Welcome to the Monday night line-up! In my house we have three DVR's. Yes - THREE. And we need them all. Scary, I know. My family is a tv family. My mom blames my dad, and I blame the wonderful distraction of colorful pixels and stories I seem to always try to predict (and 98% of the time I am right *toot*toot*). Anyway, the first show to leave the Monday line-up was the wonderful new series "Alphas", a SyFy original series that made me reminisce about a lovely show I used to watch called "Heroes". The two shows do not have many similarities at all - unless you make wild associations like Red Flag=Sylar, etc. - but the theme of super-powered human beings is one that I love. The first season introduced a motley crew of Alpha investigators, and I fell in love with each character...especially Gary. The first season wrapped up at the end of the summer, but they are already signed up for a second season. This news makes me super happy and I give the new show an A right out of the gates.
Now having lost one Monday night show Fall Season started to amp up! First we have "The Lying Game", a guilty pleasure for my Monday night line-up. This ABC Family new series is about twin teenage sisters who swap places and cause a big commotion with scandal and a very attentive DA hovering around them. Why do I watch this show? Or more importantly, why do I enjoy it? Because everyone needs a guilty pleasure. For one - I love Emma's character. The way she changes Sutton's world around, I mean, kudos to her. Sure the possy of people who call themselves Sutton's friends should have noticed if they were true friends, which I'm sure says something about those relationships, but this is not an Emma problem. The problem is with Sutton - who plays evil twin in the worst way. She's selfish, greedy, and unappreciative. I understand wanting to find your birth mother, but being a bitch to the woman who raised you just because she wasn't your real mom? Come on, Sutton - that's low. All in all this show lacks the mental suspense to keep me dying for each episode, but holds strong on the drama and character content that makes me still come back every week. It may be low brow, but I'm not a teenager, so I'm not their target audience and probably not the best person to judge. I give it a solid C+.
Next we have the first show of the season to bite the dust: "The Playboy Club". To say I was disappointed about this outcome is an understatement. Right off the bat the show emerged as an early favorite in the new series race for me, but only three episodes in and the show was shut down. It was extremely disheartening, especially because I am a big fan of Amber Heard and I was excited to see her on the flat screen. I had the show running at a solid B, and was intrigued by the hidden gay and lesbian plot but alas we shall never know what that amounted to. I hate when shows get cut off so early on. Makes me wonder what could have been. Le sigh. Wonder if they will release the remaining three episodes that were definitely filmed according to IMDB? If you know the answer please fill me in!
Moving on we have the double trouble of two two-hour shows!! "Dancing with the Stars" and "The Sing-Off" both air from 8-10pm on Mondays. "Dancing with the Stars" gets special treatment, recorded downstairs on the big tv in the living room. This is because it is one of dad's shows. Most seasons, I will be honest, I did not watch. At least not the whole time. It's hard when you're in college. There's no time for tv. Clearly I'm making up for it now! Anyway, this season has quite an interesting cast. I know when I heard the cast revealed there was one person in particular I was excited to see on the list: Hope Solo. First off talk about a gorgeous and strong woman! She was incredible in the World Cup, and USA should have won in my opinion (I'm still bitter about some ref calls that were made but c'est la vie). Still, having her in the spotlight was a really cool kicker at the end of the biggest summer for US Women's soccer in quite a while. I still route for her every week, and this week especially. Sometimes the judges make me mad, and I'm kind of glad Maks fought about this. They judge people individually rather than as a whole. What I mean is they expect more from certain competitors and judge them harsher when they are not up to par. I am going to stop this rant before it gets out of hand. Tuesday nights for me are a big deal - not because of the elimination but because of all the professional performances. This week is Broadway week!!! So I cannot wait for the incredibly talented Kristin Chenoweth to perform again! Now this is a show I could live without, and one we fast-forward through most of, so unfortunately it gets an average approval rating of a C. Let's be honest - anything lower than this and I probably wouldn't watch it.
Now "The Sing-Off" is my show! This one I get to watch when I crawl into bed in the wee hours of Tuesday morning. I love acapella music. Spell it how you will it is still incredible and unique. It is the third season for this show and the biggest yet. I have my favorites as always but for this one I like to keep those groups to myself. I will say that this season has been the hardest for me to narrow down my favorites. If you like music you will love this show. This is music in its rawest form. So pure with only the voices of the contestants to carry them through each round. And the panel of judges can't be beat! This season Sara Bareilles joined Ben Folds and Shawn Stockman, replacing Nicole Scherzinger. She has been such a great addition to the team! Each week she is funny and her critiques are always good without being mean. She even made light of her newness to the position which made the audience laugh and I'm sure put the vocal groups at ease. The three judges are all so talented it is easy to leave the decisions of who stays and goes in their hands. That's right, people. Unlike all those other reality competitions this one does not rely on audience votes. The judges alone decide who goes home in every episode...at least for the majority of the season. Some people might not like this, but I think America can get these things wrong more than they care to admit. I mean, look at this season of "America's Got Talent"! Team iLuminate should have won. That is an act that was fresh, inspiring, and something that could sustain a Vegas act. Again, my opinion, but after all, this is my blog. Back to "The Sing-Off", I give the show a solid A-, and it gets the minus only because I find myself fast-forwarding through a lot of fluff (mostly the videos for the groups I don't care for in order to save time).
This entry is already way longer than I had anticipated, but I did warn you that Monday was a big night for me and tv. I'll just get the 'parent shows' out of the way. "Castle", a great show from what I've seen, but unfortunately I did not get into it in the beginning. It started at a bad time for me college wise so I never really got on track with watching it, but I wish I would have. From what I've seen the characters have enormous depth and the detective and writer side-kick bit is fresh and new. Plus it made me want to write watching through the first season on DVD. That is a definite plus. This is one of my mom's shows, and yes, we buy the books. I'm not sure if she finished the third because she has been trying to get through The Help since the middle of the summer. For the reason that I do not watch the show regularly I will not rate it. The same goes for "Hawaii Five-0" which I will occasionally sit down and watch with the parents for one very good reason: Eye Candy! Need I say more? Of course I still call Alex O'Loughlin's character Mick because of a little show he was on a few years back called "Moonlight" but my parents have caught on to Mick = Steve. Again, I will not rate this one because I do not watch the show on a regular basis.
Now I'm down to my last three shows; One old, two new. The old one is "Gossip Girl". Now I love drama, but recently this one has been a bit much for me. For two years this show has been one of the ones that I push aside in favor of homework, but this season - now that I'm actually watching on a regular basis - I see that it can be forgetable...hence my lack of watching in the past. I feel that sometimes the things happening are things I have seen over and over again. Some lack of originality mixed with super drama (beyond the level of drama I like) and a heaping spoonful of predictability has moved this show from its once high and mighty A rating all the way down to a C+. Maybe this season it will pick itself back up.
My two new shows start in the 8 o'clock slot on Fox with the new hit "Terra Nova". Dad and I love our science fiction shows (our summer show this year was "Falling Skies", something we looked forward to watching every week). The show is new and while it has set up some good storylines, I am not entirely sure what direction it will be taking. To me this is a plus! I like not being able to predict things about a show as this is a rare occurrence for me. Though I will say that some predictability will be appreciated in the future - because if I can't see a story arc I may just toss the show out - right now setting up the characters and the foundation are the main focus, as they should be. I am happy to give this an early approval rating of a B+ with hopes for improvement as we move along in the premiere season.
The last show on the list - if I haven't forgotten any - is actually the newest star to the line-up. "Hart of Dixie" is a new show on The CW at 9pm. This show has a Sweet Home Alabama feel to it, though I have seen promise. This is the newest show to my line-up because I watched all five of the first episodes today. I apparently felt the need to fill in some missing time from the loss of a few lingering summer shows. Rachel Bilson plays a young doctor who comes to Alabama to take up a general practice given to her by the father she never knew was really her father. Confusing? Not really if you watch the show. I like this show because I love small town living and this show is full of that kind of atmosphere. It has that "Gilmore Girls" Stars Hollow charm with the quirky characters and the "Everwood"-esque doctor vs. doctor mentality. There's drama and humor, a good mix to make for a nice easy to watch show to fill out the Monday night agenda. The early rating on this one is also a B+, for very different reasons.
Well, I hope you had a pleasant Monday. And just in case there was something that you would rather not be doing, well, I think I just gave you a few options of what you could be doing instead.
Summing up the Ratings
"Alphas" = A
"The Lying Game" = C+
"The Playboy Club" [Cancelled] = B
"Dancing with the Stars" = C
"The Sing-Off" = A-
"Gossip Girl" = C+
"Terra Nova" = B+
"Hart of Dixie" = B+
