pretending to be friends, and they can’t do that anymore. The result seems to be that after Thanksgiving dinner, they are going to break all ties. Which seems like it would be kind of difficult to do considering they have all the same friends, but whatever. It’s interesting to compare this to what’s happening on the show now, with both Ted and Barney being Robin’s exes and Robin and Barney’s recent relapse. Victoria warning Ted that the three of them continuing to hang out constantly like nothing ever happened wasn’t going to work long-term. I think we’re seeing the very beginnings of that here, and it’s kind of surprising that the group has been able to function for all these years since Robin and Ted’s break-up. I guess that’s because it’s television!

While Ted and Robin are hashing things out, Barney is out in the living room begging Marshall not to slap him. Marshall refuses to give in, though. When the countdown ends, there’s going to be a slap. Barney is so upset that he even tries to leave the apartment, but Lily puts a stop to it. She changes her mind and declares as Slap Bet Commissioner that there will be no slaps on Thanksgiving. It’s understandable that she wouldn’t want her first time hosting Thanksgiving to fall apart because of the slap bet.

So everybody sits down around the table to eat, and they’re all kind of pissed off for different reasons. Lily doesn’t even want to give a toast, declaring that the day sucks and everyone should just eat up and go home. Marshall, as usual, takes a more thoughtful approach, though. He gives a nice toast about friendship and thanks Lily for beginning this tradition of the group celebrating Thanksgiving together. Bob remarks that this is really nice compared to his family Thanksgivings, and it prompts Ted and Robin to sort of reconcile their friendship. As the countdown clock winds down, Barney gets really obnoxious about taunting Marshall’s lack of permission to slap, and at the last minute, Lily gets so fed up with Barney that she gives Marshall permission to deliver the slap after all. Slap three is an awesome slapstick performance by Neil Patrick Harris where he falls on and breaks an end table, and it’s followed up by the legendary song Marshall had prepared, called “You Just Got Slapped.” The group happily enjoys the song, with Barney’s pained groans serving as backing vocals.

Ringer 1.06: "The Poor Kids Do It Every Day"

2011-11-23T23:00:00.001-05:00

"You asked for a warrant? Here it is. Spelled your name right and everything."
-Victor

I’ll just come out and say it. This episode of “Ringer” was kind of slow. After all the drama that went down in the last episode, I guess everyone needed time to react to those events. One bright spot of the episode, however, was the introduction of Jason Dohring (Logan from “Veronica Mars”) as a high school English teacher who has the misfortune of teaching Juliet now that she’s transferred to public school. I’m a huge “Veronica Mars” fan, and it’s always nice to see the very talented cast getting work. The episode has me really, really curious about just what happened to Gemma, because in this episode alone, the tables were turned multiple ties and new twists were added. By the end of the episode, we think we know who is responsible for Gemma’s disappearance, but we don’t know for sure if all is as it seems, and we also don’t know Gemma’s current status. I thought she was supposed to be a major character in the show, so I’m rather curious to see where this plot goes.

This episode has a lot of scenes of Bridget just looking broody in general, and the first is right at the beginning of the episode, with Bridget checking on Juliet and sort of tucking her in for the night. Bridget runs into Andrew in the hallway, and Andrew tells her about the call he received from Gemma and how Henry acted really strange when he stopped by their house to check on Gemma. We then go to a quick cut of Henry cleaning up the blood from the wall of his house. We later see Henry leave a car in long term parking at JFK, which makes him look even shadier. Cue What Happened to Gemma Theory 1 of the episode.

Bridget leaves a voice mail for Gemma while Andrew fights with Juliet over what Juliet is going to wear for her first day at public school. He thinks the shorts and tank top she’s wearing are kind of skanky, and Bridget agrees. As do I. Juliet takes Bridget’s advice about making a good first impression to heart and goes to change her clothes. Before she leaves for school, she also gives Bridget the last of her stash of drugs. This triggers another bout of Bridget broodiness, as she struggles to actually dispose of the drugs instead of using them. She shoves the bad in her dresser and calls Charlie for some pseudo-sponsor help. When she hangs up the phone, she gets a call from the doorman that someone from Gemma’s office wants to see her. Gemma’s minion wants to return the keys to the loft since Gemma’s company won’t be working on it anymore. She also mentions that Gemma hasn’t shown up at the office. The minion is not especially concerned, because she might be on site somewhere, but Bridget is concerned.

We then transition to Juliet’s first class at her new school with Logan (I’m just going to keep calling Jason Dohring’s character Logan here until I bother to learn his actual name). Juliet is polite to him when entering class, but things quickly go downhill when another student named Tessa starts harassing Juliet, calling her “Rich Girl” and asking her for $5. Juliet gives Tessa the money, but she gets the upper hand by telling Tessa that the money will probably be able to pay for her family to eat all week. The conflict escalates after class to a major fight out in the hallway. Tessa shoves Juliet into a locker, and Juliet fights back until Logan and some school police officers break it up. Juliet lands in the principal’s office, and thanks to her lengthy disciplinary record from her former school, the principal doesn’t believe her when she says Tessa started the fight. It doesn’t help that Tessa has her classmates under her control, and they all say that Juliet started the fight. The principal has called in Andrew to discuss the matter, and he doesn’t seem to believe Juliet, either. Logan ends up saving the day by telling the principal what actually happened (even though he wasn’t really an eyewitness to the beginning of the fight), and he tells Juliet that she deserves a second chance. Something tells me this won’t end well.

Bridget goes to Henry and Gemma’s house to try and locate Gemma, but only Henry is there, and he’s really upset. He accuses “Siobhan” of being behind Gemma’s disappearance. Apparently, way back when, the real Siobhan had “joked” about having Gemma and Andrew killed so she and Henry could be together. Henry gets a little scary, continually demanding to know what “Siobhan” has done with Gemma. Bridget continues to deny knowing anything about the disappearance, and she is eventually able to leave the house, obviously convinced that Henry is to blame. It doesn’t help that he told her all about the blood on the wall, tossing the cleaning rags in a restaurant dumpster, and leaving Gemma’s car in long term parking. He claims he did it all to protect Siobhan (because he thinks she’s responsible), but it’s not very convincing to Bridget.

Meanwhile, out in Wyoming, Victor has found Malcolm’s car, still abandoned in the parking garage. Still in captivity, Malcolm looks to be about to break. He’s been re-addicted to heroin, and the thugs have denied him the drugs for long enough that he’s experiencing withdrawal symptoms. Victor shows up at the crime lord’s strip club (where Malcolm is being held in the basement), but the thugs won’t let him search there for Malcolm without a warrant. DNA from a cigarette in the parking garage is traced to one of the crime lord’s minions, though, so Victor is able to get his warrant and access to the club. By the time this is accomplished, though, Malcolm is long gone.

Henry shows up at the Martin house in his usual creepy way. He claims he now believes that Bridget isn’t connected to Gemma’s disappearance, but Bridget kicks him out anyway and goes to the coffee shop to meet up with Charlie. Charlie manages to throw out Juliet’s drugs for her. When he tries to connect with Bridget any further, though, Bridget runs off. She calls Henry and says she needs to make sure the police don’t connect Gemma’s disappearance to her in any way. Bridget follows that up by going to the dumpster with the cleaning rags, opening it up to verify the contents, and calling the police tip line. Thanks to Bridget’s tip, Henry is taken in by police for questioning. All of a sudden, though, the police let Henry go free. It’s quickly apparent why. We see Victor get a call from New York, where police have found Bridget’s fingerprints at the dumpster while investigating Gemma’s disappearance.

When Bridget gets home, Andrew sits her down to give her the news about Gemma’s disappearance and how the police now suspect foul play. Bridget manages to fake being surprised and upset pretty well. Soon after that conversation, she gets a phone call from Victor. He wants to know from “Siobhan” why Bridget’s fingerprints are at the crime scene. It turns out Bridget left the fingerprints purposely. I guess she figured that by implicating “Bridget” in Gemma’s disappearance, he would be safe from the police as long as she was “Siobhan.” Bridget isn’t the only sister acting nefariously, though. We quick move to Paris where Siobhan (the real Siobhan) gets a call informing her that the Bridget problem has been “taken care of.”

Body of Proof 2.05: "Point of Origin"

2011-11-20T23:21:00.000-05:00

For your reading pleasure, here's another "Body of Proof" write-up courtesy of Sarah.

***

“I know what it’s like to wonder about your birth parents because I wondered about mine for years.”
- Peter

Peter is driving along late at night when he stops to see a house on fire. After making a 911 call, he barges in to try and be a hero. He manages to save a woman (though she’s in critical condition), but her husband wasn’t so lucky. Megan gets to scene to find out that the couple (the Applebees) had some domestic dispute trouble a week earlier. Bud and Sam tell Megan that the arson investigators are handling the scene, and she doesn’t seem too thrilled. It becomes clear very quickly why Megan isn’t happy about working with the arson boys, led by Ray Easton. They won’t release the body to her until they’re done, and it took them three hours. Ray thinks someone poured accelerant on the husband’s body, but Megan can’t confirm until after she examines it. They also have an argument over Peter breaking in to save the wife. Ray thinks he should have waited for the fire department and both of them could have lived. Megan’s not so sure.

When she finally gets the body back to the lab, Megan determines that it was lighter fluid in the husband’s pocket that caused the fourth degree burns to his leg and pelvis. And she’s called in Kate to help with bone fragments. Things go from bad to weird when Ethan arrives with the Mike Applebee’s dental records. He also brings news that Peter is fine except for a bruised shoulder. Megan wants Peter to stay at the hospital to collect the wife’s clothes, and she tries to get Bud to nudge Ray along on what started the fire. Ethan thinks he knows what subdued the couple (cyanide), but Megan reminds him that when a fire burns it releases toxins into the air. And the weirdest thing of all is the crispy body in autopsy is not in fact Mike Applebee. He had all his wisdom teeth removed, but the body in the morgue still has all of his.

Megan is examining the John Doe when Curtis walks in. He tells her that most of the time he sides with Kate when it comes to issues with Megan, but on the Todd front, he’s Team Megan all the way. I really thought they’d put their drama behind them from last week. Guess not. Anyway, Megan keeps trying to cut into the victim’s skull to see if he suffered head trauma but keeps getting interrupted. Ethan shows up to tell her the cause of death was carbon monoxide poisoning. Not surprising given he was in a fire. Over at the hospital, Peter is checking up on Jenna, the wife. She’s unconscious and still being treated for carbon monoxide and cyanide toxicity when Ray Easton’s lackey shows up. He says he wants Jenna’s clothes, but Megan got to them first. He also tells Peter about the John Doe. Peter is clearly distraught over not knowing there was a second person in the house.

Meanwhile, Bud and Sam have tracked down the real Mike Applebee in some run down motel. He claims he wouldn’t hurt Jenna and that the last few months had been difficult with him being out of work and her working more often. He called her out on why she wasn’t coming home and she threw him out. He denies being anywhere near the house when the fire started. He was in his motel room reading The Girl Who Played with Fire. Back at the lab, Megan is examining John Doe’s brain. She discovers that someone hit John Doe over the head while he was still alive. She heads back to the scene to try and look for a murder weapon and finds that the arson investigators haven’t even left the kitchen yet. They’ve been on scene ten hours and have made very little progress, though they claim an old fridge was the cause of the fire. Megan doesn’t think so.

Bud and Peter show up bearing Jenna’s clothes and a possible murder weapon from Mike Applebee’s motel room. Down in the lab, Kate is still working on her bone fragment analysis while Ethan examines what he can out of John Doe’s wallet. He finds a picture and a card indentation in the leather. It turns out to be an organization that works to reunite adopted children with their birth parents. John Doe is now identified as Ben. Jenna was a client of the organization, and they helped find her birth father, Daniel Robinson. But it seems he wasn’t interested in seeing his daughter because he closed his door on Ben’s hand. Guess that’s where the hand fracture came from. Back at the lab, Megan, Peter and Kate have a little pow-wow which is rudely interrupted by Peter getting a call that Mike Applebee was arrested.

Peter is really pissed that they arrested Mike without even looking into Jenna’s biological father. Bud claims they didn’t have any reason to look at him, especially since Ray says the vodka bottle found on top of the old fridge with Mike’s prints on it was the accelerant. Peter finally reveals that when he went into the house, Jenna called him dad. Would have been useful to know beforehand, Peter. The car ride to the Robinson house is quiet and we finally get a little Peter back story. He was adopted, and when his dad died, Peter got a sealed envelope with information about his birth parents. But he buried the information with his father because he didn’t think he wanted to know. Looks like he and Megan have something in common. They meet Daniel Robinson, and he says that Jenna showed up the night of the fire despite his wishes not to see her and he turned her away. But he says he never went to her house and didn’t know anything about the fire.

Curtis is examining Jenna’s clothes, and he’s using her shoes to chart her movements the day of the fire. There’s trace of floor cleaner from where she worked and a pebble to corroborate she visited Daniel’s house. And she stepped in wet paint. Just then, Peter shows up with the news that Jenna is dead. Megan tells Peter that she can handle the autopsy on her own and lets him go home. He’s still pretty upset over the whole thing. Megan begins to look over Jenna’s body and discovers there’s far more cyanide in her body than here should be, given the treatment she was on had been working. So someone poisoned her. At the police station, Bud is releasing Mike and Peter stays to look through hospital security footage. Megan continues the autopsy and finds blunt force trauma to Jenna’s head made by a different weapon than the one used on Ben. We get a very brief exchange between Megan and Kate regarding Todd. I really thought they’d gotten over this whole issue.

Peter is still going through the security footage when Ray’s lackey shows up to help. We learn that Peter was a cop, but he got shot and decided he liked medicine. Ray’s lackey said that Ray took him under his wing. Peter fast forwards through some more footage and finds Daniel Robinson’s daughter, Emily on the tape. Emily claims she was only there to try and give Jenna some peace. Her dad didn’t know she was home when Jenna was there. Peter runs into Daniel waiting for Emily and demands to know why Daniel gave up Jenna. It turns out Daniel was only seventeen when Jenna was born. He left her in a police station with a t-shirt and a stuffed turtle. The same turtle Jenna was holding when Peter rescued her (that got lost in the fire). Bud is out checking to see if there’s any footage of Jenna at the nearest train station while Megan and Sam check the park (which Emily said she saw Jenna head towards the night of the fire). It leads them to a toy store fire where Megan finds a spent canon fuse. She thinks that Ray has been setting the toy store fires.

Kate is arguing her case to Bud (he’s rather defensive about the accusations) and Megan backs her up. She’s found leather fibers in Jenna’s head wound and Bud makes the connection of a sap (a leather thing passed down in families of cops). Megan borrows Bud’s to test against the wounds while Peter goes with Ray’s lackey to the toy store. Things get out of hand pretty quickly. Ray shows up in autopsy all creepy-like and denies setting the fires. He says he gave his sap to Skip (his lackey). So Ray isn’t the arsonist, Skip is. Peter puts it together pretty quickly and Bud and Sam show up just in time to nab Skip. The next morning, Peter goes to tell Ben’s biological mother they caught the killer and to ask for her help in finding his birth parents. At the lab, Megan and Kate are actually civil to each other about the whole Todd situation. Megan even gives Kate tips on where to go on their next date. Things are definitely getting interesting.

HIMYM 7.06: "Mystery vs. History"

2011-11-20T22:53:00.000-05:00

“Oh my God. They’re six minutes into the date. Ted’s probably already told her that he loves her. We’ve gotta get down there!”
-Barney

“Mystery vs. History” was a rather sweet, although not especially memorable, episode of “How I Met Your Mother.” It had some good funny moments, although I wouldn’t put it in the pantheon of best episodes, either. As the title pretty easily points out, the theme of the episode is whether or not it’s better to go into a situation completely prepared and knowing everything, or if a little mystery makes life more exciting and fulfilling. Personally, I think I’m somewhat in the middle on this debate. On the rare occasions where I do allow myself to be surprised (a few rare unspoiled episodes of “Lost” come to mind), I find the surprise to be a whole lot of fun. Most of the time, though, I have no willpower, and as several of the characters say in this episode, “I gots ta know!” I’m really enjoying much of the Marshall and Lily baby storyline right now, because it’s speaking directly to my life, and that’s when HIMYM works the best for me. My college roommate/best friend and her husband are having a boy in February, and while I haven’t been able to be a part of it as much as Ted has been a part of Marshall and Lily’s pregnancy due to the fact that we live about three hours apart, I still see elements of these episodes that are very true to my own experience thus far.

The article opens with a Saget!Ted monologue about how thanks to the Internet and smart phones, nothing is a mystery anymore. Peoples’ life history is just all out there for you to find easily. We flash back to 2005 (Was it really that different a world then? Please tell me it wasn’t so I don’t feel so old) where the gang is at MacLaren’s having what seems to be a fairly routine for them argument over trivia. They’re trying to determine the most popular food in the United States. Flash forward to today, and the group is sitting silently, all checking their smart phones. Somebody morosely drones that hey, it turns out that the most popular food in the United States is bread.

At MacLaren’s the group is having a (not capable of being resolved by internet searching) debate over whether or not Marshall and Lily should find out the sex of their baby. Doctor Sonya wrote it out on a card and put it in an envelope, but Marshall and Lily haven’t looked at it yet. Nevermind that couples can’t usually find this out until about 20 weeks (have I mentioned that beyond by college roommate I have two other friends who are due all within about a month of each other early next year?), and Marshall and Lily aren’t even half way to that point at the time of this episode. Barney, of course, thinks that Marshall and Lily should read the card immediately. Lily is hesitant, though. She thinks that by giving birth without knowing the sex of the baby, it will help her and Marshall not limit the baby with gender expectations. Robin chimes in (since her dad always treated her like a boy and all) with a rather hilarious flashback to her fourteenth birthday. Her dad dropped her out of a helicopter for a three day survival trek while he went to the Caribbean.

Ted goes to the bar for a drink and meets Janet, who is played by the same actress who played Ashleigh on “Greek.” They make a date, and Barney and Robin immediately want to start internet researching her to find out what’s wrong with her. This is apparently a regular occurrence. This time, though, Ted stops them. He goes back over to Janet and asks her to make a deal. They are not going to research each other prior to their date so that they can have the fun of discovering each other in person. This sounds rather creepy, but since Ted delivers the speech is his usual sappy, earnest way, Janet eats it up and agrees.

The next day, after Ted leaves for his date, Barney and Robin start their researching. Kevin desperately tries to get them to stop and go help Marshall and Lily paint the nursery instead. They go to Marshall and Lily’s alright, but they keep researching as Kevin does all the painting prep. Then Lily unveils the nursery paint color, which can really only be described as baby poo yellow. Lovely, right? Barney puts together a really hilarious presentation (complete with photos projected up on the wall) about the awesome gifts the baby will get if everyone knows the gender, as opposed to the androgynous burlap sack he/she will receive if Lily and Marshall keep it a secret. It seemed like Neil Patrick Harris was channeling The Price is Right a little bit, which makes sense, considering Barney’s former obsession with Bob Barker being his dad.

Still furiously researching wile Kevin paints, Robin yells out that she thinks Janet’s been widowed three times (the implication being she’s a murderer). Barney panics and says they need to go rescue Ted right away, and this makes Kevin lose it. He starts ranting about how the gang is the most controlling, codependent, incestuous group of people he’s ever known. He says that the only problem behavior he hasn’t seen from the gang is physical violence. Which is followed up by an awesome montage of past physical violence set to “Murder Train” of course. It’s little callbacks like that which make HIMYM great and rewarding for long-time viewers. Rather than facing up to the truth of that, the rest of the gang gets really pissed off until Kevin offers to paint the rest of the room by himself as an apology.

Ted and Janet’s date is not going well at all because neither of them have anything to talk about. I guess they were both so used to planning out conversation topics ahead of time based on their internet research that without the research, they were crippled. It gets to the point where Ted is so desperate for conversation topics that he starts talking about the font of the restaurant menu. I was wondering why they weren’t using this opportunity to ask questions about each other. Seems like a pretty obvious way to proceed to me. Meanwhile, Barney finds some real information about Janet and quickly shares it with Robin. They both do a synchronized spit take when they read about Janet’s background, and Barney texts Ted with a link to a story about Janet.

Ted finally figures out what I already had (that they should ask each other questions), and he and Janet start getting along well after he asks if she likes “Annie Hall” (she does). Janet gets up to use the rest room, and Ted is really tempted to look at the link Barney texted him. The suspense builds over at Dowisetrepla. Barney and Robin get to see the card with the baby’s gender, and they tease Marshall and Lily about it so Marshall and Lily really want to know too. It turns out, though that Barney has ripped the card in half, and he’ll only let them see it if they look at the Janet link. Marshall and Lily’s reaction is just as shocked as Barney and Robin’s was, although Kevin provides the spit take this time. Marshall ends up throwing the gender card out the window without reading it, and surprisingly, Lily is okay with that.

Ted plays through several scenarios of Janet’s big secret, which encompass everything from Janet actually being a dude to Janet not liking “Annie Hall.” Ted can’t take it anymore, and he finally looks at the link. It turns out that Janet is pretty much the perfect person. She’s a kidney-donating prodigy who really loves Annie Hall. When Janet reappears, Ted becomes a blubbering idiot in front of her, much to Janet’s chagrin. Ted just can’t take feeling so inferior to her, and he can’t even string a sentence together. Janet is disgusted by this, because this is how all guys act around her once they know about her background. Needless to say, the date’s over. Ted makes his way over to Dowisetrepla, and the gender card sticks to his shoe. Lily and Marshall see it and find out that they’re having a boy. They’re really thrilled, which was sweet. And Kevin leaves to go buy blue paint.

Fringe 4.04: "Subject 9"

2011-11-15T23:46:00.002-05:00

“I suppose I’ve learned that crazy is a lot more complicated than people think.”
-Walter

“Suspect 9” marked the final, sort-of long awaited return of Peter to the narrative, but really not in any way that he (or viewers) would have expected. All is not going to be back to “normal” any time soon. We’re still very much in the amber opening credits universe. And I wonder where we go from here. Clearly Peter is going to have to adjust to breaking out of nothingness only to find that the world he knew is gone because of his absence. I’m not sure if that’s compelling, or if I’d rather just have everybody back to the original recipe blue universe to finish out what is likely the last season of the show. I invested a lot in the original versions of these characters, you know? I think once Peter starts really reacting to nobody knowing who he is I’m going to be wishing for the old timeline even more. The centerpiece of “Fringe” is the relationship between Peter and Walter. They’re dynamic has been what has seen the show through the times when some of the writers’ more creative decisions haven’t quite panned out. To give that up for too long would be a serious mistake.

The episode opens with Olivia asleep in her apartment. An energy ball of sorts appears, and it seriously made me think of the kind of lame 1960’s special effects aliens that would show up in Star Trek (the original series). Olivia wakes up as the energy ball is hovering in her bedroom, and when she sees it, she completely freaks out. Meanwhile, Walter is at the lab trying to photograph the apparition he’s being seeing in reflective surfaces. Olivia stops by the lab and tells him what happened in her apartment. When Olivia leaves him alone to tend to some other business, Walter notices an envelope in her coat pocket, and notices the St. Claire’s logo on it. He decides to open the envelope, which is of course a rather bad idea. It’s a form from his St. Claire’s therapist recommending he return there for long-term treatment. Olivia still hasn’t signed off on his opinion yet.

Olivia and Astrid start an investigation at Olivia’s apartment, and the energy ball apparition appears yet again. Walter sees the whole thing go down on his monitor about 30 seconds before it actually happens, which was quite odd. Walter says that the whole thing reminds him of one of the other Cortexaphan trial kids known as Subject 9. Subject 9 could do astral projection, and the side effect was attracting metal objects like this energy ball seems to be doing. To get more information on this, Olivia and Astrid pay a visit to none other than Nina. She’s giving a speech on nanotechnology (at Massive Dynamic headquarters, I guess) when they find her. She lets Olivia and Astrid look at the files from the Cortexaphan trial, and they do indeed find Subject 9. His name is Cameron. In an effort to show that his mental health is sufficiently stable, Walter offers to go with Olivia to New York to find Cameron.

Olivia and Walter head to a New York City apartment building, but they find out from a neighbor that the person they’re looking for isn’t going to be home until the next day because he’s a truck driver. Olivia and Walter then get set up at a hotel for the night. The hotel room gives Walter a serious attack of germophobia, but instead of getting freaked out by Walter’s freak out, Olivia takes him for a root beer float. This is quite the bonding experience for Olivia and Walter, which is really kind of adorable. The adorable-ness doesn’t last for long, though, as Walter seizes the opportunity to ask Olivia about the St. Claire’s letter. Olivia kind of hedges when asked what her recommendation will be, but she doesn’t have too much time to talk about it before the kind of lame energy ball appears again. Olivia jumps out the restaurant window in an effort to get away from it, and she almost gets hit by a car.

Olivia and Walter head for Cameron’s apartment again, and this time, he’s home. He gets freaked out by Olivia’s questioning, and he tries to run away, knocking Walter down in the process. Seeing Walter makes him even more freaked out, which is understandable considering Walter conducted experiments on him when he was a child. Cameron reveals that he hasn’t been able to astral project for years, but he still has all the negative side effects (the attracting metal and such). The energy ball makes yet another appearance, but this time, Cameron is somehow able to stop it.

After seeing what Cameron can do and remembering how he saw the second attack in Olivia’s apartment before it even happened, Walter thinks that the energy ball is a sort of time distortion. Now that he has a theory, it’s time for a new experiment. Olivia, Walter, and Cameron head to what looks like an electrical substation. Walter thinks Olivia will attract the energy ball again, and this time, Cameron is going to try to disburse that energy through the wires. It definitely starts to work, but then Olivia sees Peter’s image in the energy ball and makes Cameron stop what he’s doing. All the way in Reiden Lake, a flesh-and-blood Peter surfaces from the water. Two fisherman in a boat on the lake pick him up.

Following the incident at the power substation, Olivia gets a call from Broyles about a man who suddenly appeared at Reiden Lake and knows a disturbing amount of classified information about Fringe Division. The man (Peter, obviously) is in the hospital, and Olivia, Walter, and Broyles go there to see him. Olivia sees Peter first, and although he expresses relief to see her, Olivia has no clue who he is. While Olivia’s visiting with Peter, Walter takes another peek at the St. Claire’s letter. Olivia has recommended that Walter not be hospitalized.

Person of Interest 1.04: "Cura Te Ipsum"

2011-11-09T07:19:00.000-05:00

Enjoy Sarah's take on episode 4 of "Person of Interest."

***

“I know that you spent years of your life healing people, and I know if you do this, if you murder this man in cold blood, it will kill you. I know what happens when you take a life. You lose a part of yourself. Not everything, just the part that matters the most.”
- Reese

We begin this week with a somewhat disturbing voiceover by an unseen woman. She’s talking about how when she closes her eyes, she still sees “him” and she wonders if she’s already dead. It doesn’t make a lot of sense now, but it will in time. Next, we find ourselves meeting this week’s number, Doctor Megan Tillman. She walks into a curtained off waiting area to see a patient whose been there two or three hours. Lo and behold it’s Mr. Finch. He’s complaining of back pain. He gets Megan to write him a prescription (and clones her pager). I’m pretty sure he isn’t faking the pain.

Reese follows her out to a food truck on her lunch break where he sees a well-dressed yet creepy guy watching Megan. Reese follows her that night as she goes home (telling her colleagues she needs to sleep since she works 80 hours a week). She’s not home long though. She heads out to a club. Reese sidelines a guy he thinks has a gun (it’s just a cell phone) and then spots the creepy well-dressed guy from the food truck. Enter Andrew Benton. It seems someone else is following Megan.

The next morning, Reese goes to scope out Benton’s apartment since not only is he creepy, he was carrying date rape drugs at the club. And he’s got various other drugs in his apartment. There’s also some concern since Megan’s been at the club every night that week. Much like the pilot, it appears we have a damsel in distress. And we also have our B plot of the episode. Detective Carter is going to talk to Finch about the robbery at the evidence locker since it appears he talked to the robber (aka Reese) from the surveillance video. That’s not going to end well.

Reese is a little annoyed that there is no apparent connection between Benton and Megan. He hasn’t done any sort of online checking up on that would indicate she was his next target. He and Finch do find an old college police report and Reese is off to talk to Lionel to get it. We find him playing hockey with his son when a group of drug dealers (the ones who lost product when the other corrupt cops got busted) shows up and threatens to kill Lionel if he doesn’t get them $1 million dollars in 2 days.

Another night means Reese is back at the club watching Megan. And this time Benton makes contact as the bar. They leave quickly and Benton tries to entice Megan back to his place but she declines. He really is creepy. But that’s not the worst of it. In continuing to follow Megan, Reese discovers that she’s the one doing the stalking. She stands in a parking garage across the street from Benton’s place and videos him entering the security code to get in. Honestly, I’m not that surprised. We can’t always have victims.

Reese pops up (quite literally) behind Lionel to pick up the police report (and a medical examiner’s report as well) and Lionel complains that if he’s going to keep helping Reese, he (Lionel) needs protection. He wants Reese to get rid of the cartel. But Reese isn’t interested. He proclaims he can find another dirty cop just as useful and without the baggage. Back at HQ, Reese and Finch learn why Megan is stalking Benton. In the 90s when she was in college, he supposedly raped a freshman girl at a frat party. That girl was Benton’s sister, Gabrielle. He was never arrested because she waited 2 days to report it and the physical evidence (rape kit and toxicology) were inconclusive. However, a year later, she OD’d on anti-depressants and sleeping pills. Megan’s after the man who caused her sister’s death. Not a good combination.

Detective Carter is heading to do her interview with Finch (whom she believes is a paralegal). Being the smart man that he is, he doesn’t let anything slip. She didn’t really think it would be that easy, did she? She thinks he slips up when she asks if any of the robbers said anything to him and he says ‘no’. He coves well. Later that night, Reese does a little surveillance on another cop meeting with a hooker to use for leverage. It’s also going to help with the Detective Carter prying.

Reese follows Megan (who is going by the name Kate) to a rape victim support group. Luckily, he manages to talk to Megan alone and sort of connects with her by saying he lost someone very close to him. It makes me wonder what happened to Jessica. Anyway, Megan says she’d gotten past what happened to Gabrielle until a month ago when she saw Benton and her world just crumbled. The following morning, Reese heads out to a beach house that was rented under Megan’s alias. And she’s got enough lye to dissolve a body in a few hours. Reese decides he’s not going to give Megan the chance to ruin her life by killing Benton. He’s going to do it for her.

But first he has to take care of Lionel’s drug cartel problem. He beats the crap out of the guys (but doesn’t kill them much to Lionel’s dismay) and steals some of their drugs. He pays a visit to Benton and knocks him out and sets him up to get arrested with said drugs in the front seat of his car. Unfortunately, he’s a team of expensive lawyers to bail him out. That makes Reese rather unhappy. And what’s more, Megan’s on the move. It turns out the voiceover from the beginning of the episode was Gabrielle’s last phone message to her sister. Megan’s getting ready to take out Benton. He’s on his way when he gets knocked out by the cartel, leaving Megan to taser Benton and abduct him.

Reese takes a beating from the drug cartel boys but obviously fights back. He uses his time down in Mexico doing whatever sort of CIA spook stuff he was doing to kick off some inter-gang hostilities to escape. He’s really not happy to have been derailed. But he catches up with Megan at a diner. He talks her out of killing Benton by telling her that she doesn’t want to kill him because it will ruin her and take away the best parts of her. She finally hands over the keys to the van and we end with Reese and Benton at the beach house. Benton claims he can change but Reese isn’t sure. We end with a fade-to-black as Reese places his hands on either side of the gun, deciding whether or not to kill Benton.

Ringer 1.05: "A Whole New Kind of Bitch"

2011-11-08T09:26:00.001-05:00

“Dad, she held my hair back while I was puking. We’re hardly besties.”
-Juliet

The fifth episode of “Ringer” is where the drama really seems to take off. More secrets are revealed, and some crazy, crazy (well, more crazy than usual) stuff starts to go down. I’d kind of like for the show to pause from the drama and develop these characters a little more, but I know this isn’t that kind of show, so I try to not let it get in the way of my enjoyment too much. What we do learn about the characters doesn’t come from their natural interactions so much as the well-timed shocking reveal designed to be shocking. The twists and turns of the plot are fun enough to make “Ringer,” including this episode, good entertainment if you don’t think about it too much. This episode was more fun than some have been because there was some serious plot movement, and with some of the twists that happened, I’m really not at all sure where they’re going to go from here.

The episode picks up pretty soon after the last one left off. Bridget, Andrew, and Henry are all driving home from the Hamptons, and nobody knows where Gemma has gone. It turns out that when Bridget revealed to Gemma that she’s not actually Siobhan, Gemma didn’t take it so well. She doesn’t believe Bridget, and she thinks she’s still standing in front of Siobhan, who has pretty much been the worst friend ever. Bridget and Andrew arrive home to find that the word “whore” has been written in big red letters on the big picture of Siobhan in the front hallway. We’re probably supposed to think that Gemma stopped by and ransacked the place, but it was actually Juliet who was responsible for the vandalism. She’s been having a little drugged-out party with a couple friends, and even though “Siobhan” helped her out the last time she was wasted, Juliet still hates her.

Henry arrives home and sees Gemma there. Gemma has been watching a video of a party with herself, Henry, Siobhan, and Andrew on her computer. She flat out refuses to talk to Henry, even though he really wants to know what has her so upset. As she continues to watch the video on her computer, Gemma notices a prominent scar on Siobhan’s wrist. Meanwhile, over at the Martin household, Bridget starts dealing with Andrew a bit more forcefully about Juliet’s drug use. Andrew has no idea she’s speaking from experience, so he’s kind of confused about how she all of a sudden is full of advice on how to handle a drug addict. He is, however, pretty impressed that she seems to finally be taking an interest in Juliet’s welfare. Sioban never did, apparently.

The next day, Gemma finds Bridget and demands to see her arm. Not surprisingly, there is no scar. Now Gemma finally believes Bridget. Siobhan got her scar from a cooking class, and Gemma seems to have known all about it. Gemma finally believes Bridget, but she’s not at all sympathetic. She thinks what Bridget has done to Siobhan by taking over her life is horrible. She also makes it clear that her first loyalty is to Siobhan, because Siobhan was her friend. I still think she was the worst friend ever, but I guess that must count for something in Gemma’s world.

Back at the Martin home, Juliet sees that her stuff has been rummaged through (thanks to Bridget, who hd earlier been bent on proving to Andrew the severity of what his daughter has been going through). She figures “Siobhan” is the culprit, and she thinks she has the perfect way to get revenge. She starts pulling fancy clothes out of Siobhan’s closet and destroying them. As Juliet starts pulling stuff of the top shelf of the closet (barely missing Bridget’s gun, of course), a pamphlet for Narcotics Anonymous falls to the ground. This leads Juliet to follow Bridget to a meeting. She spies from the doorway as Bridget has a post-meeting chat with a man named Charlie. At dinner that night, Juliet blabs to Andrew that she saw “Siobhan” at NA. She thinks “Siobhan” went to the meeting to check it out as an option for her, and she’s pissed at “Siobhan” interfering so much in her life.

Gemma bizarrely just waltzes in during dinner and says she has something to tell “Siobhan” and Andrew. Of course we’re supposed to think she’s about to dish about the affair and Bridget’s true identity to Andrew. Bridget begs her not to, and it turns out that all Gemma wanted to say was that she can’t work on the loft renovation anymore. Once Andrew leaves the room, Gemma says Bridget owes her a favor in return for her not blabbing. She wants Bridget to sleep with Henry so she has good evidence for the divorce she’s planning. She wants to make use of the infidelity clause in their pre-nup so Henry can’t get any of her money. Gemma gives Bridget an ultimatum; if Bridget doesn’t do as Gemma asks, Gemma will out her true identity to Andrew.

Being asked to sleep with Henry throws Bridget into a pretty serious crisis. We see her all weepy in front of her bedroom mirror, and she comes very, very close to owning a handful of pills. She tries to call Malcolm, but he still won’t pick up (because he’s still being tortured and suffocated by the crime lord, of course). Since she doesn’t really have anywhere else to turn, Bridget ends up meeting with Charlie at a diner. He helps her realize that her sobriety is the most important thing and she shouldn’t do anything to jeopardize it. Something as guilt-inducing as sleeping with Henry would certainly jeopardize Bridget’s sobriety. Charlie also offers to be Bridget’s new sponsor, and since Malcolm has been MIA for so long, Bridget takes him up on the offer. She also takes Charlie’s advice to heart by trying to get Gemma to back down from her ultimatum. Gemma doesn’t budge, though. Not only is she going to tell Andrew the truth, she’s going to tell Victor as well.

Meanwhile, Andrew and Juliet are having a major argument. Andrew wants to send Juliet to public school to get her away from her bad influence friends (isn’t it usually the other way around?). In retaliation, Juliet yells about how Siobhan cheated with a married man. We’re supposed to think this means she knows about Siobhan and Henry’s affair, but again, it’s a fake-out. We’ll see how in just a minute. While Andrew and Juliet are fighting, Bridget meets with Henry at the bar. Henry thinks he’s finally going to be getting lucky again, but instead, Bridget tells him about Gemma’s threat (well, the taking Henry to the cleaners in the divorce part, not the revealing real identities part). She begs Henry to make things right with Gemma so she’ll call off this ridiculous ultimatum. Finding out about the threat just makes Henry pissed, and he wants a confrontation.

A dejected Bridget arrives back at “home,” and Andrew tells her that Juliet “knows.” What she knows, however, is that Siobhan and Andrew’s relationship began as an affair. Andrew was still married to Juliet’s mother when he started seeing Siobhan. This is why Juliet is so bitter towards her. Juliet has snuck out yet again, but thanks to a matchbook from a club (really, do places still give out matchbooks these days?) that she found in Juliet’s room, Bridget thinks she knows where Juliet is. She gives Andrew the matchbook so he can find her and try to talk her down first. Right after Andrew leaves, Gemma shows up to carry out her threat. Somehow Bridget manages to finally talk her down and promises to be a friend, and Gemma starts to feel awful about what she was going to do. It doesn’t seem like the warm fuzzies are going to last for long, though. On Gemma’s cab ride home, Henry calls and starts ranting about what Bridget told him. Oops.

Meanwhile, Andrew and Bridget do indeed find Juliet at the club from the matchbook. Bridget apologizes for Siobhan breaking up Juliet’s family, and Juliet seems to actually appreciate that. At Andrew’s suggestion, she agrees to go home with “Siobhan” in a cab. Once home, she helps wipe the “whore” graffiti off the big photo of Siobhan. Before he can go home himself, Andrew gets a call from Gemma. She says she needs to meet with him right away, and it’s an emergency. When Andrew arrives at Gemma and Henry’s house, however, Henry answers the door and turns Andrew away. As the episode ends, we see Henry close the door and walk through a very blood-spattered room. Clearly something very bad has happened to Gemma.

Body of Proof 2.04: "Lazarus Man"

2011-11-05T10:10:00.000-04:00

Here's Sarah with her take on another episode of "Body of Proof." Enjoy!

***

“Maybe it’s our new thing.”
“So you’re admitting we have a thing?”
“We’ve always had a thing.”
- Megan and Peter

We begin with a guy running through the woods at night, and he looks pretty freaked out. He runs into a chain link fence and falls over, dead. Next we find ourselves in what appears to be a van as a somewhat crazy driver speeds through a parking garage. Turns out the driver, a pretty brunette named Dani, is the new driver for the ME’s office. Megan lets Ethan handle the body Dani’s brought in, and Ethan is quite impressed she knows what she’s doing. Turns out the guy, Alex Grant, was found ice cold. Paramedics thought he was a druggie. There are marks on his arm that might support that theory. With that, Dani heads out and leaves Ethan to do his autopsy. He begins to undress the body when he discovers a gunshot wound to the upper abdomen. Ethan races to tell Megan and interrupts her and Peter having a little light-hearted argument about how they never talk about Peter’s personal life, but always delve into Megan’s. She and Kate seemed almost friendly the night before. Guess Megan’s over her boss dating her ex. Anyway (and given the episode title), Ethan explains about the gunshot wound, and Peter goes to call Bud and Sam. Megan and Ethan head back to autopsy to find the body has disappeared. They get everyone, including Kate, in on the search until Megan finds Alex sitting at a table. And he’s not looking good.

Bud and Sam arrive and Megan assures them that it wasn’t her team that messed up. It was the paramedics at the scene. Bud is a little cranky that if Alex dies, he’ll have a murder but no crime scene. As the paramedics wheel Alex out, Sam gets him to tell them that his roommate Paul shot him. So the cops head to the apartment (Bud kicks down the door), but Paul’s not there. Sam thinks they have a lead because the crime scene techs got a GPS lock on his phone. But, after a rather disappointing chase scene, they find Paul’s cell phone along with his rather dead body in the back of a trash truck.

Paul was definitely shot in the chest, but it was a through and through so no bullet for Bud and Sam. Apparently Paul worked on a campaign for a local Councilwoman. He’s the complete opposite of junkie Alex. Peter makes a comment about how he won’t tell Megan about some of the guys he roomed with in college and she snarks back at him that of course he wouldn’t tell her. Later, Sam and Kate meet with Ms. Bennett (the Councilwoman), and she says that Paul didn’t have any enemies and that anything they need that she can give them by leveraging her political power, she’ll do. Ethan is trying to figure out what the trace is that Megan pulled from Paul’s body when Dani shows up. She thinks she’s in trouble for bringing in the still living, and she’s partly right. But Curtis also tells her that her outfit (kind of biker chick-esque) isn’t appropriate work attire.

Bud and Sam are going over Alex and Paul’s apartment, and Bud thinks that whatever happened to them came from Alex’s world. Sam’s not so sure when she finds a gun in Paul’s desk. The plot thickens. Megan is a little cranky that Peter hasn’t gotten Paul’s medical records yet, but pre-Katrina records are hard to come by (Paul’s originally from New Orleans). Megan rambles on about all the strange thing she’s encountered while doing Paul’s autopsy when Peter’s sisters show up. Megan is going to have a field day with this. Apparently Peter’s been avoiding his sisters by not answering their phone calls or emails, and they’ve showed up to stage an intervention. His “great love” is in town. Peter’s clearly mortified at them just showing up and dropping this on him, especially with Megan giggling away beside him. Ethan appears (as he always does) with news about the trace. It’s from Astroturf. Peter drove the garbage truck route to see if it would provide any clues as to where Paul might have been killed and remembers seeing a school being built. The gang heads over and Peter finds blood on a dumpster and Megan finds a sign with Councilwoman Bennett’s face on it.

Kate, Bud and Sam head over to Councilwoman Bennett’s office to have a chat. The Councilwoman says she didn’t want to think about Paul being at the school and that’s why she didn’t tell Sam about it previously. Conveniently, Bennett gets a call from the Mayor, leaving her chief of staff to handle their visitors. They’ve got some surveillance video of a known loan shark harassing Paul. Supposedly it had something to do with Alex. Ethan’s managed to type the blood found at the school and it’s a match for Paul, but they’re still running DNA. He and Megan dig into a Peter a bit, telling him to call Lizzie (his “great love”). Luckily, he’s saved by the phone. Alex is out of surgery. Megan, Bud and Sam head over to question him, but things don’t get far. Bud and Sam push Alex too hard in trying to get information and his heart rate spikes. Megan manages to get them to leave before too much damage is done. And it also looks like Paul didn’t shoot Alex. The bullet the doctor’s pulled was .25 caliber while Paul’s gun was a .22.

Sam and Bud head out to Sam’s old neighborhood looking for the loan shark, Mike. They find his mother, but no Mike. And mom isn’t too keen on giving her boy up, either. She remembers Sam and asks about her brother, but Sam just tells her to let Mike know they’re looking for him. Megan walks into the break room to find Peter still there. He says he’s waiting on the DNA results from the lab. As Megan wonders why Paul and Alex stayed roommates for so long, Ethan materializes with the results. The blood on the dumpster was Paul’s. But there was a second sample that belonged to Alex.

Bud and Sam go back to the hospital and cuff Alex to the bed. They tell him they know he killed Paul and that the DNA proves it. They aren’t the only ones getting antsy to close the case. Councilwoman Bennett is giving a press conference, and Kate is pissed off. First the Councilwoman says she doesn’t want press, and then she mentions DNA evidence and an arrest, even though Alex hasn’t been formally charged yet. Her chief of staff says it’s just politics, but Kate’s not buying it. Back at the lab, Peter shows up to find Megan’s big breakthrough. She’s finally figured out where all the problems in Paul’s body are coming from. He had a bone marrow transplant and his body was rejecting it.

At the hospital, Megan and Peter let Alex go (well they uncuff him anyway). He didn’t know Paul before the marrow transplant and afterwards, Paul acted like he owed Alex. So Alex used that connection to his advantage. He still feels responsible for Paul’s death. And the reason Alex’s DNA was at the school was because of the transplant. That night, Bud and Sam are staking out Mike’s mom’s store, and Sam explains that her brother never made it out of the neighborhood. He was gunned down in a drive by shooting. This episode seems to be all about family. Bud and Sam chase Mike down, and he claims the night that Paul was shot, he was playing cards.

Back at the lab, Ethan is busy cleaning up Paul’s body to be released when Dani stops by. I really like their banter/flirting. It’s cute. Ethan lets Dani help, but the spray bottle she’s got won’t work until Ethan fixes it. Unfortunately, some of the solution gets on Paul’s hand. Curtis walks in and after scolding Dani for being there, tells Ethan to get a sectioning kit because there is something on Paul’s hand (that turns green and luminescent). At Paul and Alex’s apartment, Peter and Megan are trying to figure out what happened. Alex says he wasn’t supposed to be there. He’d been out of town but came back early. He does recall that Paul had a secret hiding place that Alex wasn’t supposed to know about. Peter finds two environment survey reports with the exact same numbers. One was for a building site and one was for the school. They get back to the lab to find Curtis and Ethan examining the substance on Paul’s hand. It comes from a testing kit to test for soil contamination. Kate, Megan and Peter head to the school and test the soil. Turns out, Paul was right and it was contaminated. I knew the Councilwoman was sketchy.

Bud and Sam are grilling Councilwoman Bennett in interrogation while Megan, Kate and Bennett’s chief of staff watch. Things go downhill quickly, though. The chemicals that Paul was working on transferred to his killer and Megan can smell them right now on the chief of staff’s coat. She admits to it, saying she was just trying to protect Bennett’s career and her own. Big mistake, lady. That night, Alex asks to see Paul’s body. He claims he’s going to use his second chance for good, in honor of Paul. Megan ends up at a bar, and after shooing away a somewhat good looking guy, Peter saunters over. He’s just finished dinner with Lizzie. They had a good time, but the chemistry just wasn’t what it used to be. Megan asks if there are any other great loves in his life. He says maybe but he’s not sure he likes having Megan dig into his life. They’re so adorable!

HIMYM 7.05: "Field Trip"

2011-11-05T09:28:00.002-04:00

“It’s like watching ‘The Breakfast Club’ on TBS.”
-Barney

“Field Trip” was a rather middling (although not horrible) episode of HIMYM. I prefer the episodes that really speak to life events, and this wasn’t one of them. My roommate said that Marshall’s plot made her sad (she’s an environmental policy student), but overall, there wasn’t big stuff going on in this one. Some reasonably funny stuff, for sure, but noting big. I guess my favorite bit of the episode, even though it was awfully shallow and cartoonish, was Barney stressing because Nora said she hated Ewoks. Mostly because I loved Barney’s very long PowerPoint all about Ewoks. That was genius. Ted’s plot had some potential, because the idea of him dragging his class around to all the important locations in his life had potential, but it didn’t quite hit the mark. It was funny, but it didn’t really get into Ted’s character enough for me. Ted being so desperate for one of his students to want to be an architect just didn’t work for me. Yeah, it fit with Ted’s character, but it was kind of pathetic. I suppose it just goes to show how low of a place Ted is in right now.

Anyway, the episode opens with Robin in therapy with Kevin. They’re working through her abandonment issues when all of a sudden Kevin drops Robin as a client. He says he’s moving to Alaska, but then he turns up at the diner while Robin is eating breakfast. Kevin admits that the real reason he dropped Robin was because he was attracted to her and didn’t want to cross any ethical lines. Robin invites him to eat breakfast with her in as non-date like a way as she can muster (sitting side by side, technically alone, looking at the coffee maker). After this goes on for about a week and Robin walks forty blocks in the rain to make it to breakfast, they decide to finally start dating for real. I found that to be just plain gross. And thankfully, the rest of the characters all pretty much agreed with me. I like Kal Penn and the character of Kevin, but the fact that he was Robin’s therapist is just something I’ll never be able to get over. Squickiness to the extreme.

The gang is at MacLaren’s, as they often are, and Marshall starts venting some frustrations about work. He’s concerned that the great Garrison Kootz isn’t really as much of an environmental defender as he seems. He seems to have become jaded about the environmental law game. Somehow the conversation turns to Ewoks, and Nora arrives in the middle of it. She says that she doesn’t like Ewoks, and this makes Barney really upset. So upset that the thinks he wants to break up with her. Even though I am firmly pro-Ewok like Barney (and no, I think I was older than ten when I first saw the Star Wars movies, so that kind of destroys Barney’s theory I’ll be writing about it a bit). It just amuses me that underneath the kind of gross ladies’ man exterior, Barney is a massive Star Wars fan.

In other news, Ted has been planning a big field trip for his Inro to Architecture class. He’s going to take them to the new GNB tower construction site in the hopes that it will expire one of them to decide on architecture as a career. This plan backfires, however, when a construction worker tells Ted and his students (about the 1/3 of the class that actually showed up) that it’s a closed construction site and they can’t go in. Which makes sense, really, and Ted should have realized. Construction sites are dangerous places. So Ted takes his students to see Barney, with the thought that Barney could teach them about the financial side of constructing a building. Instead, however, Barney gives an awesomely hilarious lecture about the “Ewok Line.” Basically, according to Barney’s theory, anyone who hates Ewoks is in their late 30’s, not 29 like Nora claims to be, because only people who were little kids when Return of the Jedi was released actually like Ewoks. The theory is funny enough on its own, but what really made the joke was that Barney had to flip through a ton of slides about the details of Ewok physiology and culture before he got to the “Ewok Line” slides.

Meanwhile, there’s a big party going on at Marshall’s office because of a $24,000 settlement offer from a big pharmaceutical company that Garrison seems ready to accept. There’s cake and champagne and all the trimmings. This really pisses Marshall off, because this company did major damage to a waterway, and there’s no way $24,000 will fix it. Eventually, Marshall just can’t take it and has a major outburst. Garrison pulls Marshall into his office (which has creepy green lighting for this scene for some reason), and he goes on a tirade about how the environmental movement has lost and the world is going to end in ten years. Garrison has just been putting on a happy face for his staff with the cake and champagne so they can be comfortable while they wait for Armageddon. The next day, they talk again (in much less threatening office lighting), and Marshall explains why he still has to have hope- his unborn child. He shows Garrison a video of Lily’s latest ultrasound. There’s also some hilarious conversation about how Garrison has a bunker set up that is stocked with all five seasons of Friday Night Lights, but Marshall warns him that season 2 isn’t worth watching. So true, so true. Garrison ends up turning down the settlement offer and “going to war.” Saget!Ted tells us that Garrison and Marshall would eventually save the planet.

The next stop on Ted’s field trip (with Barney now tagging along) is his and Robin’s apartment. Robin and Kevin are there on the couch, and Robin’s kind of annoyed because she was just about to make a move. There’s a really funny sequence where Ted and Barney give Kevin a hard time (sometimes in unison) because they (rightfully) think that a therapist dating a former patient is super creepy. They decide to poll Ted’s students, and the vast majority of them think it’s creepy, too. Outside the apartment building, Ted and Barney realize they have collected the perfect focus group, so they start polling the students on all sorts of things, such as whether macaroni salad is really a salad (the answer is “no”). Then the questions start to get into Barney’s situation with Nora. Ted and Barney keep changing the story to try to win the students to their side (Ted thinks it would be shallow for Barney to dump Nora over being old, and Barney obviously disagrees). Meanwhile, now that they have the apartment back to themselves, Robin and Kevin try to make out, but they finally realize it’s too creepy. Robin fixes the situation by acting as Kevin’s therapist for a couple hours to even the score. Which I don’t think is really good enough to erase the squick, but whatever.

Ted’s field trip ends up at MacLaren’s. One student finally says he might be interested in being an architect, mostly because since Ted can meet up with his friends at the bar at 4 PM, the hours must be good. He says he’ll look into it if being a DJ doesn’t work out, but Saget!Ted tells us that he did indeed become a DJ. Ted finally lets the class go home. Nora meets up with the gang, and Barney confronts her with his belief that she’s about nine years older than she says she is. It turns out that Nora had only just seen the Star Wars movies a year ago, so she had indeed been older than ten when she first saw the Ewoks. But she’s most definitely still 29. Barney is happy with this answer, and I’m annoyed that Nora is still sticking around.

Halloween "Classic" Recap: Buffy the Vampire Slayer: "Fear, Itself"

2011-10-31T22:58:00.002-04:00

“Maybe it's 'cause of all the horrific things we've seen, but hippos wearing tutus just don't unnerve me the way they used to.”
-Oz

I had a tough time choosing this year’s Halloween recap. It was either this wonderful Halloween episode from season 4 of “Buffy the Vampire Slayer” or the season 2 Halloween episode aptly titled “Halloween.” I went with this one because I love the costume choices and the humorous take the episode has on horror in general. If you can wade through all the “woe is me” drama the characters are going through at this point in the series, there’s some really funny stuff. I love Giles’ and Anya’s costumes best because they’re hilarious an unexpected. I also love moment like Giles with a chainsaw because it’s just so silly looking. And the ending of the episode is a great, humorous twist on the typical apocalyptic scenario the Scoobies often face. Like “The Zeppo,” (where we follow Xander doing more mundane things while the rest of the Scoobies face some unnamed but super-serious apocalypse) but, you know, funnier. Because it involves a tiny, tiny demon (sorry…retroactive spoiler alert). Rest assured, if this blog sticks around for a couple more years, “Halloween” will be recapped here, too!

The episode opens with the gang carving pumpkins at Xander’s basement apartment. Buffy is still broody and miserable over her recent one night stand (that she wanted to be more) with Parker, and she’s kind of dragging down the mood of the party. Xander announces that he’s picked up a movie for the gang to watch on Halloween, and thanks to a mix-up, it turns to be that great horror classic, “Fantasia.” Willow mentions a big frat party that she thought everyone was planning to go to. Xander didn’t know about the party because he doesn’t go to UC Sunnydale, and he’s a little miffed at being left out of the loop. All is forgiven, though, when he’s invited to tag along. Still broody, Buffy decides to go home early without even carving one line in her pumpkin. On the way home, she accidentally punches a teen dressed in a costume. She thought he was a vampire or demon or something. Have I mentioned yet that mopey Buffy is kind of insufferable?

We next see Buffy and Willow at school getting lunch. Buffy is still complaining about the Parker situation, but Willow just wants to talk about how far she should go in her study of magic. She really wants Buffy’s encouragement to keep pushing the boundaries of what she can do with her powers. Oz catches up with the girls and expresses some concern about the idea of Willow doing increasingly more powerful magic. Buffy turns around at the end of the lunch line and sees Parker at a table chatting with friends. Of course, she hightails it out of the cafeteria as fast as she can. She tells Willow that she’ll probably have to go on patrol instead of going to the frat party. When she goes to visit Giles (who is dressed in an awesomely hilarious sombrero and poncho ensemble), however, she finds out that she won’t need to patrol, either. Apparently the supernatural denziens of Sunnydale find Halloween crass, so they stay mostly out of sight. Poor Giles is feeling so directionless since he isn’t an official Watcher anymore that he’s gone all-out with Halloween costuming and decorating.

Later in the afternoon, Anya shows up at Xander’s apartment. Their relationship is still in a sort-of murky, undefined phase, but they’re growing closer. Xander invites Anya to go to the frat party. Anya is a little skeptical. She openly wonders why Xander still hangs out with the Scoobies considering they don’t really have much in common anymore. This hits Xander in his insecure about not being in college like his friends soft spot. Anya is going to join everyone for the party, though, and Xander tells her to pick out a scary costume. Then Xander has to help Oz deliver a sound system to the frat house where the big party is to take place. They have quite the scary set-up, with peeled grape fake eyes and everything. The brothers are even painting a mystical sign on the floor. The conversation turns to how Xander’s a townie, which of course makes his insecurity even deeper. Oz manages to cut himself while trying to repair something on a speaker, and some of his blood drips on the mystical symbol. The air goes all wonky, and a fake spider comes to life. This can’t end well

After visiting Giles, Buffy goes to pick up her assignment from Professor Walsh because she missed class. She gets a reaming out from the Professor for skipping, but she gets some sympathy and a bit of a pep talk from Riley (ew). Riley convinces her to go to the frat party. Going to the party means that Buffy needs a costume, so she has her mom make some alterations to an old Little Red Riding Hood cape. Buffy has a nice heart-to-heart with her mom during the sewing, too. They talk about how even when you get hurt (like Buffy’s mom did in the divorce to Buffy’s father) and it’s tempting to be gun shy around other people for a while afterwards, you have to let people in eventually.

Finally, the Scoobies are on their way to the party. We’ve got Buffy as Little Red Riding Hood, Willow as Joan of Arc, Oz as God, and Xander as James Bond. As they walk to the frat house, they run into some strange military types, who we would learn in later episodes belong to the Initiative. Meanwhile, at the party, more of the fake Halloween accoutrements, like the grape eyeballs, have become real. The result is complete chaos. You wouldn’t know this from outside, though. When the gang gets to the house, there’s definitely not a jumpin’ party going on. As they make their way through the downstairs, things get more and more creepy, including a real spider falling on Willow. Anya arrives at the house after the rest of the gang has already entered, but there is no longer any door into the house. Anya really starts to freak out when she sees an upstairs window close itself off. She’s very worried for Xander. Dressed in a hilarious fluffy bunny costume, she goes to Giles for help.

Inside the house, things are progressively getting worse. The Scoobies want to leave, but they can’t find their way out. To make matters even worse, nobody can see or hear Xander anymore. The gang finds a traumatized frat boy in a hall closet who warns the gang that something is “alive.” That something turns out to be a plastic skeleton that attacks Buffy with a knife. Buffy’s injured, but not badly. She starts to gather up her weapons and wants to go on and find the monsters on her own. She doesn’t want to have to worry for her friends’ safety. This just leads to a big fight between Buffy and Willow about who should be in charge and if Willow’s magic is worthwhile. Xander tries to break the fight up, but he’s still invisible, so that doesn’t really go well. Buffy goes off on her own, and then Oz starts to wolf out. Oz in semi-werewolf form scratches Willow (I guess bite is required to turn someone into a werewolf in the Buffyverse) and runs off before he can hurt her more. Willow tries to do a guidance spell to find her way out of the house, but the little ball of light she calls up soon turns into a swarm, and they’re swarming like bees.

Buffy hears Willow screaming and starts running, trying to help her. She only succeeds in falling down into the house’s basement, though. While she’s laying on the ground, trying to catch her breath, hands start coming up out of the ground and grabbing her. It’s super creepy. Meanwhile, Giles and Anya arrive at the house. Giles announces that they “need to create a door,” and in my favorite moment of the episode, he whips out a chainsaw to do just that! Buffy finally escapes the basement and finds herself in an upstairs room with the rest of the Scoobies. It’s the room with the mystical marking, which we learn is the Mark of Gachnar. Anya and Giles (thanks to the chainsaw) join the rest of the Scoobies, and Giles starts explaining about how Gachnar is a fear demon and must not be allowed to cross over to our dimension. Acting too quickly, Buffy destroys the Mark, but that just means that Gachnar will appear immediately. It turns out that the gang didn’t really need to be afraid, though. He’s super tiny, and listing to him rant is quite funny. Buffy puts an end to Gachnar with some foot-stomping action. Back at Giles’ house, the Scoobies have a big of a candy pig-out. And Giles admits that he should have read the caption of Gachnar’s picture in his demon book more closely. It said “Actual Size.” Happy Halloween everyone!

Fringe 4.03: "Alone in the World"

2011-10-30T18:37:00.002-04:00

“Hey. I’m a little freaked out. You wanna talk about it?”
-Lincoln

“Alone in the World” was a decent episode of “Fringe,” mostly because of the many great Walter moments, but there’s still something missing. Lincoln’s a wonderful character, and I’m really glad he’s a regular presence on the show now, but he doesn’t work as a complete replacement for Peter. He’s not fully developed enough yet. Plus, I miss the Peter/Olivia chemistry. And seriously, Bad Robot and FOX powers that be, if you’re thinking of setting up a Peter/Olivia/Lincoln love triangle for later in the season? Please don’t. Way too much time has been invested in setting up Peter and Olivia. Derailing that now would just be blatantly antagonizing viewers. Another issue I have is the continued use of this completely new universe. Is the world of the show in which I invested for three years (plus one other, fairly well developed alternative world) gone for good? I’ve always greatly respected the creative leaps the “Fringe” staff is willing to take. In fact, that’s why I think “Fringe” was the best network drama on television last year, but this feels like one leap too far, especially when this is likely to be the show’s last season. It would be a shame to spend the last time we have with these characters with iterations of them other than the ones we’ve grown to know over the past three years.

The episode opens with Walter having a chat with his therapist from St. Claire’s. Apparently these regular check-ups were part of the conditions for Walter’s release from the institution in this universe, presumably since Peter isn’t there to keep an eye on him. They’re having a civil conversation, although it’s clear Walter’s trying to hide the visions of Peter he’s been having, but then he sees a reflection of Peter in the therapist’s clipboard, and it all goes to Hell. Walter would continue to have these sorts of freak-outs intermittently throughout the episode, such as a time when he’s trying to explain something he needs for an experiment to Broyles, but he has to shout over Peter’s voice. The therapist has already raised concerns about Walter’s behavior after the session, so this isn’t looking good for him at all.

Then it’s time to introduce the mystery of the week (yes, there’s actually a pretty contained mystery this time around). We see a little kid chased into a creepy, cellar-like tunnel by two bullies. One of the bullies accuses the kid of ratting out the stash of drugs he was keeping in his school locker. Before they can start hurting the kid, though, something grabs on to the two bullies, and they’re clearly in pain. The kid manages to escape the tunnel before he’s caught, too. Meanwhile, at Fringe HQ, Olivia has called Lincoln in for a meeting. And it’s super awkward. Olivia basically wanted to let Lincoln know that if he freaks out over all the stuff he reads in the Fringe case files, she’s there to talk. Lincoln doesn’t quite know what to make of this, because he hasn’t freaked out yet. The awkwardness doesn’t end until Olivia is saved (as per usual) by a phone call from Broyles informing her of their latest case.

The two bullies from the tunnel look like they’ve completely decomposed in the few short hours since they died. Walter, unfortunately, doesn’t have any theories about what’s happened yet, even as Olivia and Lincoln check out the tunnel. There’s a break in the case when Olivia and Lincoln get a tip about a kid at a school, Aaron, who was regularly bullied by the two kids who died. They bring Aaron back to the lab, and he bonds a bit with Walter. Walter needs to draw some blood from Aaron for one of his experiments, and it trying to get Aaron, who is afraid of needles, comfortable, he mentions Peter. It becomes obvious that Walter is projecting the two-time loss of his son onto this new little boy. While all this bonding is going on, the body they have at the lab (the other bully’s body is at the morgue, and Walter wants it to do some extra tests) has been getting more and more moldy. Lovely picture, I know. Luckily, Walter notices this and puts it in containment right before it explodes and releases massive amounts of spores. Ah, a good, old-fashioned creepy and gross “Fringe” case.

Walter calls Olivia (who is with Lincoln at the morgue) right away, but nobody can get word in time to the morgue employees in the room with the second body that the moldiness is going to go ‘splodey any second. By the time Olivia and Lincoln make it to the room, the two employees, who we got to know in a very brief scene, are moldy themselves. Olivia, Lincoln, and some other FBI folks put on hazmat suits and check out the now thoroughly moldy examination room. Walter, after doing some more tests, tells the rest of the team that he thinks powerful UV light will kill this fungus just like it would any fungus. That should work just fine for the examination room, but Olivia has a better idea for the original tunnel. Flame throwers.

While the Fringe plans are all clicking into place, Walter and Aaron have some more bonding time. Walter makes milkshakes, which are most likely sure to be a hit with any tween. Aaron then takes the opportunity to ask some questions about what happened to Peter. Walter gets very somber as he talks about how the original Peter from our universe died of the mysterious illness (just like in the original timeline), but “our” Peter drowned in the lake as Walter tried to kidnap him instead of being saved by September the Observer. And boy must that sound super confusing if you aren’t a regular “Fringe”-watcher. Meanwhile, Olivia and Lincoln find a big hole in the wall of the tunnel that is of course housing a massive amount of fungus. As the Fringe team starts to shine light on and burn the fungus, Aaron starts seriously freaking out. He also gets so feverish that he passes out. Walter calls Olivia and asks her to stop whatever they’re doing to the fungus.

Olivia calls off the flamethrowers and starts doing a little investigating. She finds some drawings and turns them over to Walter. Walter confronts Aaron with the drawings because they suggest Aaron has been to the tunnel before. It turns out that not only was he a frequent tunnel-visitor, but he also has developed a psychic bond with the fungus. Psychic fungus, yay! Or not. Walter explains to the rest of the team that each colony of fungus is like a big brain (which immediately makes me think of a few episodes of “Futurama” in particular. In response, Broyles gives Walter two hours to try and break the psychic link between Aaron and the Fungus before they call in the flamethrowers again. The fungus is spreading, and they can’t let it keep doing that.

As the time keeps ticking down, Walter gets a little desperate and wants to essentially lobotomize Aaron to try and save him. Thankfully, Olivia convinces Walter that cutting out the sections of Aaron’s brain that seem to be linked with the fungus would be a really bad idea. The fungus is spreading even further than anyone originally thought, so Broyles decides to move up the timetable on the destruction. A Massive Dynamic tech (I was wondering if it was Brandon) administers a toxin to the fungus in the tunnel just before the fungus fights back and kills him. Aaron is not doing well at all, and Walter realizes the true nature of the psychic connection. Aaron’s the one controlling the emotional link between himself and the fungus because he was lonely. Poor kid- his only friends are some sentient fungus and a crazy mad scientist. Walter pleads with Aaron, invoking the losses he suffered with Peter, to get Aaron to finally release the fungus. Aaron eventually does as he’s asked, the fungus dies and Aaron doesn’t, an Lincoln, who was also hit in a fungus attack, starts to recover (in Olivia’s arms no less…that can’t be going anywhere good).

Once the fungus threat is over, Aaron is wheeled off to the hospital. Walter briefly considers going with him to keep him company (a good idea considering Aaron’s abandonment issues and all), but then he sees another image of Peter. It totally freaks him out to the extent that he starts trying to do brain surgery on himself. Thankfully, Olivia finds him before he can do any real damage. It turn out she’s been seeing Peter too. He appears in her dreams. Walter is overjoyed at the news that someone else has shared the same hallucination, because it means he isn’t going crazy. Or going more crazy, as the case really is. He’s plenty crazy without seeing and hearing strange apparitions of Peter!

Person of Interest 1.03: "Mission Creep"

2011-10-28T18:35:00.004-04:00

Here's Sarah with another "Person of Interest" write-up. Enjoy!

***

“You’re playing a dangerous game and I’m not sure I understand why.”
- Detective Carter

We begin this week with Reese showing up at HQ and finding Finch asleep at his desk. Reese tells Finch he’s feeling guilty about blowing Finch’s cover and has been looking for a new cover position. Finch isn’t interested. The machine’s given them the number of a former Marine, Joey Durbin. He works as a doorman for a hotel in Midtown. It’s quite clear Reese identifies with Joey. Both being ex military and having seen the same things overseas. Reese even worked with a portion of Joey’s unit in Iraq. So he’s off to tail Joey and see what he comes up with. The first eight hours prove boring for Reese, though Joey gets a garbled text message which Reese sends to Finch to decipher. At this point Joey’s on the move (visiting his girlfriend, Pia, who waited six years for him to get back from deployment, and window shopping). When Reese calls to give Finch the text message, we find Finch doing pushups while reading a book. It was rather amusing. Reese follows Joey into a bank and not two seconds later, three men in masks (Joey makes four) come in and rob the bank.

This week is apparently going to be more Reese flashbacks. We jump back to 2006, and Reese runs into Jessica. She asks when he got back state-side but he tells her he’s heading back overseas. When she asks why he’s not in uniform he makes a sort of shady comment that he’s got a new job. We’ll see this flashback play out over the course of the episode. Back in the present, Reese follows Joey to a meeting with a young blond woman and witnesses an exchange of money. And they also find the courier for the bank robbers, a guy named Willis who was also in Joey’s unit in Afghanistan. Finch also finds that Willis stopped at a bar on Coney Island called the Green Zone, run by former Master Sergeant Sam Lattimer (aka Captain Montgomery from Castle). So Reese pays Lattimer a visit to try and get in with the bank crew. Meanwhile Finch is busy creating a vacancy for Reese. He leaves some guns in the trunk of Willis’s cab and the cops pull him over. Good job Finch.

Over at police headquarters, Detective Carter gets to know a robbery detective. Apparently at the bank robbery the day before, they printed the guard’s holster that Reese touched to keep the guard from getting shot. Carter points out that the robbers are likely soldiers. Not looking good for Reese. Well, not from the police angle. From his perspective, it’s looking pretty good. He got a call from Lattimer. He wants Reese (who is going by Miller) to meet the team. Turns out Lattimer’s version of “meet the team” is having them kidnap Reese, drag him to a dark alley and threaten to shoot him if they don’t like him. He manages to sweet talk his way out of a bullet between the eyes by saying he trusted their unit in 2005 and they trusted him. It works enough to get a burner phone. Back at HQ, Reese says he doesn’t think Joey is the kind of killer that can do it up close and personal. Time to find out who is gunning for Joey.

Reese is back to following Joey who shows up where Pia works to talk to her. Joey kind of blows off her request to see apartments with her that night. And as Reese watches, we get the second part of the flashback. It turns out that Jessica got engaged to a guy named Peter back east while Reese was away. Jessica says she waited for Reese but he reminds her that he didn’t ask her to do that. She says that he just left without saying anything to her because he figured he’d die and he didn’t want to hurt her but Jessica thinks it was because he wanted to be alone. Reese explains that you learn in war that you’re alone and no one will save you. Cheerful guy, isn’t he?

Over at police HQ, Carter and her robbery buddy are getting further on the bank robbers. The radios they use are military issue (no surprise there) and Fort Drum reported a shipment stolen six months ago. She’s also surprised that they’ve pulled a dozen jobs together without imploding. Meanwhile, Reese spies Joey watching the blond woman pick up a little girl from school. By the way Joey’s watching, Reese guesses it is his daughter. And while Finch tries to ID the girl, Reese is going to have a little one-on-one with Joey. They “run into” each other at a bar and bond a little bit. It gets even better when a couple banker snobs try to butt in to the conversation and after being told to use his head, Reese head butts the nearest guy. He leans that Joey has what he calls an obligation, though denies it to support a child. He does explain that Straub has gambling debts. Finch also has some intel. The girl’s name is Amy. But there was no father listed on the birth certificate so he’s going to dig deeper.

Reese is going to do a little surveillance on Straub. Straub meets with Lattimer, saying he needs more money or else the guys he owes will take his mother’s apartment. Lattimer says he’s got a job tonight that will score $400,000. When Straub brings sup the fact he needs to split the $200,000 he’d be getting with the rest of the gang, Lattimer says he doesn’t care how he splits the money. Either way he’ll have enough to pay his debts and retire. We are shown a photo of two other Marines who Lattimer says are retired. Lattimer assures Straub that if something were to go wrong and they had casualties on the team, the split would still be 50/50.

The cops are getting ever closer to the gang. They’ve put a trace on Teddy Dalloway’s phone (the driver). Carter and her robbery buddy show up to where the gang is going to be robbing (a gambling hall). Luckily, Reese has Finch monitoring the police band and hears when they call for back up. He gets the gang out before back up arrives. Straub is not happy they left so much money behind. Carter looks pretty pissed when they bust in to find just the patrons there. The next morning, Straub is filling in Lattimer about what happened and neither seems overly pleased. They’ve got another job and Lattimer tells Straub to watch Reese. They might need him to get in but they really don’t need him to get out. And Finch shuts down Reese’s theory that Joey is Amy’s father. Turns out the father was Joey’s best friend who got blown up in Afghanistan on a shift that Joey was supposed to take. So now Joey feels obligated to take care of her. But Reese fails to talk Joey out of doing the job. And he also fails to talk Pia into giving up on Joey if he doesn’t come around soon. Reese really has some mixed emotions about all this. I’ve no doubt he sees himself and Jessica a little in Joey and Pia. So he tells Finch that once he knows the next job, Finch can call the cops to round up the whole gang.

Carter has ID’d the two Marines that Lattimer told Straub were in retirement. They were both shot in the head. Not a good sign for the rest of the gang. We find Lattimer on the phone with a mystery man. Looks like the current gang is about to get replaced once the job is complete. The gang is en route to the evidence lock up and Straub makes Reese ditch his phone and earwig. So much for staying in communication with Finch. But it looks like Finch is a step ahead. When the guys get there, Finch is trying to get some evidence, and it’s enough for him to get a message to Reese. Lattimer is going to kill them. They find what they’re looking for, but Teddy get’s shot by a guard. They make it out of the building and to the van where Lattimer is waiting, but he shoots Straub and Teddy before speeding off. Reese peppers the van with bullets but it doesn’t do much. Carter shows up and takes the radio she finds on Straub. He does get Joey out of the line of fine and successfully convinces him to get out of New York with Pia.

Carter gets on the radio and has a little conversation with Reese, but it doesn’t turn up much for her. He is going to take his chances doing what he does and see what happens. She’s convinced he’ll end up dead or in prison in the end. Reese goes to find Lattimer to tie up loose ends, but he’s too late. Whoever Lattimer was working for shot him after taking the evidence that the gang stole. It’s got the name Elias on it and so Finch has something to look for. We end with the conclusion of Reese’s flashback. Jessica asks Reese to ask her to wait for him and she would, saying it would take real courage to do it. She walks away and he whispers it mostly to himself. So now we’ve got a season-long mystery on our hands.

Body of Proof 2.03: "Missing"

2011-10-25T09:47:00.001-04:00

Sarah joins us again with a "Body of Proof" write-up. Enjoy!

***

“Daddy killed himself, we suffered and I miss him. How is that a point of family pride?”
- Megan

We begin this week in a park where a little boy, Noah Parker, is being kidnapped. A woman, his nanny named Helen, sees him and tries to save him, but a man grabs her and pushes her to the ground. When she chases after the car that has Noah, she gets run over and is killed. Megan and Peter arrive on scene to find Bud (Sam’s training down at Quantico) and lots of campaign signs for Megan’s mom. Megan’s not pleased. And she points out rather quickly that Helen put up a fight before she died. She also discovers a child’s inhaler. Noah has asthma and is now without his medication. At Noah’s house Bud and Special Agent Ames are meeting with his parents. They don’t seem to know anyone who would want to go after them or Helen.

Agent Ames is intent on going to see Megan about theories. Bud warns him to be careful what he wishes for (after they discuss the odds of finding Noah alive and they aren’t positive). Megan tasks Curtis and Ethan with finding out the make and model of the car that killed Helen. Ames shows up and tells Megan she’s working too fast and that she can’t let her emotions and her heart get in the way of the investigation. I really dislike this guy. He’s messing with our team. Megan discovers some day-old bruises on Helen’s shoulder and agrees to join Ames in looking through Helen’s room once she’s found cause of death.

At the precinct, Peter and Bud are talking to the witnesses and other nannies that knew Helen. They all seem to think she was great, but they do mention that she had a boyfriend, Oscar, who they think was hitting her. Bud and Peter bring Oscar in for questioning, but he denies taking Noah or killing Helen. He loved her and she was his world. They’re not all that impressed, but for now they’re looking elsewhere for suspects. Megan shows up to find the Parker house crawling with feds. Megan has cause of death. Not surprisingly, Helen died on impact. And just as Ames shares that all he found in Helen’s room were a few discarded photos of Oscar, Noah’s mother gets a call. Noah managed to get hold of a phone for a few seconds but it wasn’t long enough to trace the call. But at least for the moment, they know he’s alive.

Curtis and Ethan have found the type of car the kidnapped drove and identified the only guy with priors and a huge debt, Jason Peterson. They also took the liberty of updating the Amber Alert. Megan is collecting trace from under Helen’s nails when her mother calls and then shows up at in autopsy. She wants Megan to go to lunch with her and her publicist but Megan is not interested. Just as her mom asks if she’s working on Noah’s case, Ethan shows up with the news that Bud arrested Jason Peterson. Things get very dicey, very quickly. Bud hauls Jason into the precinct and locks himself in interrogation. He cuts video feed and the next thing we know, Jason is dead. Megan is really pissed and confronts Bud, even though Peter tells her not to. She’s dubious of the injuries on Jason’s neck and flank but Peter tries to explain those as injuries that could have happened in order for Bud to subdue Jason.

Kate’s decided to assist Megan with the autopsy on Jason. The case brings up some old memories. She worked a missing child case early on in her time in the ME’s office and unfortunately, the child didn’t make it. The team discovers that there was a fungus under Helen’s nails that likely was transferred from Jason. It’s a bioluminescent fungus (hooray for glow in the dark) and that means it came from somewhere dark and damp. Even though Bud is off the case, he stops by Peter’s office to give him evidence that he thinks Jason left in his car. It could be Noah’s. Peter tells Bud he’ll pass it along to Megan but that Bud can’t be around the case anymore. He also expresses his displeasure with Bud’s tactics. I can totally agree with him. First of all, it wasn’t necessary to cut the camera. And even if they don’t normally tape the interrogations, they could have had more proof of what Bud did or didn’t do to Jason.

Megan is working late that night and calls Lacey to make sure she’s okay. And once again, Megan’s mom shows up. She’s got abstracts of every case where Jason was mentioned. Megan asks what the quid pro quo is (it is an election year after all), but her mother says she doesn’t want anything. And she wants to know what she said that’s set Megan off now. Megan pulls out her mom’s campaign pamphlet with a photo of them after Megan’s father’s death. Megan says it was the worst day of her life and every time her mom runs for election to the bench, she has to relive it. The next day, Megan runs into Ames at the office. She’s found blood mixed with the saliva on Noah’s toy and she’s got the team looking into it, and she’s about to head to see his parents. Ames questions if that’s the best use of Megan’s time since she hasn’t found a cause of death on Jason Peterson yet. She just gives him an annoyed look.

At the Parker house, Megan asks his mom if Noah had an asthma attack recently. Mrs. Parker doesn’t see how that helps but then breaks down, saying that she and her husband have been arguing a lot lately with work stresses. The FBI techs get an image of Noah holding a sign that is asking for 1 million dollars and he’s really sick. Megan tries to tell Ames she’ll have evidence he can use to help find Jason’s accomplice (who likely knows the Parkers) in an hour. She really shouldn’t have said that. Kate makes a comment that Megan isn’t the first to get swept away from by Ames. Megan reminds Kate that she’s got a boyfriend (and for once, there’s no tension between them about Todd at all).

Megan finds what looks like an insect in some of Jason’s tissues that he could have swallowed. Meanwhile, Bud shows up in Peter’s office again, begging to know what’s going on. Peter tells Bud to expect the worst. Internal Affairs getting ready to consider voluntary manslaughter and Bud doesn’t seem to care and won’t tell Peter what happened. Ethan bursts in, as he usually does, with news that he found cocaine cut with a weight-loss drug in Jason’s teeth. Ames brings in a dealer (who we assume Bud identifies), but the dealer denies knowing Jason. Ames gets the dealer to tell him where all of Jason’s hideouts were. They’re scattered all over the city but between the poor air quality needed for Noah to get sick so fast and for the bug that Jason swallowed to be alive, they narrow it down to one place. But they’re too late. The accomplice and Noah are gone. And worse yet, Megan realizes Noah has pneumonia.

Megan and Kate are back to trying to find cause of death on Jason Peterson. It turns out he had an infection that spread to his blood and eventually burst an artery. Bud didn’t kill him after all. And Bud is more than just a little relieved to hear it. He admits to Megan that he thought he really had killed Jason. Ethan pops by to explain the cause of the infection; vaporizer lung. Sounds awful to me. Ames and Megan are at the Parker house in Noah’s room, and Ames shares the news that Mr. Parker’s company bankrupted the year before giving him motive (according to Ames). Megan explains to the Parkers about vaporizer lung and Ames can’t help but try to implicate Mr. Parker for being Jason’s accomplice (he had to get into the room somehow).

The interrogation turns into a shouting match between Mr. Parker and Bud. But once both of them calm down, Mr. Parker says he and his wife were out of town over the weekend a few weeks earlier. The team figures out Oscar wasn’t involved because he was in the hospital and Helen was with him. So she likely entrusted Noah to another nanny. And thanks to the bioluminescent fungus, Megan figures out who it is. But they’re a little stuck. They need a warrant on a Sunday morning. So of course Megan goes to her mother (not that she’ll tell Ames that). He takes the nanny (Rina) inside to go room by room to try and find Noah, but Megan checks outside. She spots a rusty hatchway door and they get to Noah in time to save him. He’s reunited with his parents and all is well. Mostly. Ames tries to ask Megan out but she turns him down (I don’t think I could stand I they went out). Back at the lab, Megan is saying her last goodbyes to Helen when her mother shows up again. She’ brought with her an article about Megan’s father’s death and says that the worst four hours of her life were when she got home and Megan wasn’t there. Megan’s mom just wants her back in her life (and campaign support). Yeah, we’ll see how that goes.

New Girl 1.03: "Wedding"

2011-10-24T23:08:00.001-04:00

“This is the first job I’ve had in like two months, dude, and I really want to just get in there and ush this wedding in the face.”
-Winston

“Wedding” was my favorite of the “New Girl” episodes that have aired thus far. Mostly because of the slow-motion Chicken Dance at the end of the episode. Any good Pennsylvanian, even those of us who aren’t from the “Pennsyltucky” part of the state, can appreciate a good Chicken Dance. I first learned the dance at the roller skating rink in my hometown that was the happening place to have birthday parties. Anyway, I also liked this episode because it took some major steps in character development and building the relationships between all the characters. Jess really stood up for herself, which I liked. It was different from how she stood up to her lousy ex-boyfriend in “Kryptonite.” That was more about acknowledging that it was time to let the relationship go. This time, she stood up for who she is at the core. She decided it’s okay to be quirky, even if it annoys the guys sometimes. And, even better, Jess finally embracing her quirkiness leads to everyone having a much more fun time.

The guys and Jess are all going to a friend’s wedding. Winston is an usher, and Jess is going as Nick’s date. Caroline is going to be there, and the guys think that having Jess along will help him handle it without becoming his usual weepy mess. The guys don’t approve of the first dress Jess wants to wear to the wedding, but when she tries on the second one, we get a rehash of the “oh, she’s actually hot” spoiled by Jess doing something strange moment from the pilot. This time, it’s fake teeth that spoil the mood, like the kids use to freak out their teacher in “A Christmas Story” (my favorite Christmas movie, by the way). Jess also informs the guys that if they end up doing the Chicken Dance at the wedding, she does a pecking movement as the final dance move instead of a clap.

The gang arrives at the wedding, and we quickly set up the three storylines for the episode. One of those plots is Schmidt trying to figure out who he’s going to take home with him from the wedding. He rather desperately wants to go after Brooke, a woman he’s had a thing for since college. And now that he’s lot significant weight since his college days, she might be interested. She’s also recently sober, so Schmidt kind of gets himself in trouble by claiming he’s recently sober too…right before the bartender delivers his drink. There’s also Gretchen, a kind of nasty woman who Schmidt has a history of banging at pretty much every wedding they both attend. She’s the only character we’ve seen yet who can completely overpower Schmidt with feelings of insecurity.

The second storyline also involves insecurity. Winston arrives at the ceremony to see that the tween “Alternate Usher” has already started to do his job. Winston was wary of going to the wedding in the first place, because he wasn’t looking forward to having to answer the “so what are you doing these days” question. He hasn’t held down a job since he returned from playing basketball in Latvia. The two have a bit of an ush-off, which each trying to charm the ladies into letting them escort them to their seats. At the reception, this turns into a dance off. The dance-off is pretty evenly matched until Winston scares off the kid by grinding with Jess.

The main plot is, of course, the drama between Nick, Caroline, and Jess. Jess does very well at making Caroline jealous when they first meet at the ceremony, and Nick is very pleased about this outcome. At the reception, though, Nick asks to talk to Caroline alone, and Jess reluctantly agrees. And that’s when things really start to go south. Nick is completely enamored with Caroline again, and Winston tells Jess that this is a serious problem. Caroline considers Nick her back-up plan and always ends up hurting him. Jess tries to fix the situation by getting Nick’s attention with a dance, but to say it doesn’t work would be an understatement. He leaves the table to go get a drink with Caroline, telling Jess that he thinks he has a chance with her again.

Meanwhile, Schmidt manages to cause even more trouble for Jess. Jess goes to him for help with the Nick situation, but she’s being typically Jess-like about the whole thing, and Brooke is a bit disdainful about Schmidt associating himself with someone quirky. To get out of that pickle, Schmidt makes up this elaborate story about how Jess is his psycho ex-girlfriend who just can’t let go. This turns out to be a very bad thing when Brooke runs into Jess in the ladies room. Jess had been wearing tight bicycle shorts as makeshift Spanx, and she decided to cut herself out of them when she got too uncomfortable. Jess tries to talk up Schmidt to Brook, but Brooke takes it way the wrong way when Jess accidentally points the knife she was using to cut the shorts at her.

Jess storms over to the a photo booth where Nick and Caroline had been taking pictures to confront Nick directly. Caroline ends up confessing that she has a boyfriend, and this of course sends Nick into an instant downward spiral. Schmidt and Winston are kind of pissed at Jess for not properly taking care of Nick, and thankfully Jess has had it with their rudeness. She’s going back to being herself, and she’s going to spend the rest of the wedding having fun. I was so glad Jess made this choice. She really needs to stand up for herself more often. Jess ends up sitting at a table blowing bubbles (the guys had tried to keep her away from the bubbles before). Winston approaches her and tries to mend fences. He says they’re all glad she’s around, even Nick, although they aren’t always good at showing it. Schmidt interrupts the rather sweet conversation to let them know that they have a serious Nick situation on their hands.

Since Jess went off on her own, Nick has gone on a drunken rant that was recorded for the bride and groom’s wedding video, and he has taken up residence in the photo booth. Which pisses off many of the guests, obviously. Jess goes into the photo booth (which Nick claims he lives in now) and manages to talk Nick down. I guess their common status as recent dumpees helps Jess get through to Nick. Nick is inspired by Jess to let go of Caroline for good. Or at least he tells Caroline he’s letting go for good. Whether it sticks remains to be seen. Nick then approaches Jess as a slow song comes on and asks for a dance. I expected a sappy romantic moment between them (which I wouldn’t have minded), but what we got is even better. They started Chicken Dancing to the slow song. Schmidt and Winston even join in, and it is glorious! Oh, and Schmidt ends up with Gretchen at the end of the night, poor guy. So all of you out in MTVP-land, any thoughts on which of the guys the writers are hoping we’ll root for Jess to end up with? It’s a close call for me, even though it’s becoming obvious that we’re supposed to expect Nick will be the first.

Ringer 1.04: "It's Gonna Kill Me, But I'll Do It"

2011-10-24T09:15:00.001-04:00

Sarah's helping me out again with another write-up of "Ringer." Enjoy!

***

“My sister did something unforgivable. She ruined her life, just one bad choice after another until I didn’t even recognize her anymore. I’m ashamed of what she did. I should have been able to help her, save her.”
- Bridget

We begin this week with what obviously is a dream. Bridget walks in to the Martin home with shopping bags and Andrew confronts her as Bridget. He tells her that she lied to everyone and that he doesn’t want her apology. But there is someone she needs to apologize to. She turns around to see a dead Siobhan. She wakes up in a bit of a cold sweat. Andrew comes in and seems to be in a good mood. When he makes note that she’s not been sleeping well for weeks, she suggests she could go to the Hamptons for the weekend to get out of the city. It quickly turns into a trip for two when Andrew tells her he won’t let her spend her birthday alone. She’d completely forgotten it was her birthday. I can understand that. That morning, Bridget heads out to the Hamptons before Andrew gets back from work and retrieves her bag with her ID as Bridget from a storage locker. Too bad Victor had the place under surveillance and he’s got proof she took it.

Bridget gets back to the house and makes a call to Malcolm but leaves a message. Poor guy is probably in a really bad place. Just as Bridget is about to stow the bag in a closet, Andrew arrives early. He’s pawned his work off on Olivia. I’m sure she’s really pleased (sarcasm much?). Andrew and “Siobhan” end up on the beach at the Hamptons, and she quickly nixes the idea of going out on the boat. She plays it off as the thought makes her nauseous because of the baby, and he buys it. Andrew swears this year will be different between them. He won’t let work get in the way. They head back to the house and have a good-spirited debate about the merits of soccer when they hear something crash. Andrew grabs a poker from the fireplace, intending to be all manly, only to discover Henry and Gemma. The weekend trip for two has now become a foursome. Gemma tries to brush it off that they were having a discussion and the vase that is now smashed on the ground just broke. Henry says she threw it at him. It’s quite clear they are very unhappy. But they’re going to stay the weekend anyway. This is going to get awkward.

At police HQ, Victor is getting rather excited. He’s going to try and find Bridget by finding evidence she’s been in touch with Siobhan. Victor’s really determined to find Bridget. We’ll see how well that works. “Siobhan” and Gemma are out getting coffee, and Gemma explains how things have just been so bad lately. They couldn’t even handle a 2 hour car ride together without sniping. Bridget obviously feels really bad for what Siobhan did to Gemma by sleeping with Henry. They part ways for a little bit and we get our first flashback to Bridget and Siobhan as kids. It’s their birthday, and they’re about ten or eleven, and they see a necklace in a jewelry store window. They’ve only got $20 so they decide to buy one necklace and share. They will alternate who gets to wear it. It definitely informs the rest of the episode. As Gemma is looking at hats, Victor pops up and says he has some questions for her. He shows her a picture of Bridget and when Gemma calls her Siobhan, Victor drops the “she’s got a twin sister” bombshell.

Gemma gets back to the house and confronts “Siobhan” about why she never mentioned Bridget. “Siobhan” feeds Gemma a line about how they fell out of each other’s lives because Bridget did something unforgivable. She says it was ruining her life with bad choices, but obviously it has something to do with the little boy from the pilot. Gemma has nothing but sympathy for “Siobhan” and promises not to tell Andrew. We get another flashback, this one only to six years previous, when Bridget shows up to find Siobhan packing. She’s moving to New York with Andrew. She tosses the necklace they bought years earlier on the ground at Bridget’s feet and says she doesn’t want to ever get it back.

Segue to Paris in the present. Siobhan is in the lounge at the hotel about to light a cigarette when she stops, presumably because of the baby she’s now carrying. She spots Tyler walking through the lounge and attempts to approach him when she finds him on the arm some brunette. She tries to apologize, but he’s really not interested. As he walks off, Siobhan gets a call from whoever she’s working with. They’ve now hit a snag.

Back in New York, Bridget is trying to sneak off to dispose of the bag and ID when a drunken Henry corners her. She tells him the affair is over and when he asks her why she’s acting like the last year never happened, we get yet another flashback to her birthday a year ago where Siobhan and Henry are sharing a very passionate night together. Siobhan begs Henry to read to her from his latest manuscript, even though it’s only a first draft. As Henry gets up to get the manuscript, he notices an envelope addressed to Siobhan. It’s the necklace from Bridget. Siobhan doesn’t say much when Henry asks, only that it was from an old friend and they used to pass it back and forth. In the present, “Siobhan” makes it clear that she cares about Andrew and Gemma and doesn’t want to hurt them anymore. Henry storms off, leaving Bridget to make it out to the beach to burn the bag and its contents.

In Paris, Siobhan narrowly avoids getting booted from her hotel because she doesn’t have the money to extend her stay when Tyler swoops in to the save the day. They end up at an outdoor café, and Siobhan says she’s just been having a crappy week. She’d always dreamed of going to Paris (took lessons and everything) but now she’s here alone because her husband never took her. She says she left him and ran away, so he doesn’t know she’s in Parris. Which is true. It’s also true that someone drained her savings account, so she’s got no money. And she plays the “it’s my birthday and I’m pitiful” card. Tyler eats it up and decides to take her out to celebrate. Somehow, I’m pretty sure that’s feeding into whatever plan she’s got.

Stateside, one of the detectives Victor is working with found a citation for the Martin’s boat. It was taken out the day Bridget went missing, and someone returned it to the wrong slip. But no surveillance was able to catch either sister anywhere near the boat. The detective did, however, did get a US Coast Guard recording. That doesn’t bode well for “Siobhan”. Meanwhile, Andrew has hired a chef and set up an elaborate set of gifts for “Siobhan”. She says it’s too much and her cover slips a little as she eats a piece of meat. Apparently the real Siobhan has gone vegetarian. She blames it on the pregnancy (that is getting a little old Bridget) and rushes off for a moment alone. She puts on the necklace and Henry catches her. They have another whispered argument about the affair, but Henry says he’ll walk away if that’s what “Siobhan” wants. He just doesn’t understand how one minute she could be with him and look at him like he was the only person that mattered, and now, she looks at Andrew that way. The pregnancy comes up again, and unfortunately (though not all that unexpectedly), Gemma’s listening in. She tries to keep it together at dinner but rushes off. Henry says he’ll go talk to her but “Siobhan says she’ll handle it.

We hop to Paris for a brief moment to see that Siobhan and Tyler spent the night together. Not all that surprising. He’s brought her a croissant with a candle in it since they never had cake the night before. And he’s taken care of her hotel situation. Nice guy. Stupid, but nice. While he’s in the bathroom finishing getting ready for work, she steals a Martin-Charles folder from his briefcase and hides it under the sheets. She calls her cohort once Tyler’s left and says the plan (whatever that may be) is back on and that Tyler extended her stay on the company dime.

In the Hamptons, Bridget heads inside to find Gemma, makes another call to Malcolm and gets accosted by Victor. He really does need to learn some boundaries. He plays the Coast Guard recording and “Siobhan” feeds him a line about how she and Bridget argued on the boat and that’s why she made the call. She went to find the duffle bag to see if it could lead her to Bridget. She basically tells Victor to get out, and she leaves. He saunters towards the door but picks up her phone to see she’s been calling Malcolm. And if there wasn’t enough drama in this week’s episode, Gemma explodes and threatens to tell Andrew about the affair. To try and keep things quiet, “Siobhan” blurts the truth that she is in fact Bridget.

HIMYM 7.04: "The Stinson Missile Crisis

2011-10-23T23:45:00.002-04:00

“The truth is, I thought I’d be married by now and going through all this stuff alongside you guys. But even if I meet the girl of my dreams right this second, I’m still one night and nine months away from having a family of my own. And that’s assuming the mother of my children is just a huge slut.”
-Ted

I expected to hate this episode because it was the beginning of the relationship between Robin and her therapist, Kevin, played by Kal Penn. But the truth is, it was pretty decent. I wouldn’t put it in the upper echelons of HIMYM with “Slap Bet” and “Slapsgiving,” but I didn’t hate it, either. The only thing that gave me pause was that this episode saw a bit of a return to Cartoon Barney. Regular readers (all one, maybe two of you) will know that I am a firm supporter of the Evolution of Barney and don’t really enjoy when the HIMYM powers that be him regress to his cartoon, joke delivery system state from the first half of season 1. As much as it pains me to admit it, Kal Penn and Cobie Smulders have decent chemistry, enough that their squick-inducing therapist/patent relationship may be tolerable until Robin and Barney (inevitably…I hope…please?) get back together. The B story of the episode, which involved Ted figuring out how involved he should be in Marshall and Lily’s pregnancy hit a particular chord with me as well, since my college roommate and her husband, who I always said would be the Marshall and Lily to my Ted if we all lived in the same city, are pregnant, too. I find I love HIMYM best when it really speaks to something I’m going through as a late 20-something.

The episode opens with a framing device that’s a little different than usual. Instead of Ted telling a drawn-out story to his kids, Robin is telling a drawn-out story to Kevin because she’s at court-mandated therapy following an assault charge. She’s telling him the long version of how she ended up being charged with assault, intertwining it with the story about Ted figuring out how much to intrude on Marshall and Lily’s pregnancy. Kevin occasionally expresses exasperation with how long it’s taking Robn to get to the important part of the story (why she committed assault), and I imagine that’s how Ted’s kids often react during one of his stories. That’s probably what we’d see if the producers didn’t need to rely on stock reaction shot footage of the kids to make them look the same age after all these years. Anyway, Robin opens her story by telling Keving about how it hurt to see Barney wooing Nora. Since Robin and Nora are coworkers, she’d see every time Barney had something sweet like flowers or chocolate delivered. There was also a time when he started singing “When a Man Loves a Woman” right in the middle of the office. Robin ended up drunk under her desk after that one. I wished Barney was singing for Robin, but I’m never going to complain about a chance to hear Neil Patrick Harris sing!

Meanwhile, Marshall, Lily, and Ted are at MacLaren’s, doing their usual after work socializing thing. Lily takes a sip of wine and tells Ted that her OB/GYN, Dr. Sonya, has said that all sorts of usual pregnancy no-nos are okay if it’s “just a little bit.” Which is probably true, but Ted doesn’t see it that way. He says he’s going to research it all himself, since he’s part of “Team Baby.” He’s got a custom-printed t-shirt and everything. Which really doesn’t surprise me. Later, Ted is so invested in “Team Baby” that he intrudes on Lily’ OB/GYN appointment to present Dr. Sonya with all the research he found about things that are bad to eat/drink during pregnancy. This really, seriously pisses Lily off, and she yells at Ted to get out of the exam room. There’s a funny flashback of Ted not understanding the “sock on the doorknob” signal and accidentally walking in on Marshall and Lily. I think this was to illustrate how Ted has always sort of been the meddlesome third wheel.

Robin goes back to telling the main story, and she mentions that she strted trying to come up with ways to get Nora to go far away. At work, Sandy announces that he needs someone to cover the G8 Summit in France. Robin volunteers Nora to go, but when Sandy says he was going to ask Nora in the first place, Robin suddenly wants to be the one chosen for the assignment. Later at MacLaren’s the gang finds out that Barney is still running game, despite being with Nora. He manages to shoo Nora out of the bar just before a woman approaches him and days she saw his advertisement for a free breast reduction consultation. It turns out that Barney has “Bimbo Delivery Systems” in place, and he hasn’t dismantled them just yet, even though he’s dating Nora. My personal favorite was Arnie Linson, the attorney who advertises that he’ll represent people who want to sue that fraudulent plastic surgeon, Barney Stinson. Robin offers to help barney dismantle all his Bimbo Delivery Systems. Kevin thinks this was a ploy to try and win Barney, back, and he’d be right about that.

Meanwhile, while folding laundry, Marshall tells Lily that he feels bad for Ted because it’s difficult to be the third wheel. We see through flashes that Ted indeed is not taking the new distance form his friends well. He’s crying over a photograph of the three of them in an awkward themed Halloween costume group- salt, pepper, and cumin. Oh, and Marshall’s not sure he likes Dr. Sonya, either, much to Lily’s chagrin. Lily wants to be able to keep having sips of wine and eating soft cheeses. Marshall decides that Ted should be back on Team Baby, and Ted, of course, immediately takes his leeway too far. He signs them all up for a birthing class, which Lily explicitly said she doesn’t want to do this early. Only Marshall and Ted actually show up for the class, which results in all kinds of awkwardness as they do the class activities together. Ted eventually starts to feel bad about going against Lily’s wishes, and he and Marshall leave the class. Marshall goes home to apologize to Lily, and we flash forward to their child’s birth. Dr. Sonya is much more of a hardass during labor and delivery than she is during pregnancy, and Marshall hasn’t made it to the hospital yet.

Over at Barney’s apartment, Robin is helping Barney dismantle all his Bimbo Delivery Devices once and for all. Barney has a hilarious sad phone conversation with “Port Authority Mitch,” who would alert him to any especially vulnerable wanna-be starlets who arrived at the bus terminal. We also learned about a flamboyant hair dresser character Barney would sometimes use. Then there’s the Cold Call 5000 that was set up to cold call people in Barney’s perfect target demographic. Robin and Barney wind down at MacLaren’s, and Robin starts trying to convince Barney that they should get dressed up and go out on the town (mostly in response to a cringe inducing sequence where he says she’s a “Bro” over and over). She just about succeeds when Nora gets back early from her assignment in France. Robin ends up drunk under a MacLaren’s table this time. It turns out that Robin accidentally activated the Cold Call 5000 on her way out of Barney’s apartment, and a cold called girl shows up at MacLaren’s wanting to know where Barney is. Against her better judgment, she tells the woman that Barney is at a café down the street. Next thing we know, we see where the assault charge came from. While Barney and Nora are having a nice meal, Robin (who I guess is feeling some remorse) is tackling the Cold Call woman before she can ruin Barney’s date.

Doctor Who 6.13: "The Wedding of River Song"

2011-10-20T19:22:00.001-04:00

“I can help Rose Tyler with her homework. I can go to all Jack’s stag parties in one night.”
-The Doctor

The sixth series of modern Doctor Who ended with quite a mind-bender, but that’s pretty much to be expected from head writer Stephen Moffat. It was rather confusing at timey-wimey the first time I watched it, although I think I was able to follow it okay on rewatch. I was glad to see the end of some things that were niggling me about this series, like the ongoing theme about how the Doctor is dangerous to the people around him and Amy seeming to not have any feeling about losing the chance to see her daughter grow up. While I think this is unlikely, given their popularity, I think this episode would have been a perfect retirement for Amy and Rory and companions. Their story arc is pretty much complete. Amy now has lovely conversations on the back patio of her house with River, and that’s probably where the story should end. I’d be up for placing them on Martha in series 4 status for next year, though, maybe giving them a fun little 2-3 episode reunion arc, but as for primary companions, they should be done.

The episode opens by dropping up into a really messed-up version of earth. Not messed-up in a post-apocalyptic sense, but in a really jumbled sense. There are railroad tracks going through famous London buildings, cars being suspended in mid-air by hot air balloons, and a park where pterodactyls fly around like pigeons. One of my favorite oddities was Charles Dickens (played by the same actor who played him in series 3) giving a television interview about his upcoming Christmas special (that is “A Christmas Carol,” of course). The final bit of oddity is that Winston Churchill is the “Holy Roman Emperor” and has his home base at the “Buckingham Senate.” He’s noticed that the date and time never change, and he questions a servant about it. The servant doesn’t think it’s strange at all. Time is frozen at the exact moment the Doctor was supposed to die, by the way. Churchill calls for his soothsayer to give him some answers, and of course the soothsayer is the Doctor. He tells Churchill that time is broken “because of a woman.”

The Doctor starts telling Churchill the story of how time got broken. It turns out that after he left Craig and Sophie’s house, he decided to do a little investigating about the silence before his death. He meets with an operative of the Silence who actually turns out to be the Tesselecta and crew. The Tesselecta have been investigating the Silence, too, and they give the Doctor a tip about another Silence operative who may have useful information. After playing a game of live (as in live electricity) chess with this other operative, the Doctor learns that Doriam (the blue alien who recently became a Headless Monk) has the answer he seeks. The Silence operative leads the Doctor to a vault where the heads of the Headless Monks are kept. Most of the Monks are just skulls on shelves, but Doriam’s head is still intact and kept in a fancy box. Doriam starts explaining why the Silence thinks the Doctor is dangerous by talking about the upcoming “fall of the eleventh” when the question will be asked and silence must fall. This was exciting to me because it shows that the creative team is starting to think about the transition to the Twelfth Doctor, even if it isn’t actually due to take place for a while. I like Matt Smith just fine (although David Tennant’s Tenth’s Doctor will always be “my” Doctor), but I’d like to see a bit of a creative rejuvenation of the series overall.

Back in weird, time-stopped London, Churchill and the Doctor move into the Senate room. Churchill pulls a gun, and hash marks start appearing on the Doctor’s hand. This means Silents are about, obviously. Churchill starts acting forgetful and asks the Doctor to continue his story. In the flashbacks, the Doctor has dragged Dorian’s head on to the TARDIS. Dorian very kindly tries to convince the Doctor that his time may finally be up, but the Doctor is in a rather petulant mood. He tries calling up his old friend the Brigadeer for an adventure, but the Brigadier has died (a little tribute to the actor who played the Brigadier, who did actually pass away recently). This sobers the Doctor up a bit, and he gets the Tesselecta to deliver the TARDIS blue envelopes for him. That kicks off a bit of a “The Impossible Astronaut” highlight reel. This time, though, we see River inside the space suit at Lake Silencio. The suit is in control, but River manages to avoid killing the Doctor by raining her weapons system. Lake Silencio was a fixed point in time, though, so things go bad very quickly.

Back in “present day” London, the hash marks on the Doctor’s arm keep getting more and more numerous. It turns out that there’s a whole colony of Silents in the Senate chamber, hanging up on the rafters like bats. Just as things are looking quite bad for the Doctor, Amy and a bunch o soldiers burst in.
Back to London, marks keep growing on Doctor’s arm, whole colony of Silence perched like bats in the ceiling. Amy and bunch of soldiers burst in, and at first, we aren’t sure what side she’s on, because she’s wearing an eye patch.. She shoots something at the Doctor, and the Doctor wakes up on a train. On the train car, which is filled with drawings from Amy’s time with the Doctor in the regular timeline, Amy reveals that she’s with a group that knows time has gone wrong and is trying to fix things. Amy and the Doctor also talk about how she hasn’t found Rory yet, which becomes a really funny running joke when “Captain Williams” pokes his head in the room to give an update.

The train arrives at “Area 52,” which is located at the base of one of the Great Pyramids. A bunch of Silents are being stored there in tubes, which is really creepy. And they’re even creepier when they start waking up and breaking out of their tubes. Before the situation gets really dire, the Doctor gives an amusing little pep talk to Rory about asking Amy out. Then the Doctor is brought to see a tied up Madame Kovarian (aka Eye Patch Lady) and River. The Doctor tries to make River understand that not killing him at Lake Silencio was wrong, but she’s not at all remorseful. Because they are the two pieces of this break in time, the Doctor tries to touch River to repair everything, but she has him handcuffed. The Silents make their way to the room where all this is going on, and they’re using the eye patches (called eye drives…Amy and her crew use them to be able to retain visual records of the Silents) to overcome the resistance. They can use the eye drives to cause extreme pain. Rory offers to stay behind and hold of the Silents while River and Amy take the Doctor to see something River has created at the top of the pyramid. It’s an incredibly noble moment because the eye drive is already causing Rory pain, but he’s grimacing through it. Amy ends up returning to save him, and then she leaves Kovarian with her eye drive frying her brain.

Up at the top of the pyramid, River shows the Doctor a distress beacon she’s created. Millions of people out in the normal universe have answered the call and want to help the doctor. This was a welcome end to “the Doctor brings destruction” plot that was getting rather tiresome. In order to finally get River to agree to reset the timeline, the Doctor takes a drastic step. He marries her in a quickie Gallifreyan ceremony that involves Amy and (a kind of confused, but humorously accepting) Rory giving consent and the Doctor’s bow tie as a binding. I’m really not sure how I feel about this. River’s feelings for the Doctor are clear, but the Doctor’s feelings for River really aren’t. The whole idea that he would marry her just doesn’t make sense given what we’ve seen. Anyway, after they’re married, the Doctor basically begs River to reset the timeline. They touch hands, and we go back to the lake. The doctor appears to die, and tie goes back to how it was.

The next thing we see is River and Amy talking on Amy’s back porch. River’s just come from the Weeping Angel adventures from last season. Amy is still really upset that she killed Madame Kovarian, even if it was in an alternate screwed-up timeline, and she wishes she could talk to the Doctor about it. River reveals that the Doctor had another trick up his sleeve, but she wasn’t supposed to tell anyone about it. It turns out that it was the Doctor inside the Tesselecta that was shot at Lake Silencio. The Doctor himself is still very much alive. The Tesselecta protected him. They’re celebrating this happy news as Rory arrives home, presumably from work. Meanwhile, the Doctor returns Doriam’s head to the Headless Monk vault. He’s decided that he’s going to keep having adventures, but he’s going to do it on the down-low. Doriam reminds him that he can’t escape his fate. The ultimate question that will be asked at the Fall of the Eleventh is, not surprisingly, “Doctor who?”

Fringe 4.02: "One Night in October"

2011-10-16T18:32:00.002-04:00

“At the risk of sounding sentimental, I've always thought there are people who leave an indelible mark on your soul. An imprint that can never be erased.”
-Broyles

I know there’s been a lot of complaints about Peter’s absence from “Fringe” so far this season, and I certainly don’t like our usual team being disrupted (see my complaining about the switched Olivia plot that most critics loved), but I thought this episode was pretty decent. The plot provided a cool way to blend the two universes (although I hope this method of blending doesn’t become the show’s weekly format- I’d rather be kept on my toes a bit). I also really enjoyed getting to see our Olivia interact with Alt!Lincoln. Alt!Lincoln cares so deeply about Alt!Livia that it was fun to watch him sort of discover our Olivia and all the ways in which she’s the same and different. They had a really interesting dynamic. Although I would like to see more of our universe’s adorably geeky Lincoln on a regular basis. In this episode, we were relegated to once appearance by him at the beginning of the episode.

The episode opens with a fairly creepy (like old-school, pre-split universe “Fringe” creepy) interrogation scene. A man is holding up what looks like a childhood photo and asking another man to recount the story behind the picture. The interrogated man seems reluctant, but he slowly tells the happy story. The camera then pans to show a glow-y tube emanating from the open back of his skull and traveling to a sinister machine. The other man apologizes, hits some switches, and the interrogated man dies.

Back in Boston, Walter is having a bit of a ‘sode as they’d say on “Wonderfalls.” He’s covering up reflective surfaces with blankets and towels (so he doesn’t see Peter’s image, presumably), and he’s ranting about how evil the folks on the Other Side are, using every synonym for evil he can think of. Lincoln arrives in the middle of this scene, because he had been told he was going to learn about shape shifters. Astrid helps explain to Lincoln what’s going on, and Walter calls Lincoln “Kennedy.” That made me crack up.

Olivia arrives at the lab, and she and Astrid have a little aside about how Astrid thinks Olivia should ask Lincoln out. Olivia makes all sorts of excuses about why she shouldn’t. Obviously this scene is meant to let us know that Peter still occupies some space in her subconscious. Olivia is saved from having to explain herself further by a phone call from Broyles. There have been 23 murders, essentially by brain freeze, on the Other Side, and they want our Fringe team’s help. Olivia and Broyles meet with Alt-livia at the Statue of Liberty bridge. Alt-livia wants our Fringe folks to help with the case by bringing our universe’s version of the suspect over to the Other Side to check out his doppelganger’s apartment. In our universe, the man is a forensic psychology professor specializing in serial killers.

Olivia visits the professor, whose name is John, and tells him that the FBI needs his help in building a profile. He eagerly agrees to help, basically saying he’s been training for something like this. Then Olivia brings out the tranquilizers. John can’t know that he’s going to a parallel universe, after all. It kind of reminded me of how the Others transported new recruits to the Island on “Lost.” Then we cut to the Other Side, where we see from the title card that most of the action this week is going to be taking place in the parallel universe version of my old stomping grounds, southeastern Pennsylvania. Norristown, to be specific. Strangely, it looks less dumpy on the Other Side. Of course, that’s really just because of the fact that the show is actually shot in Vancouver, Canada. Alt-livia is dying her hair blonde to look more like her doppelganger mission, and Alt-Lincoln interrupts. Alt-livia mentions that she’s dating Frank (another change brought about by Peter disappearing), which must disappoint Lincoln terribly. Meanwhile, Alt-John is stalking his next victim at a gas station.

At the lab, Astrid finds Walter lying back in a chair, listening to really loud music emanating from a wall of speakers. It also turns out that he’s been self-adjusting his medication levels. It’s pretty obvious that he’s reaching his limit of being able to deal with the visions of Peter. At the end of the episode, we see that all the measures Walter is taking to block Peter out aren’t working. He’s got all the reflective surfaces covered, but he still hears Peter’s voice begging for help as he tries to go to sleep. Walter turns on the loud music again to try and drown it out, but Peter’s voice only gets louder.

Over on the Other Side, John is at his doppelganger’s house, beginning to build a profile. He figures out that the killer had a very unhappy, abusive childhood. He finds victims who are happy and had good childhoods. I guess that explains why he wanted the victim at the beginning of the episode to tell the story behind that childhood photo. John starts to see things he recognizes from his own childhood, like a set of chairs. He really freaks out, however, when he sees one of his own childhood photo’s on the suspect’s wall of photos. He rushes outside the house and is even more confused when he runs into our Olivia and Alt!Lincoln, then turns is head to see a nearby neighborhood encased in Amber. He understandably wants to know where the heck he is.

Back in the house, our Olivia sits John down and talks to him about how they both grew up in an abusive home. John says his father saw the darkness in him, that’s why he was abusive, but he was saved by a woman named Marjorie. John wants to save his doppelganger like Marjorie saved him, but Olivia explains that his doppelganger can’t know he exists. While the agents have a bit of a confab outside about Alt-John’s latest victim (a mom from the gas station), John escapes the house. Lincoln and the Olivias (should that be the name of my “Fringe” tribute band?) rush to Fringe HQ to figure out what to do next. Alt!Astrid calculates that it’s going to take many hours to locate John, but Olivia has an idea. She remembers the license plate (PA, of course) from the tractor in the childhood photo that set John off. The address where it was registered is a farm that was shut down “after the Richboro fires.” There were just so many Southeastern PA references in this episode! I guess the house where I grew up probably was damaged in the Richboro fires, too.

John shows up at the killer’s lair (presumably at the farm…are there actually any farms near Richboro anymore? I don’t think so) just as Alt!John is about to drill into the skull of his latest victim. Meeting his doppelganger freaks Alt!John out quite a bit, but the two of them do figure out where their lives diverged. They were both at a carnival as a kid when their dad discovered had been killing animals. John ran away and met Marjorie when he woke up on her farm, and Alt!John got dragged home and beaten by his father. John tries to convince Alt!John that there’s another way to deal with the darkness, but Alt!John knocks him out and hooks him up to the glow-y tube machine. He wants to know all about Marjorie, and he uses the machine to steal all of John’s memories of her.

While this is going on, the Fringe team raids the farm. At first, they think they’ve found the wrong place, but Alt-Lincoln finds a door down to an old basement. That basement is Alt-John’s lair. Olivia finds Alt-John, and he tries to shoot her, but Alt-Livia manages to shoot Alt-John before Olivia gets hurt. Back in our universe, John winds up in the hospital with significant memory loss. The team is worried that without the memories of Marjorie, he’s going to become a serial killer like his doppelganger. It turns out there was no reason, to worry, though. Olivia has a nice conversation with him, and it soon becomes apparent that while he no longer remembers Marjorie, he still very much remembers the lessons he taught her. Broyles tells Olivia hat he thinks people leave an indelible mark on the soul. Which is yet another reference to memories of Peter still kicking around. Can he just be brought back already?

Person of Interest 1.02: "Ghosts"

2011-10-13T07:23:00.000-04:00

Sarah's back today with a write-up of a recent episode of the other show she's covering for MTVP this season, "Person of Interest." Enjoy!

***

“I know what it’s like to lose someone and to feel the need to disappear. But trust me; you don’t want to leave people behind.”
- Mr. Finch

We begin this week with a man talking on the phone to who we assume is his wife. He’ going to meet her at their usual place and he’s carrying flowers. He gets on to the elevator and just as the doors are about to close, a man rushes in. It turns out to be John. Somehow he’s looking less gray than he did in the pilot. Anyway, he strikes up a conversation with the flower guy, Bill. And within seconds it becomes clear that Bill’s number is up. Bill’s been cheating on his wife and John says that while some women would just leave, others would hire hitmen to make it look like a robbery gone bad. He takes out the two hitmen in the elevator and as the doors open on the ground floor, Bill backs out as John coolly walks off, recommending Bill call the cops and a good divorce attorney. John does like his violence.

We briefly see a man answer a pay phone. He’s been given an assignment and I’m betting it’s not to deliver dry cleaning. He appears to be a gun for hire. We then find John on the street and he calls Mr. Finch. They’re on opposite sides of the street but they can’t just meet. It would look sketchy. John gives Mr. Finch a rundown of the night before and says he wants to meet. Finch tells him they’ll meet when he (Finch) wants to. Meanwhile, Detective Carter shows up at the scene where John took out the two hired guns. For once, he only wounded them. Even though it’s not a homicide, she says it is part of a bigger investigation into the man in a suit who “helps” people. I have a feeling she doesn’t like our unconventional vigilante.

John and Mr. Finch eventually meet up in a cemetery. The machine gave another number, belonging to a fifteen-year-old girl. But there’s a problem. She’s been dead for two years. Murdered along with the rest of her family. Identity theft in week two, really? Things get even weirder as we get our first flashback. We hop to 2002, shortly after 9/11 to find Mr. Finch in a rather large building, running on a treadmill. Another man, who appears to be his business partner, shows up and says they’ve won another award for service to humanity. He’s more interested in what Finch is working on. He’s got all the feeds from the NSA that covers New York. He’s still teaching the machine recognize to people by cell phone data and facial recognition. He wants to be able to teach it sort though the people, seeing as terrorists don’t just stand out on street corners. But it is likely to take another four or five years to get to that point. I like that we are seeing the development of the machine and how Finch got to where he is now.

Back in 2011, John and Finch meet up at the last place Theresa (the dead 15-year-old girl) was seen. She and her family went out on their boat, and supposedly no one came back alive. The father killed the two kids and his wife and then killed himself. But Theresa’s body was never recovered. Something is obviously fishy here. John is off to twist Lionel’s arm for information. He needs the police report from the case. Lionel is less than pleased to see John again. Apparently IA is looking at him pretty hard. John could care less. He just wants the file. Back at HQ, he’s watching old footage of Theresa’s aunt and uncle after the bodies were discovered. He’s also got a lead in a friend Theresa was arrested with once or twice. John thinks it was a professional hit made to look like a murder/suicide. So we actually get to see Finch out in the field. And he’s not half bad. He gets the aunt to tell him that she and her husband divorced and that they didn’t have any kids, though Theresa was like a daughter. She’s hoping that the currents will bring Theresa’s body back so she can have some closure.

At police headquarters, Carter is running into more trouble. She’s got John’s prints at eight crime scenes but half the files are redacted. Looks like the feds aren’t going to play nice. Meanwhile, John is still looking for Theresa but has no luck, until he spots the kid she was arrested with. The kid claims he hasn’t seen her since she’s been dead. It gives John enough time to clone the kid’s phone and see he sent a message to “T”. John finally spots her and chases after but gets cut off before he gets too far. Plus, Theresa had a blade and cut his hand. He seems more pissed about losing her, honestly.

In a surprising turn of events, we see where Mr. Finch actually works. He appears to be a somewhat low-level employee named Harold. But John’s done some digging (and showed up at the office kind of creepy-like). Finch owns the whole company and if John were to say the wrong thing or talk too loudly, most of the office would be overhauled to keep the secret. John explains he lost Theresa and he’s going to look into who the shooter was while Finch searches for the uncle (who is MIA) and looks further at the father’s financials. John gets Lionel to help him out again by taking him to a bar where he can find a fixer. Said fixer usually has a cut in every contract killing in the city but won’t talk to anyone who just walks through the door. John doesn’t seem concerned. He goes and gets thrown out immediately. He gets up, dusts off his jacket goes in again and beats the crap out of enough people so he gets a name. The guy’s in prison though. He doesn’t deny killing the family but says he doesn’t kill kids. So John thinks whoever hired him found out and sent a new guy to finish the job.

Finch has found some useful information. The uncle had some land holdings in a company and sends John the address to check it out. Unfortunately, just as John gets there and finds Theresa’s uncle, Finch says he’s found Theresa through the skimmer she’d been using to support herself. She tried to sell some credit card numbers online. John finds her just in time for the new hired gun to show up. They have a fight and it looks like John’s gotten beat for once (ncluding smashing through a window). But he puts three or four bullets in the guy and gets Theresa to at least go with him to a hotel. Too bad the hitman was wearing a vest.

John took the liberty of renting the whole floor in the hotel on Finch’s card so they would be sure no one would bother them. As soon as Finch arrives, John’s off to have a word with Theresa’s uncle. We get a quick glimpse of the hit man installing a wiretap on the aunt’s phone as she calls her ex husband again asking him to call her back. Things aren’t exactly as John assumed when Theresa said she didn’t trust her uncle. It turns out the uncle got some money launderers involved in one of his brother’s land holdings that was affected by an oil spill. The government didn’t clean it up fast enough so the shady guys hired a hit man to take out the family and made the uncle the administrator of the estate. So now John understands why they’re after Theresa. She’s the legal heir to the land (and it’s gone up in value 40-50 times).

Back at the hotel, Finch tells Theresa that he saw her aunt and relays the message that she’s missed and loved. Theresa really is not too trusting. But we get another Finch flashback, this time to 2007, when his partner discovers that the machine picks up non-terrorist crimes too. He’s appalled that they’re not doing anything but Finch says that he’s set it to erase the irrelevant list at midnight (information we already knew). Back in the present, John’s relaying the information that Theresa is worth millions just as the uncle gets home to find the hit man sitting in his living room. The uncle gets dead pretty quickly while John follows the father former business partner to a meeting with a councilman. Somehow John manages to find a dump trunk to commandeer long enough to hit the business partner’s car. But he’s too late. The hitman listened in while Theresa called her aunt (didn’t say anything but it was long enough to trace the number) and is now at the hotel.

Theresa and Finch manage to trick the hitman a couple times by turning on the light in the adjoining room when he kills the power in the hallway. And calling her cell phone on the room phone while they slip out into the hallway. Things aren’t looking good when he corners them. But Theresa is ready to face him. Luckily, John shows up and puts a few bullets in him (not enough to kill). Later that night, John calls Carter. He’s tired of her just chasing after him and asking questions, so they set up a meet. Of course he doesn’t actually show up. Carter brings all kinds of back up and all she finds is Theresa sitting on a wall waiting for her. We get a pretty happy ending. Theresa is reunited with her aunt and her father’s ex-business partner is arrested. John shows up at the office of the company Finch owns to find Finch gone and none of the employees seem to know what happened. Just as John is about to leave, Finch calls and says that he’s really not a trusting man and that in the future, he (Finch) will call John. As Finch leaves the building, we see a bust of his former business partner with what looks like a year of death as 2010.