Lisa Marie’s Week In Television: 11/14/21 — 11/20/21

Posted on November 20, 2021 by Lisa Marie Bowman

It’s that time again. Here’s some thoughts on what I watched over the past seven days:

Allo Allo (Sunday Night, PBS)

Finally! It was time for the long-distance duck to fly from France to London, carrying with it the plans for the German invasion of England. Unfortunately, the duck itself really didn’t feel like flying, which led to Rene and Edith having to chase it around the courtyard while Michelle and the two airmen watched from a balcony above. Meanwhile, everyone was trying to figure out what to do with the forged money that Rene stole from the bank. It was a funny episode. I relate to Michelle.

Baywatch Hawaii (Prime)

I had a really tough day on Tuesday so I decided to unwind and calm myself down by continuing my binge of the first season of Baywatch Hawaii. This, of course, was the sequel to Baywatch, in which the Hoff moved to Hawaii and helped to train a new group of lifeguards.

I started things off with watching the 9th episode of the series, which was called The Hunt. It featured Jessie investigating a case of shark poaching and Jason trying to come to terms with his Hawaiian heritage. In the end, the poaches were defeated, Jessie was rescued after her jet ski sank, and Jason proved himself to be worthy of the islands by having some sort of weird mind-meld with a shark. “The shark is my brother,” Jason explained. Yay! Incidentally, the poacher’s boat was named “All She Rote,” which was kind of clever. This was followed by a treasure hunt episode, where the lifeguards mistakenly believed that they had found a long-lost treasure. I’m pretty sure this was a remake an old Baywatch episode, with gold instead of doubloons.

Cold Case (Weekday, Afternoons, Start TV)

On Tuesday’s episode, Lily and the gang investigated the 1967 murder of a brush salesman. Speaking of brushes, Lily could have used one because her hair was a mess. I will never understand why Lily never did anything about that.

Court Cam (Wednesday, A&E)

A&E always airs several episodes of Court Cam on Wednesday and they do tend to blend together. For some reason, this week, there were a lot of clips of defendants cussing out their judges. That’s never a good courtroom strategy. One fellow got 360 days for contempt of court, though it was later reduced to 90 days. Ironically, he only served 5 days for the crime that he was initially charged with. Seriously, be polite when talking to a judge.

Crossing Jordan (Weekday Afternoons, Start TV)

I watched two episodes on Tuesday. Jordan was cranky while Bugs was again being targeted by bigots and Homeland Security. That was pretty much the plot of every single episode of Crossing Jordan, yet somehow everyone on the show always acted as if the same thing didn’t keep happening over and over again.

Dexter: New Blood (Sunday Night, Showtime)

I wrote about the latest episode of Dexter here!

Fear The Walking Dead (Sunday Night, AMC)

I wrote about the latest episode of Fear the Walking Dead here!

Monty Python’s Flying Circus (Monday Morning, BBC America)

I watched two of my favorite episodes on Monday morning, Mr. Pither’s Cycling Tour and The Ministry of Silly Walks. I especially love Mr. Pither, if just because Michael Palin did such a wonderful job playing the well-meaning but utterly clueless cyclist. “My lack of God, it’s Trotsky!”

Open All Hours (Sunday Night, PBS)

Arkwright cheated his customers by pretending to be blind. Granville took a heap of abuse. They both attempted to provide better customer service at their little shop. It didn’t go well.

Shipping Wars (Tuesday Morning, A&E)

It amazes me that everyone who ever appeared on this show — whether they were a regular or just a customer — was a complete and total jerk. I watched several episodes of Tuesday morning and I can’t think of one episode that featured anyone who was the least bit likable.

Survivor (Wednesday Night, CBS)

I wrote about Survivor here!

Three’s Company (Weekday Afternoons, Antenna TV)

I watched two episodes on Tuesday. Believe it or not, both of them revolved around simple misunderstandings that could have been solved in a matter of minutes if all of the characters on the show weren’t so stupid.

The Walking Dead: The World Beyond (Sunday Night, AMC)

I think what’s frustrating about this show is that it works best when it focuses on the teens growing up in a world where society has collapsed but, for some reason, the show keeps getting sidetracked with all of the adults. I don’t care about the adults but sometimes, the majority of the show seems to be made up of scenes of them sitting around and having hushed conversations. It gets boring!

Yes, Minister (PBS, Monday Morning)

I rewatched the episode where Jim becomes Prime Minister. Yay, Jim!

TV Review: Fear the Walking Dead 7.5 “Til Death” (dir by Lennie James)

Posted on November 20, 2021 by Lisa Marie Bowman

I can still remember when Fear the Walking Dead first started back in 2015.

The premise, as you may remember, was that the show was going to take place in the “world of The Walking Dead” but that it was going to deal with an entirely new group of characters and follow them through the early days of the zombie apocalypse. Would there be crossovers with the main show? While AMC refused to rule them out, it was also said that the world of the Walking Dead was so compelling and fully realized that there really was no real need to bring over Rick, Darryl, Morgan, or anyone else from the original show. In fact, since Fear the Walking Dead was a prequel, it really wouldn’t make any sense to have any of the original show’s characters show up for anything more than a winking cameo. Instead, audiences would be thrilled with the new cast of doctors, drug addicts, and city planners.

Well, that didn’t quite work out. It turned out that audiences didn’t really respond to the entirely new cast and so almost all of them were killed off, Lennie James switched from the main show to the spinoff, and, from season 4 on, Fear the Walking Dead became the Morgan show.

And I’m really not complaining. I tried to watch the early seasons of Fear The Walking Dead and I was so bored that I gave up on the show fairly quickly. However, I’ve been mostly entertained by the seventh and final season of Fear The Walking Dead. Yes, there have been a few pacing issues but, at this point, that’s something that anyone who has ever watched more than a handful of episodes of The Walking Dead and its spin-offs should be used to. But still, I enjoy Fear the Walking Dead‘s rather surreal landscape. Colman Domingo’s wonderfully weird performance is always entertaining to watch. I’m even somewhat interested in discovering who Padre is, even though I know the character probably won’t live up to all the hype. At this point, unless he turns out to be Rick, there’s no way Padre can meet the expectations that have been set for him.

Last Sunday, Dwight and Sherry joined the search for Padre. Like Morgan, Dwight and Sherry were originally on The Walking Dead. Dwight was one of Negan’s lieutenants. Sherry was his wife. Now, they’re “ethical outlaws,” riding across the radioactive landscape of Texas and protecting those in need. During the latest episode, Strand tried to get Dwight and Sherry to join his organization and Dwight was certainly tempted. But, in the end, they did the right thing and helped a woman named Mickey find and put down her reanimated husband. They then teamed up with the Stalkers to continue their search for Padre …. okay, so the plot summary sounds a little absurd and, to be honest, the idea of Dwight and Sherry calling themselves the Dark Horses and fighting for the bullied is a little absurd. But, and this is the secret as to why Fear the Walking Dead‘s final season has been so enjoyable, the show seems to be aware of how absurd it all is. Whereas The Walking Dead would have taken the whole “ethical outlaw” thing way too seriously, Fear the Walking Dead is willing to have fun with it all.

And this Sunday’s episode was a fun one. Apparently, with The Walking Dead and its two spin-offs coming to a close with the end of their current seasons, AMC is planning on keeping the franchie alive with an anthology series. Hopefully, the Dark Horses will appear in more than a few episodes. As much as I disliked them on The Walking Dead, Dwight and Sherry are a blast on Fear the Waling Dead. Dark Horses forever!

TV Review: Dexter: New Blood 1.2 “Storm of Fuck” (dir by Marcos Siega)

Posted on November 20, 2021 by Lisa Marie Bowman

The second episode of Dexter: New Blood had a title that I’m sure Deb would have appreciated.

Indeed, any Deb-centric episode of the first series of Dexter was always guaranteed to feature a storm of profanity and one of the the things that I always liked about Dexter is that everyone on the show was always as shocked by Deb’s language as the viewer was. Ghost Deb tends to curse a lot as well. Of course, Ghost Deb has her reasons. Not only is she dead but she can’t get her stupid stepbrother to listen to her advice. Ghost Deb told Dexter not to let Harrison stay in the cabin. She told Dexter that everyone he gets close to dies. And yet, over the course of Storm of Fuck, Dexter not only invited Harrison to live with him but he also took Harrison along with him while he covered up the previous episode’s murder of Matt Caldwell. (Of course, he didn’t tell Harrison what he was actually doing. Dexter is very good at keeping his secrets.)

A few thoughts on Storm of Fuck:

First off, it’s pretty obvious that the girl in the motel is going to be used as the target in some version of The Most Dangerous Game, right? And it’s also pretty obvious that Edward Olsen is the one behind it. It’s in no way a big surprise because Dexter has always been full of evil, rich serial killers. It also seems fairly obvious that Audrey is eventually going to end up getting hunted by Olsen.

Secondly, I don’t think Matt’s father (played by Clancy Brown) is a serial killer but I do think that he’s going to eventually figure out what Dexter did to his son. He’ll be the New Blood‘s equivalent of James Doakes, the man who knows the truth but can’t get anyone to listen to him.

Third, Harrison has totally murdered someone, right? I mean, he may not be a serial killer. And the events of Storm of Fuck would seem to indicate that he doesn’t have anything to do with any of the recent missing persons cases. But, obviously, he’s got some secrets. What did he do back when he was on drugs? Was he even on drugs or was that just something he said? Are those drawings of people who he knows or people he killed? When he read Dexter’s letter about “dark tendencies,” was he upset because he discovered Dexter was alive or was it because he knew that he did have those dark tendencies? My point is that Harrison is destined to follow in his father’s bloody footsteps eventually.

As for the rest of Storm of Fuck, it was an okay episode. It didn’t exactly move the story forward by much but it did allow us a chance to get to know all of the new characters. To me, this episode worked best as an example of the show’s often underrated use of dark humor. As macabre as the subject matter often is, it’s hard not to laugh at the contrast between Michael C. Hall’s deadpan voice-over and the events happening on screen. And, in grand Dexter tradition, the entire episode featured Dexter getting one lucky break after another until, during the final few minutes, everything fell apart. Dexter had nearly gotten everyone away from his cabin when Kurt Caldwell showed up and gave a rousing speech. On any other show, we would have cheered a community coming together and Kurt’s speech would have been a big hero moment.

On Dexter, though, it’s just a storm of fuck.

Artwork of the Day: Modern Mechanix (by Stewart Rouse)

Posted on November 20, 2021 by Dazzling Erin

by Stewart Rouse

This is from 1936. I wish I had a trailmobile.

Music Video of the Day: Lonely Boy by Andrew Gold (1977, directed by ????)

Posted on November 20, 2021 by Jedadiah Leland

On August 1st, 1981, MTV premiered. Over the course of 24 hours, 116 unique music videos were played on MTV. Yes, there was a time when the M actually did stand for music.

After three and a half months, we now come to the final video that MTV played on its first day of broadcast. That video was Andrew Gold and it was for his song about growing up with a younger sister, Lonely Boy.

Thank you for following this recreation of MTV’s first day and enjoy!

The First Videos Shown on MTV: