A Good Weekend for Television

Starting with Friday night: Battlestar Galactica on SciFi and Friday Night Lights on NBC, this weekend proved to be very satisfying for this TV Viewer.

I’ll get back to Friday night in a bit, and move on to Sunday…

The premiere of Big Love was solid and entertaining. I’m still not crazy about Bill Paxton (I never really have been), but the rest of the cast is fantastic. I’m worried about Barb, with the weight of EVERYTHING on her shoulders. Nikki continues to become much more of a sympathetic character. And Ginnifer Goodwin’s Margene has the best reaction shots on TV. (Just watch her in the background of any scene she is in.) Also, Alby is as creepy and disturbing as ever – I get chills whenever he’s on screen.

I hope this season will prove to be as compelling and well-made as season two. It’s off to a good start.

The premiere of Flight of the Conchords reminded me why I enjoyed the show so much in its first season. I also didn’t realize how much I had missed it. My two favorite bits: Bret’s knitted pants and his dolls and their effect on Jemaine’s jacket.

I also enjoyed the return of Secret Diary of a Call Girl quite a bit. It was a show I watched because of how much I liked Billie Piper on Doctor Who, but I found the premiere to be more funny and entertaining than I remember the show being.

And I enjoyed The United States of Tara A LOT more than I thought I would. A very solid cast, especially Toni Collette (of course). It was actually a lot funnier than I thought it would be.

Unfortunately, this week’s Desperate Housewives and Brothers & Sisters weren’t quite up to the standards of the other shows. Housewives wasn’t bad, just kinda dull and static. I’m close to giving up on Brothers & Sisters. It’s mostly annoying me lately.

But on to the really good stuff…Friday night’s TV.

I downloaded the first few episodes of FNL when it originally aired on DirectTV in the fall, and I enjoyed what I saw so much I thought I would rewatch the whole season again. And the premiere was as good as I remember, and while maybe it was not as good as some eps from the first season, it was a solid hour of TV.

From the amusing opening scenes, to everything with Buddy (the two game rumor!), to absolutely everything Kyle Chandler does – especially when he’s with Connie Britton (I love watching them fight and then apologize.)

Other standouts from this ep:
- I’m kinda liking Lyla so far
- Landry’s scene with Tyra and her mom was great (fixing the toilet, reaction to the hanging lingerie)
- The whole scene at the bar was hysterical: the interplay between Tim and Billy and then Tyra’s reaction to the proposal and her “future”
- The one shot during the football game after JD came in at the end of the game and Saracen in the foreground looking disappointed and his Grandma in the background looking confused (even though you couldn’t see her face, you could tell)

And of course, then there was the season premiere of Battlestar Galactica, which far exceeded my expectations – and for a show that is always surprising and entertaining me, that is quite remarkable.

The opening sequence alone was impressive. So depressing, so quiet, so powerful…I actually jumped when Roslin returned to the ship and someone yelled “Madam President” after her.

Tyrol’s vision: Are the final five the only original members of the 13th tribe that survived? Could the final five have created the Cylons as we know them now? Are they the initial five and not the final 5? He (along with the other three) then has the memories of his original model(s) which were triggered at the end of season three when they came to that nebula.

At this point in the episode, after Tyrol’s vision and Starbuck finding the destroyed Raptor, I thought that she was the final Cylon. But I guess she isn’t so what is she? A clone? The Cylons did harvest her eggs (I think) and performed a number of tests on her. Could she have traveled through time when she “died?”

I was also thinking that I was happy that Dualla had so much to do and it was nice to see her laugh and smile. I was absolutely shocked when she shot herself, but looking back at it now, it seems obvious that that is what was going to happen.

I was very impressed by Jamie Bamber this week – especially as he wiped the ‘1’ off of the board of survivors and in the scene with Starbuck. That scene was very moving and powerful.

I like the reveal that Ellen is the fifth. I think it’s surprising and feels right at the same time. Not too obvious, like Starbuck (which I would have been ok with) and not too out of left field like either Adama would have been.

So did someone stage the Starbuck crash or is that really her? If the crash was staged, by who (Ellen?) and why? Does someone want her to think she’s the fifth? Are we going to see Ellen again even though she died? Are there other copies of the final five out there somewhere? Because if we do see Ellen again, that means that there would have to have been a copy of her at some point so she could download, and then logic would dictate that there should be copies of the other final four as well.

Just a really awesome episode that began my weekend of excellent TV watching.