Tuesday, November 23, 2010

Week 9 TV Power Rankings



1. (2) “Community” – Yep, that’s right. A new #1 for the first time ever. “Community” sadly doesn’t get the audience it should and I think its had an outstanding sophomore season (unlike “Cougar Town”). This week’s episode did an exceptionally good job at having a mysterious storyline involving night school classes that kept me as intrigued by where it was going as much as it made me laugh. The episode had plenty of references to pop culture throughout, but they weren’t as obvious as other episodes have been. Plus, the pillow and bed sheet fort Abed and Troy made could have been reason alone to elevate this to the top spot for the week. One final note, I read people felt this episode ripped off the J. Walter Weatherman storylines from “Arrested Development” but I didn’t see that at all. Double crosses and triple crosses have been in movies and TV for years, no one show can take credit for that and no show should feel like they’re ripping another off by using it.
2. (1) “Chuck” – Well here we are. Maybe if “Chuck” had tried a little harder this week we wouldn’t be in this situation. In all honesty, this episode wasn’t bad at all. It guest starred Rob Riggle (the cop who lets the kids taser the guys in “The Hangover”) as a spy trying to get Chuck to flash again. The issue is the episode was clearly the beginning of an arc and as such I felt I had to slip it down a notch. When the arc eventually wraps up, I like the chances of “Chuck” reclaiming the top spot again.
3. (3) “Modern Family” – I liked how Manny finally saw in himself how odd his behavior sometimes can be. Don’t get me wrong, he’s one of my favorite characters on the show. I would just think it would be lazy to not have him address how he clearly is very different from kids his age. I know they came close to doing this in Season 1 when he was supposed to hang out with Luke and instead hung out with Claire all day, but I thought this was a lot better. Now I am not saying I want this to happen with all the characters. I don’t need Gloria to all of a sudden notice how she seems to only wear clothes where her boobs bounce all over the place. No, let’s just keep that how it is.
4. (4) “30 Rock” – It’s funny how sometimes shows seem to just take seasons off. Maybe it’s that they tried so hard and came up with a great season, and so they can slack a little bit and it’ll still be pretty good. Who knows? But what I do know is a lot of shows have trouble rebounding from that, like “The Office” and much of this year of “How I Met Your Mother”. This hasn’t been the case for “30 Rock” as I keep being more and more satisfied with what a bounce back season this has been. This week really utilized Jack’s additional duties as Head of Microwave Ovens at GE. While it was a fitting ending to Jack being a member of GE, I am sad to see the loss of an aspect of Jack’s job that had so many potential laughs.
5. (5) “Terriers” – We finally got to see the case that caused Hank to be kicked off the police force and essentially ended his marriage. It was a particularly gruesome case, one that seemed more like something off “Law & Order: SVU” but the payoff of catching the guy was well worth it. Britt’s in a lot of trouble though for beating up Katie’s classmate. It’s going to be tough for the boys to get out of this one. Then again I thought the same thing when Landis died in Hank’s bathtub and that all worked out for everybody. Except Landis.
6. (9) “Boardwalk Empire” – I feel like I am going to be criticized for enjoying this episode more than most because of the action near the end. I realize the character building from the slower episodes that I ranked lower than this paved the way for this episode to be so good. Still, I am gonna ignore that because it makes me look semi-ignorant and just say this show is starting to fulfill the high expectations I had for when it began. I think my favorite part of the season so far was this week when the D’Allesio brother who tried to shoot Nucky asked Jimmy if he was going to kill him for mouthing off and Jimmy said “Well I wasn’t going to but now that you talked me into.” And then shoots him in the head. Awesome. Finally, was I the only one who thought that when Agent Van Alden had his first shot of whiskey he was gonna react like Doc Brown in “Back to the Future III”?
7. (7) “Sons of Anarchy” – Finally a little bit of closure to wrap up this uneven season. But there are still two episodes left and as much as Jax says he’s done listening to his father from beyond the grave, I’m sure the love letters stuffed in his bag will bring it all back again. I will say this, Salazar should kill Tara. It’s the only realistic thing to happen, but I know it won’t. I don’t want Tara gone, but she killed the guy’s girl and he has a gun and they are in the middle of nowhere. Come on.
8. (11) “Fringe” – Uh, oh. Peter knows he’s been sleeping with Fauxlivia, what’s gonna happen? The real shame will be if when Olivia goes back to her own world she gets rid of her red hair. That look is working for you girl!
9. (8) “Walking Dead” – Much better than the previous two. The only reason it slipped was because of how good the shows in front of it all were. I am very excited for these last two episodes.
10. (6) “The Event” – Here’s the deal, I don’t care about Sean and Layla. So when the plot deals with them I zone out. Plus, we found out early on in the episode that the VP was behind the assassination attempt and we knew Hal Holbrook was bad already too. So this “backstory” episode that was so supposed to reveal so much did nothing for me.
11. (14) “How I Met Your Mother” – I will never ever tire of Robin Sparkles. Nor will I ever complain about Nicole from the Pussycat Dolls being around. However, it was a bit of a stretch that she was from Canada, yet was living in New York as the organist for the Rangers. They have hockey teams in Canada, a lot of them.
12. (12) “Family Guy” – This week’s laugh out loud moment was when Brian leaves Stewie to take a cab and Stewie sees he has no money. He then says, “Well at least it’s not raining” and some guy runs up and stabs him. Typical NYC.
13. (13) “It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia” – Two back to back very strong episodes are keeping this from falling any lower. I feel like the show could do every episode focused solely on Charlie’s warped mind and I wouldn’t grow tired of it. Denim chicken is a sweet band name by the way.
14. (10) “The Challenge: Cutthroat” – This season isn’t going as well as it started as it has hit quite the lull. But Boston’s own CT is on next week! I will work you son!
15. (15) “The Office” – Ryan’s idea was actually not bad, but obviously he doesn’t have the work ethic to follow through on it. Dwight’s whole hay ride shenanigans weren’t funny and I guess the best part of the episode was Horn-Rimmed Glasses Guy from “Heroes” being Angela’s new love interest.
16. (16) “Cougar Town” – Eh, as previously stated this show’s not having the sophomore season I wanted or expected it to. I really don’t like Travis and I think that’s what is affecting my fondness for the show. I don’t see how these people like him. I know two of them are his parents, but even still, he sucks.
17. (17) “Raising Hope” – I do like this show, I do. There’s just not a whole lot to say about it and I run into this problem every week. It’s about a 6 or 7 every week, so if you are looking to kill 22 minutes (you should own a DVR at this point, you’re not Amish) every week then here you go.
18. (18) “Glee” – I have to admit, Gwyneth Paltrow REALLY impressed me. I was fully expecting all her scenes to be cringe-worthingly awkward, but she did a real good job and clearly has a stage presence I didn’t think she had. I still dislike a vast majority of the characters and now only enjoy about one song an episode.
19. (19) “Survivor” – How is Dan still on this show???? I gotta think if he makes it to the final three you’d have to vote for him simply because he literally “survived”.
20. (20) “Parenthood” – Why was Joel the director of a play his daughter wasn’t even in? I hope I missed that part because if I didn’t that made ZERO sense.
21. (21) “The League” – I think this will be the last season I watch this show
22. (22) “Running Wilde” – Wasn’t on

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