Girl: please.

Jersey Shore. It's sort of interesting to see how the relationships and interactions in the house have evolved from typical Real World-y "who ate my pickles"/"fuck you"-type fare to, basically, office politics among co-workers at a very weird job. The arguments and bonding moments seem to happen in professional and choreographed manner. I wouldn't say it's entirely contrived at this point, but it's not very compelling anymore now that Ron and Sam have figured out how to conduct a relationship (quietly; mostly off-camera) and everyone else has figured out that the Situation is a shit-starter. I do enjoy most of them, though; I hope S5 is the last, so that I can continue to enjoy them.

L&O SVU. I like the addition of Giddish; I have liked Pino on other things, but I don't care for him here. Something is visually off, like he needs to put on 20 pounds or something — and could the ouster of Stabler have come off any more abruptly? It's almost irrelevant, because of course everyone knows the status of Chris Meloni's contract and so on, but they couldn't even arrange for one scene? Poochie returning to his home planet was less awkward than that exposition.

I still enjoy the show, though. Its quintessential over-the-topness still remains. I do have a quibble with the wavy hairstyle on Hargitay, which doesn't suit her.

Mad Fashion. I wanted to like it, because I loved Chris March on Runway, but at only half an hour, it still draaaaaags. (And not in the fun way, heh.) And it's weirdly unenlightening, too, in a way that suggests it would actually move faster with a full hour to work with. As it is, it's like, here's the brief, here's how it's totally impossible to execute, the client hates it; commercial; all fixed, client's happy, wah wahhhhh. Like, what? I don't really care about the particular guest star/client; I want to see how the sausage gets made, not drama with no backstory. Punted after two episodes.

Prime Suspect: The New Class. I gave it a chance, and I actually like it. It doesn't try to copy the original, really, and it's got some very good, under-sung actors on it (Acevedo is usually a sign of quality); Bello is in fact cast perfectly here. It can get heavy-handed at times — the sexism on the squad; the interactions with her boyfriend's ex, who is a finely-drawn cartoon but a cartoon nonetheless — but the writing has wit and it generally holds up as a procedural. If the wardrobe department can find a way to phase out the much-pilloried hat, great, but overall the show is a pleasant surprise.

Project Accessory. It's early yet, but I'll probably stick with it, although the first elimination struck me as bullshit, and obviously engineered to create more drama down the line. If you want to find the best designer, you keep Cotrice, who had way too much going on, over Nicolina, who choked and didn't do much at all. If you want to create the most drama, on the other hand…

And I hesitate to get into this, because I am as white and square as a bathroom tile, but between the response to Kimberly's styling on Project Runway and the response to Cotrice, it seems like the judges (or producers, or whoever) don't get urban style. It's one thing not to respond to a given design element, like a color or a shape or whatever, but it's like they just don't acknowledge it at all, that so many people already wear (and rock) these things, whether it's brights or big earrings or a ton of metallics piled on top of each other.

I for one would like to see that discussion: the tension between designs that reflect current urban trends, and the fact that editorial fashion is often aimed at the very rich. Do you necessarily want to try to go there in your capacity as a reality-show judge? No. But you could at least acknowledge that there's a conversation to be had.

Project Runway. …Uch. I dug Anya at first, because she's undeniably chic and pretty, and I liked her shaved-sides hairstyle and her stacks of bracelets. She's cool, definitely. It's not a reason to keep her, though, and as the season wore on and it became clear that the producers would do whatever they had to do, bend whatever rules they had to bend, and make whatever last-minute changes they had to make not only to keep her in the competition until the finals, but to engineer her victory, I started to despise Anya. It isn't her fault that this is how it went down, but I do not believe for one second that she didn't know what was going on, and the feigning of surprise every time she dodged another bullet that obviously was never going to hit her grossed me out.

Tom and Lorenzo made these points and others eloquently and repeatedly, so you can just step over there and read what they had to say about the season, but their overall assessment that the season unfolded based on personalities and backstage narratives, not on talent or achievements, is right on. As much as I loathed Wendy Pepper, I could understand how she got as far as she did. Someone else always sucked more than she did in a given week, then she had a couple of well-timed wins…it was annoying, but it read as fair. This is just disappointing, because, you know, we know the fix is in, and that in and of itself is not a big problem, but when it's this obvious and this cynical, the show becomes boring.

I'll watch the All-Star season, obvs, but Bunim-Murray needs to get their shit together with this.

I hate this hat so much I could CRY

The Movie: Mystery, Alaska

The Crush Object: Ron Eldard

The Story: Co-written by David E. Kelley and directed by Jay Roach (Meet the Parents), Mystery, Alaska opens on the town awaiting the arrival of a Sports Illustrated article about their hockey team and its famous Saturday Game.

The team, you see, features the best players in town, selected by the town fathers, and plays an intrasquad game on a frozen pond every Saturday. The SI piece is written by hometown-boy-gone-city-trash Chuck Danner (Hank Azaria), and his account of how the forbidding conditions create great stickmen in a smithy of ice sparks interest from the New York Rangers in an exhibition game. Well, interest from the networks; the NHL starters aren't too psyched to huck it to East Asscrack, AK on their only off days that month and risk injury against a bunch of amateurs. So, naturally there's a court case versus the players' union in which beloved town attorney (and also town drunk) Bailey Pruitt (Maury Chaykin) has to punctuate an impassioned argument to a New York City judge with a fatal heart attack that inspires the townies to kick ass.

But whether the townies can kick ass remains a question. The town fathers, in their infinite wisdom, have decided that skating prodigy Stevie Weeks (Ryan Northcott, whose resemblance to Dylan Baker is rather unwelcome given the premature-ejaculation scene in which he figures) is ready to rise (hew) to the ranks of the Saturday Game. But the roster is fixed: adding a player means subtracting one as well. The player told to step down is Sheriff John Biebe (Russell Crowe, sporting very shiny long hair), who's getting kind of old and fat and who's also pretty busy with his day job, which includes arresting the town's best scorer, Connor Banks (Michael Buie), on assault charges when he accidentally shoots a dicky Price World rep (Michael McKean) in the foot; not arresting one of the many paramours of Skank Marden (Eldard) when she hits him in the head with a shovel for comparing her to a walrus in the sack; pulling Danner over for Zamboni DUI, and so on.

When it's clear the Ranger exhibition is actually happening, mayor of Mystery Scott Pitcher (Colm Meaney) begs Biebe to coach; Biebe in turn begs Judge Walter Burns (Burt Reynolds, and yes, literally everyone is in this movie) to coach, since Burns 1) played II-A hockey in college, 2) has a son on the team he needs to bond with (Scott Grimes) (…everyone), and 3) is Burt Reynolds.

That means Biebe is back on the ice as team captain, when he's not fighting needlessly with his wife (Mary McCormack) (EVERYONE) over the relationship she had with Danner back in high school, or trying to get his kids to stop cursing. (The first line of dialogue in the film is a round-faced 6-year-old observing "fuck ME" when Biebe's car won't start. Heh.) Can his steady leadership, Weeks's lightning-fast skating, Banks's shooting, and Marden's willingness to take a slap shot to the seeds carry them to victory?

Spoiler: No. The Mysterians make a horse race out of it, but lose by a single point. The viewer, meanwhile, comes out ahead; the story is formulaic, but formulae become formulae for a reason, and this one is well-acted and good-natured, with a big handful of sweet and/or funny moments. Skank's apology to Colm Meaney doesn't feel organic to the character, but it's touching — "when I get too old for the Saturday Game I'll probably end up a drunk, like my dad" — and delivered unsentimentally. Half an hour later, the camera pans past a sign in the stands that reads, "Hey Skank I'm Pregnant!" Reynolds is good as a hard-ass, and he and Judith Ivey make a believable couple and parents of young adults. And kudos to the prop department, which steals the Most Realistic Vomit Loogey championship cup from Barton Fink when a nervous Weeks hurls into his skates.

Worth the price of admission by itself: McKean's cursey ranting as Mr. Walsh. Sitting on a gurney after the bullet barely grazes his foot, Walsh delivers the following aria of bigshot rage: "No, I'm not okay! Do I look okay? The fucker shot me! What the fuck-ass fuck of a bum-fuck shithole town is this? I make a business call. I give him my card. And the hick-ass fucker shoots my foot off! Cock-fucking shit!" Ringtone!

The Backstory: One of the many forgettable-or-worse flicks I've sat through for Eldie, MA is not worth it on that level; his hair is weird, and he's either bundled up beyond all recognition or having stagey sex with Lolita Davidovich while watching a hockey game over her bare shoulder. As…you do.

But when I said everyone is in this movie, I meant it, so no doubt you can find yourself a cutie to enjoy; the cast also includes one of the crazy chainsaw-juggling brothers from Smokin' Aces (Kevin Durand), Chester from SVU (Adam Beach), Donna's quarterback-virgin boyfriend from 90210: College (Cameron Bancroft), Mike Myers as a hockey commentator, and Little Richard singing both national anthems as himself. Okay, Little Richard is more of "a creepie," but he's wearing a very pretty headband in that scene in his tour bus.

The Embarrassment Level: It's not historic cinema, but it's a rare portrayal of a unique small town that keeps it on the right side of twee and loves its characters enough to tease them. The writing/directing pedigree might give you pause, but it's quite restrained work from both Kelley and Roach. One and a half for the fact that the Eldard's character's name is Skank.

The Plot: A teacher with financial problems gets beaten up, and because notorious loan shark Tony Delaplant's son Hoagy (…seriously) attends the school, it's assumed that one of them is involved. Hanson is sent in undercover to investigate, and Hoagy is indeed a junior shylock — but he's also an academic decathlete and a lock in the upcoming election for senior-class president.This is either one of the cleverer "hiding in dweeb sight" covers ever constructed by a bad guy on 21JS, or — more likely — it's an attempt to win the approval of Delaplant Sr., who is forever shooing Hoagy out of rooms to Talk Business and intoning threateningly that he doesn't want Hoagy following in his footsteps.

Anyway, Hanson's forced to join high-school quiz bowl in order to get close to the kid. Hanson is a know-it-all, so that goes quite well, until the quiz bowl's academic advisor (Hey, It's That Anxiously Officious Clerk Or Vice President Michael Ensign, familiar to Ghostbusters fans as the hotel manager) informs the team that, if they make the finals, they get to go on the tee-vee!

For once, Hanson's chapped ass is justified — that could blow his cover permanently. Also threatening to blow his cover: class clown and gambling addict Davey Miller (Jason Lively, a.k.a. Rusty II from National Lampoon's European Vacation). Davey owes Hoagy a bunch of money, but if Hanson runs for class president and wins, Davey can take a bunch of bets and break even. At least, I think that's the reasoning. Davey spends most of the episode in a pair of Levi's that's more rip than jean, with peach-colored long johns on underneath, so his particular Earth logic isn't something I can explain to you.

Somehow, Delaplant Sr. gets wind of that plan and sends a goon (Hey, It's That Goon Ned Bellamy) to stick a gun in Hanson's face: "You're not running."

A bunch of yelling later, it's time for the set-up: Hanson has a "friend" (it's Fuller, obvs) who needs 50K. Hoagy asks his father to stake him, and they get in a big old father-son "I don't want you to be like me"/"I've run bets for two years already, can't you just be proud of me" tiff before Hoagy says he'll just use his father's contacts anyway, and stomps off. At the meet, Hoagy goes over the terms and hands over the cash, and is arrested. Delaplant Sr. turns up at the station to have the old-gunslingers-speak-frankly discush with Fuller, then…leaves, without bailing Hoagy out of jail. He explains that "It's all part of the business," then gives a weird, ambiguous speech about standing trial with his son and maybe if his own father had wah wah vicious cycle, then tears up and says, "Send him somewhere nice, huh? He's a good kid," and then he bolts. Fuller looks thoughtful. Or perhaps chilly, because that shit is cold.

The Holes: I think the idea here is that, although Delaplant Sr. wanted Hoagy to study hard and make something legit of himself, now he's touched that Hoagy wants to follow in his footsteps, so he's teaching him the…ropes? By letting him go to juvie, since he'd…get less time than Delaplant Sr.? None of that is made explicit, however. Nor does it make sense that a guy that concerned with making people believe that his dry-cleaning business is his only source of income would risk attracting attention by pulling a gun on his son's opponent in a race for student council. Nobody here should care nearly as much about the class-president race as they do, actually — Lord knows nobody's going to pry a twenty loose to bet on the thing — but it's kind of a 21JS hallmark to make a big deal over the aspects of high-school life that high-schoolers themselves wouldn't care much about.

A solid episode overall — the acting is a marvel of comparative restraint, and Hanson keeps the red-assery under control — but the ending needed another draft.

Not Quite Ready For Their Close-Ups: I tried for half an hour to figure out where I knew Hoagy from without looking him up, but failed. It's Stephen Gregory, who plays Dr. Kyle Beresford on SVU (the John Schneider-ish-looking cutie who often gives the detectives the medical brief towards the beginning).

I also learned that Jason Lively is Blake Lively's half-brother. The more you know! [swoopy star]

Ow, Quit It: God help me, but I've started to find Penhall charming. Well, not murderously irritating, anyway. His subplot in the episode is one of my least favorite "comedic" arcs — good-time galoot has to take care of an infant — and Penhall is only doing it because the baby belongs to his foxy British-air-hostess neighbor, who's just gotten separated from her husband, and if Penhall does her a favor with the tyke, maybe he'll get some tail out of it. Her flights keep getting stuck in Omaha and Penhall keeps showing up to work with baby Hannah in a makeshift Snugli and asking Hoffs to pitch in because women like babies, and "you're a woman, aren'tcha?" Hoffs's eyebrows: "Fuck off." Fuller's eyebrows start to say the same thing, but then he's adorable with the baby, natch.

It's exhausted material, but DeLuise is a soldier with it, and manages to mine some material from a running gag about using t-shirts as diapers. The neighbor gets back with her husband in the end, which I hope means we never see any of them ever again.

Drink!: Mr. Laforse's Rolodex; Ioki's cavernous Battlefield Earth-issue jean jacket; Penhall in a bowling shirt, over a Bill the Cat tee, with a safety pin earring; Blowfish makes a Pee-Wee Herman reference.

I probably should have started tracking the generic school names earlier in the process, but better late than never. This episode's is "Riverside."

What I'm watching — or no longer watching — and why.

NEW SHOWS

Boardwalk Empire. I have to catch up on recent episodes, but so far, A-minus — the minus is for the pacing, which is very slightly slow and self-regarding in the first couple of eps, but seems set to pick up a bit now that the audience has had a chance to admire the set design. It's nice to see Gretchen Mol working, too. I've always felt that she got jobbed by Rounders and didn't get another chance to show what she could do until recently. Also: Omar.

Chase. One of the few things I still enjoyed about Prison Break as it sogged into the sunset was the relationship between Michael and Sucre. Amaury Nolasco, usually saddled with some variation on a magical-Latino theme, is extremely charming in spite of it, and his scenes with Wentworth Miller were among the few that seemed to untrack Miller from constant Blue-Steeling and into actual acting and reacting. I gave Chase a try mostly for him.

It's gotten punted from the DVR, though, not because it's bad but because it's just…kind of there. The show is trying to build to a reveal about Annie's father, but I feel like the lawperson whose dad is a crook is a trope I've seen too often, and I don't care about Annie enough to see it through (Kelli Giddish is good, but she has to try so hard not to let the Cliché-o-Tron 3000 digest her whole that she can't make much headway). They do get good guest stars, but it's not enough.

Detroit 1-8-7. Another one I watched on the strength of the casting, and another one I deleted in defeat after watching Michael Imperioli nearly herniate himself in an attempt to give the autism-spectrum veteran detective some depth. Imperioli is a fantastic actor, and because he's also a writer-director, he comes at material as a whole, but it soon became clear that there's not much he can do here — we've seen it done before, and better, by various Law & Order: CI detectives, and I think the Detroit 1-8-7 writers would have done better to take that character in a less D'Onofrio, more Noth direction.

I didn't see the version of the show that more closely mimicked the style of The First 48, but based on the elements that remain, I suspect it worked better that way and I don't see why the network overrode it. Like Chase, it's fine, not actively bad, has some interesting actors in it (Aisha Hinds, the lieutenant, made good work of a bad job in an SVU guest spot last year), but I was never excited about watching it, so: punt.

Hawaii Five-0. I tried; I did. Scott Caan is fantastic. I wish he were on a different show. Alas, he's on this one, and life's too short. Nix.

Law & Order: Los Angeles. As Wing aptly pointed out on the best new podcast you should obviously already be listening to, Extra Hot Great, it's not really a Law & Order — no chung-chung, no chyrons telling you the address, none of that. It is obsessed with pointing out How L.A. It Is, which is irritating, but I gave it a spin anyway, because I don't think Skeet Ulrich is as blank a slate as some critics (or at least I don't think it's a bad thing), and I liked Corey Stoll's energy. But they went with a quickness to the, to me, super-boring territorial-posturing-over-terrorism well; Terrence Howard, ordinarily a brilliant and subtle enough actor that I can temporarily forget his creepy attitudes towards feminine hygiene, has a ham under each arm and a few slices down his shorts; and this one doesn't do anything additional to or better than the now-cancelled mothership. Fail; punt.

Luther. Mmm…Idris Elba. It's a bit strange to see Stringer Bell in a state of British-accented psychological dishevelment — even more so because I've started rewatching The Wire from the beginning — but Elba is predictably great, great enough that I can live short-term with another chewed-to-pablum trope of the genre, the serial killer who's obsessed with taunting the police in ways so intrusive and flamboyant that there's really no way a real-life detective couldn't nail his or her ass to the wall. Can Western culture please give that shit a rest? Luther does twist it a bit, in fairness; at the end of the last episode, the lightness of the "One coffee doesn't mean we're friends" exchange is startling and interesting, and Ruth Wilson bailed out her annoying character just with that single scene. The acting is carrying the over-writing.

But the reason we are culturally obsessed with serial killers is the very thing they don't do in real life: explain how they do and are, and let us understand (and thereby avoid) the tragic mayhem that results. To give sociopaths a bunch of teasy, smug, socially lubricated talking to do in our art makes sense as a human instinct, to try to control the unpredictable, but as a shortcut to making police casework interesting, it's worn out its welcome.

Terriers. I like it a lot, although I don't love it, and I feel like perhaps I've missed something because I don't love it yet. With that said, I also feel like the one reservation I have about it — that it's too invested in a USA-detective-show-ish tonal palette that, instead of leavening the darker stuff, is a little shticky and distracting — is about to change. Sometimes a story wants to go in a bleak direction, and fighting that is a mistake; certainly the actors can carry it, Donal Logue in particular, so I hope my prediction is correct. Even that quibble is fairly minor, though (my other quibble, that Logue's hair had gotten too long, was also addressed in a recent episode — way to recognize for the CFF, hair and makeup! hee). This one's a keeper.

Top Chef: Just Desserts. I didn't expect to enjoy it at first, and I almost quit watching during the Seth-fugue series of episodes; I won't pretend that I don't like reality-TV craziness, because I do, but even for me, there comes a point when it's a medication issue that isn't ethical to watch unfolding, never mind pleasurable. But it's pretty good, and Padma-free living is the way to go — I know they won't fire her at this point, but maybe she'll quit on her own and they can make Gail the head judge on Top Chef: Savory. I'm also happy to see that Gail is dressing for her body more successfully on this version; she has a perfectly cute, normal figure, but in the past has tended to wear clothes that lumped her up unnecessarily. (My theory: wardrobe only buys dresses that look good on Padma, who's like a foot taller and built differently, and Gail has to pick from those. On her own show, this isn't an issue.)

The Whole Truth. I'll give it one more episode to make me give a shit, because, once again, I like the cast a lot but the premise is not doing it for me. Also, it's possible to make obnoxious characters sympathetic, but it's not always easy, and it's not happening with Morrow's character. On probation. [Edited to add: Joe R just told me it got cancelled yesterday. Problem solved!]

RETURNING SHOWS

The Challenge: Inappropriate Historical Terminology. My continuing to watch the show is indefensible, and yet, here I am. Best wishes to Teej in his recovery; he's started strapping his bitch on over the last fewseasons, usually towards contestants I already hate, and I hope he doesso for many seasons to come. Also, shut up, Laurel.

Chuck. This fell out of the rotation last season, during my household's dark night of the DVR when we had to switch the boxes out like every two weeks — and I just never put it back on. I wasn't one of the people who hated Brandon Routh, or that arc, but the season overall felt inattentive and slow, and I just never got back into it; it had become a chore to keep up with, so I dropped it. Mr. Stupidhead reports that it's gotten its mojo back this year, and I'll no doubt catch up with it later.

Fringe. I'd expected the divided-worlds plotting to feel too slow and obligatory, but they've done a decent job with it. The interruption by baseball probably forced the show to move things along, in a way, instead of deliberately portioning out suspense to a contrived climax point timed to sweeps. That may still happen, but I'm encouraged so far.

Here's hoping that what we've seen to this point puts at least a short-term stop to the complaining about Anna Torv's acting. She's not the best in the cast, but the cast is extremely good; she's not the most emotive, but that's the character, at least partly. I don't need her to get an Emmy, but what do you expect from an FBI agent whose primary job, at least in the show's early going, was to ask Walter to explain things to the audience? No, she's not Bernhardt, but the part doesn't call for that. Give her a break.

Anyway. I'm grossed out that Alternalivia and Peter Did It, but I'm situationally grossed out, not grossed out writing-wise. Keeping it, obviously.

The Good Wife. Turned into one of my favorites last year — Kalinda is my hero. Love her outfits, love her attitude, love her awesomeness at her job, super-love her whole hate-fuck subplot with Jason Street, which really shouldn't work for me at all but somehow totally does.

I don't love Julianna Margulies, for reasons that aren't fair to her, really; she has a certain judginess to her face that's just how her face is, but it comes into her characters and I tend not to care for them as a result. But everyone else on the show is fantastic, and the decision to back away from the Alicia/Will pairing, at least for now, was smart (the execution was both abrupt and meh, if that makes sense, but the other smart choice was giving it to Alan Cumming to play). It's not the most groundbreaking material in the world, but some of it is fresh, and you can't beat the acting talent. Keeping it.

Hoarders. I might have to let it go soon. So few of the subjects get any real benefit from it, and I can't look at too many more piles of feces.

Law & Order: SVU. I should let this one go too, but I can't — it's too funny. The two-parter starring Desmond from Lost as a "tragic" pedophile? The PSA about soda and obesity? Its commitment to becoming steadily more ridiculous is unswerving. I'm in.

The League. It's actually new to my DVR roster, but I don't think I missed anything crucial last year. Paul Scheer is my favorite at UCB, and he's probably my favorite here. Hilarious show.

Project Runway. I've really enjoyed this season; expanding it to 90 minutes and bagging the separate model show works. The final three also works for me. I hope Michael C. is okay, though. That elimination was, while correct, utterly wrenching. Boyfriend needs to tell his family to fuck off.

Survivor: Nicaragua. Does the season play kind of weirdly to anyone else — as though they keep having to change things on the fly? Some seasons, I get the sense that the showrunners know it's a dud and just try to get to the end so they can start fresh with a new crop of contestants, but it's not exactly that this time out. Maybe they counted on Jimmy Johnson staying in it longer, and didn't know quite how to gin up excitement once the other Survivors (rightly) ousted him? Andy Dehnart deemed last week's episode both weird and boring, which is about where I am with it; if something compelling doesn't happen this week, I might ditch it until next time.

VINTAGE SHOWS

Alias. I've never watched the first season all the way through, and it's really fun — more so knowing that the actual plotting/season arcs always get reset, so I can just have it on while I do other things and not have to pay religious attention to it. Well, except when Garber is effing killing it, which is every scene he's in. Aw, Spy Daddy.

Modern Family. Still catching up on first-season eps, so it's in the Vintage section for now. I didn't think I'd stick with it past the first disc Netflix sent; it felt too broad in parts, but the main problem early in S1 is Phil, who is unwatchably awkward, and worse, his lines are timed to force the bloom. I call that the Kramer Entrance School of Nudging the Viewer, and I don't like it. Fortunately, the writers calmed him down a bit as the show progressed.

And what I do like about the show is its consistent ability to feint left and go right. I watch very few sitcoms, because most of them telegraph the jokes and plots from the very first scene, and watching the journey is not fun for me…I don't know why. It's a how-the-sausages-are-made issue, maybe, although I've never written for TV, so that's not the aptest description. Arrested Development could up-end that kind of thing, which is why I liked it; Modern Family isn't quite as deft and doesn't pack quite as much in, but it stays far enough ahead of me that I'll keep on with it.

The Wire. No need to get into the show's awesomeness generally, but I'll be the 18,283rd to say that, if you have avoided watching it because you're afraid the overhype from the show's fans will mean the show isn't as good as you expect, I had the same fear, but the show really is that good. Furthermore, it is a fox-fest.

My note here is about Wood Harris, who plays Avon Barksdale, and it's a question I've had since I first got into the show a few years back. Does Harris purposely play Avon as a mercurial guy whose affect is sometimes inappropriate? Or is his acting just not very good? There's a line in Episode 112, I believe, where Avon and Stringer have cleaned out the office and they're just kind of waiting around for the raid to happen, and Avon tells Stringer to open the safe instead of letting the police break the lock open. Harris's reading is a good example of what I'm asking about: "Well open it up, man, no sense ruining a good safe." Avon is pretty nervous in the scene, which is a good choice; Harris usually plays Avon as less steely than you'd expect, also a good choice. But is that reading "Avon is nervous," or is it just a weird reading?

Harris has a lot of line readings like that; you could justify them on various emotional bases, but the problem is that he's usually in scenes with heavier acting hitters like Elba or Larry Gilliard Jr. (who, by the way, gets more amazing on every rewatch). Those guys occupy their lines to the point where it's like watching a documentary; Harris frequently seems to live on top of his lines instead, and at times it takes me out of the scene, wondering if this is the best take they got and why it comes off like a rehearsal.

I haven't seen Harris in much else, but I recall having the same sensation during his guest shot on Southland (and speaking of, did that get sacked? Anyone know?), that he's a good fit physically and does his blocking seamlessly, but occasionally drops a clanker that doesn't feel intentional.

…I think that's everything I'm watching. What have you guys kept or punted from your initial fall-season lineup? Anything you think I'd like to add?

In Hargitay's defense, I think the guy taking her hostage had just gotten shot by Vincent Spano; I'd make that face too. On the other hand, she could have just read yet another script in which a member of the Stabler family is kidnapped, arrested, or pinned in a wrecked car while delivering a baby. Because: seriously.

An odd and an end first: 1) my review of Jeff Kinney's Diary of a Wimpy Kid: Dog Days is up on Monkey See — great read, as usz (Kinney, not my piece, although that's ah-ight); and 2) for those of you sending me contest receipts from PayPal, please note whether they should qualify you for a mini-prize (PayPal does not note the project name for me, so I can't tell from the forward alone).

And now: The Great And Powerful Asirda.

I've struggled somewhat with the introduction here, because she modestly objected to the "great and powerful" part, but let's start with the numbers: as you know, Asirda matched 3K worth of projects when we hit 60K — and she's prepared to do it again when you hit other key benchmarks. Yes, "benchmarks" plural. She believes in the power of the many of you, and she's more generous than words can describe in (green-)backing up that faith — but, while generous, she also enjoys cheap beer and cheap humor. Which is what makes her my people.

Asirda may appear in the comments; like all the best great and powerful people, she's easy to talk to. If she doesn't appear, she's watching — and, like our little smiley friend, she's well pleased. (She may also look really cute in a bear outfit; I have no data on that. Hee.)

…By the way? $67,243. Less than 8K to our next match; at 75K, $ and the Mysterians ante up with 5K more. We can do this.

Okay, I think that's everythi– OH WAIT WAIT did you guys watch SVU this week? How BONKERS is that? Killer Noel? Slurstine Lahti? Man. I loved it AND I couldn't watch. Amazing. Discuss.

"As a matter of fact, I've ALREADY eaten a bee."

Law & Order: SVU. Really? A cockroach? Just going to rip Papillon and Brazil off, but without the insight?

Meloni's "the walls, they breeeeeeathe" acting choices looked a lot like the ones he made while humping a fridge in Wet Hot American Summer, but WHAS is a comedy. …Well, an intentional comedy.

And has Christine Lahti always done that thing where she arranges her upper lip over her teeth like an awning? Or is that Botox? I've never liked Lahti — either every character she plays is supposed to be haughtily unlikable, or that's how she chooses to play them, but the end result is the same — but I feel sorry for her here; this character, on top of the hauteur, is a basket of dated neurotic signifiers and cliched responses that few actors could hope to rescue. I doubt we're supposed to like her, but I don't think the writing is having the effect it thinks it is. You actually can spell "credible antagonist" without "annoying."

The Office. Does anyone else really not care about Jim and Pam, or their wedding, at all? Anyone look at that trending tag on Twitter and say aloud, "But…with baseball on?"

Anyone think I'm a hypocrite, since I'm one of the 16 people still watching Survivor? Hee.

Trauma. The steam coming off this week's pile almost obscured the screen. Old guard harasses the newbie? Check. Precocious kid wins over kid-averse cowboy? Check. Failure to save apparent slam-dunk patient leads to hackneyed, "some days you're the hydrant" brooding over good days and bad days? Check. Defensive know-it-all has a lot to learn? Chfphpp…zzz.

What happened? I liked the pilot fine; it didn't do anything Third Watch hadn't done better — and the show we TWoP editors cheerfully referred to as Turd Watch didn't do anything very well to start with — but it had some promise. Did I get distracted by all the shiny explosions and the thrill of the new? Do I put too much faith in the fact that that one guy played Herc on Friday Night Lights, and has foxy sideburns?

I think it's possible to do the paramedics/FD action drama in a fresh way — but while I don't know what that way is, I do know that this is not it. One more week and I'm out.

America's Next Top Model.

Do you think Mr. Jay doesn't get to come to panel because he won't play along with shit like "smize-ing," but Miss Jay and Nigel will?Do you think that, years ago, the Jays flipped a coin to see who would have to pretend that Tyra's dippy season themes and Soviet-quality costumes don't suck an egg?"Heads, I win; tails, you have to sit with the other judges and pretend that when Tyra makes the same face twice in a row, there's an instructive difference between the two"?

I miss She's Got The Look.Kim Alexis is more natural on-camera, doesn't suffer from pathological narcissism, and runs a sensible panel whose advice is logical and occasionally funny on purpose.But nobody watched that show except me and a few stoners who switched to TV Land expecting a Barney Miller rerun.Sigh.

Brothers & Sisters. I said at some point that I would give it two or three episodes to win me back over this season; then I heard that they'd cast Amy "Toni Pavone" Aquino, which annoyed me, because I love her and I'd have to stick with it.

But why did they have to stash her in a plotline I can already tell I will despise?Kitty is still treating Robert like he left a skidmark on their sheets, which I think the audience is supposed to support her in, and in theory, that's fine, but in practice, she's not sympathetic — the writing and the acting choices both make me want to slap her.Now we have to "worry" that she has cancer?The character has become utterly unlikeable in the last year, and we've seen this done much better — via Patricia Wettig's Nancy on thirtysomething, among others.

And then in the first episode we have a "wacky" showdown between Holly and Nora; we have yet another makeup/breakup/"I love you but the world thinks I'm stupid" "crisis" in Rebecca and Justin's relationship; we have a dated montage about Sarah's internet-dating exploits; we have almost enough of Holly's boobs to qualify the show for premium cable; and Kevin's hair is simply unacceptable.

Doesn't look good for this one, folks.

the forgotten. Or this one, a good idea on paper that's drowning on camera in clichés and "Why are CSIs interrogating a suspect?" implausibilities.The victim voice-over adds nothing but unwarranted self-seriousness; Christian Slater is the only actor with enough charisma to carry the material (Anthony Carrigan, playing Tyler, is actually okay, if he can get out from under the exposition-device load he had to carry in the pilot); Slater's character is an ex-cop, and I understand why that cheat was included initially, but it causes more problems than it solves and should have gotten the heave-ho after the show got picked up.

A few tweaks, and it's a decent show, but it's functionally a procedural, and it's focusing on the parts of procedurals we've seen a thousand times before, which it doesn't do well, instead of on the parts that set it apart from the others, which it could do well if it got some momentum going.And it's not impossible; it does happen sometimes that a show snaps to, figures out what it wants to do, and learns how to do it while elegantly covering its flaws.Journeyman is one example.

But the writers' room seems more interested in repurposing the soppier parts of Cold Case than in examining how a group of civilians would solve a case of this type — or in making said group of civilians less annoying.Don't just barge up to these people and tell them their child is dead, dipshit.Pairing it with meaningful squinting doesn't make it any more your beeswax.

The Good Wife. What's with the sexism?It's one thing when the show depicts the sexism and reductive attitudes of the world at large towards a woman in Alicia's position — not that the show is doing the most elegant job with that, either, so far, but I can forgive it in a pilot.

But when the show's female protagonist is dated in her gender attitudes toward herself?Alicia's so-called gotcha line about "obviously you've never made a woman mad before" botched an excellent opportunity to make a few points about pre-judging the woman behind the famous/powerful man; instead, it went for a tired "hell hath no fury" tone.It's antiquated, and worse, it's uninteresting. Alicia correctly marking the office assistant as fed up with the parking-lot attendant, and exploiting that with some "oh, men" bonding?Interesting.Sharp.Alicia taking the same martyr angle with the state's attorney, except for real?Bah.It felt like pandering to a certain segment of the demographic, and the segment is smarter than that Erma Bombeck, Attorney At Law nonsense.

Law & Order: SVU. Why does Mariska Hargitay lift her leg up like she's in a cartoon every time she has to chase a perp?You know, how Wile E. Coyote will wind himself up with his leading leg before taking off after the Roadrunner?I keep expecting a puff of smoke to replace her onscreen every time she does that.

I shouldn't harp on the Hargs, because she's a palette of beige nuance compared with Christopher "Silent Movie" Meloni — and I can't really harp on him, either.What is it, the tenth season?I don't know what acting choices he's got left at this point; at least he's giving it 110 percent every week, and I feel like he has to know that he's the subject of a Taking! It! Personally! drinking game and he's having a little fun with it.

Not so Wentworth Miller.Either Wentworth Miller is actually really good at acting and just happens to have a kidney stone the size and shape of a throwing star every time the camera is pointed in his direction…or Wentworth Miller is not good at acting, and doesn't really like doing it, either.I think he tries very hard and thinks about his lines a lot; he's not half-assing it.But I spent his entire first scene waiting to find out that he was playing an actor in a movie within the show, because his Blue-Steeling had gotten even worse since Prison Break.I was kind of psyched about it, too, like, that's awesome that he can have a little fun with himself.…Ohhhh, that's…literally the character.Wow.

What to do with the guy?He's got a lot of fans, he's a hard worker…there has to be some kind of Keanu/action niche for him, right?

The Mentalist. I won't even bother asking who else watches the show, because…no one else watches the show.Well, maybe that's not true.I really only watch because Simon Baker is cute, so maybe it's not just me who does that, and I didn't know anyone watched NCIS, either — I thought it just kept JAG-ing along because even the net execs forgot it existed, but it's practically the most popular show on CBS and it even got a spin-off.(Which looks really dumb.Is anyone watching that?I like LL Cool J a lot, but: no.)

In any case, what the hell is going on with Owain Yeoman?This isn't a complaint, mind you — but during the season premiere, he's standing off to the side of a group shot, and I thought, "Cute new agent, but why'd they get rid of Rigsby?Not that I particularly enjoyed the 'sexual' 'tension' between him and Van Pelt last season, but I figured the writers would follow it up with WAIT WAIT WAIT THAT FOX IS RIGSBY!"Lost a ton of weight, got a hipper haircut (…I guess; it's trying too hard, but it's cute), looks tohhhhh-tally different.

…I know, no one cares. As you were.