American Horror Story S01E01 Pilot Review

American Horror Story is a newish horror-drama television series which my girlfriend has been telling me to watch forever. I finally did watch the pilot and here are my thoughts, pretty okay show. Sexy, campy fluff. Well acted, well-shot and just campy enough without tipping it over onto the floor of the campy fairground which is littered with plotlines and dialogue of True Blood.

My first problem, and it’s a fairly large one, I don’t think this show should be on TV, I guess. I’m not completely serious, I’m not one of those people that genuinely cares about the world or wants to change it particularly but I do find this show to be pretty old-fashioned in what it chooses for its theme, ie that mental illness = evil. The characters are all, to varying degrees, influenced, controlled and made to  hear voices by the malicious, seemingly indiscriminately violent spirits of a pretty cool house that I want to live in because I paid attention in school and as a result am not superstitious, thanks I’ll take it. I can enjoy silly ghost spookiness, vampire spooky silliness and demon spooky silliness, but I find evil spirits being the cause for mental health disorders extremely reductive, crude and unhelpful in this modern world that we enjoy living in and complaining about.  It’s a particular breed of horror that is distasteful and unhealthy. We’re more aware and knowledgeable of the science of mental health than we were when this evil spirit, bad juju craziness horror became a thing and there is basically no need for it now.

The other problem with this show, or at least its first episode is the pacing. Instead of carefully setting up a few good plotlines it jerks all over the place explaining and playing out several of its hastily constructed plotlines in a way that made it seem like a season of television hyper-actively patched together into a fan made youtube ‘best of’ Season 1 clip. I feel like I got spoilered by the show itself. There was just way too much development and it didn’t leave any room to be intrigued by or involved in the story. Relax, guys! It prematurely jizzed in its own narrative pants basically, is what I’m saying.

To summarise, it’s a show that is damaging and kind of a dick, but if we’re being honest it could turn into a pretty good show if it slows down a bit, we all enjoyed the jerky camera thing and we’re all into maids, so we’re all going to keep watching it. C+

Questions raised.

• How did David Schwimmer and Jon Hamm manage to conceive?

• Was there too much masturbation in this episode or not too much masturbation enough?

• How does a gay gimp ghost get it up for a moody middle-aged madam? Great alliteration, Sam.

• ARE GHOSTS RILLY RILL?

• May I clean in here?

The Walking Dead S02E03 ‘Brave New Haircut’ Recap

I’m going to assume anyone reading this is all caught up on AMC’s hit show The Walking Dead, but in case you aren’t all caught up on AMC’s The Walking Dead it boils down to: the zombie apocalypse, a thing with a horse I seem to remember, banding together, racism, overcoming racism and banding together, love triangle, the weirdest looking kid named Carl, The Hatch storyline from Lost, explosion in The Hatch, little girl lost, the weirdest looking kid named Carl gets shot looking at a deer, we need a defibrillator, there’s a defibrillator at the school, all of the zombies in the world are just chilling at the school which is really inconvenient.

The episode opens on Shane getting a haircut. It’s a really long scene of a guy getting a haircut, it’s the opening scene and basically what is the deal with this scene? We are no doubt going to get resolution on this opening haircut thing, we will learn something crucial about Shane, possibly through flashbacks that explains why he would give himself a haircut, we will learn how he escaped from the Zombies who were using the school as a nightclub for some reason and we will learn why he chose that particular haircut. As opening haircuts go it’s probably one of my favourite opening haircuts and maybe my second favourite television storyline of all time after the ‘when did Jack get one of his many tattoos and why, no not the interesting looking tattoos, that generic chinese writing one’ storyline of Lost.

After the credits Rick Grimes (who has the worst name, it makes him sound like the scrawny kid with the perpetually runny nose at school) starts delivering a monologue about sandwiches over the top of Shane and the fat man from last episode running through the zombie nightclub school. The last episode ended on a cliffhanger of the two of them trapped in a small enclosed space, zombies all around them, no escape, the small padlock between them and certain death wobbling and clinking, soon to break.

They escaped the cliffhanger off-screen I guess!?!?!?! This fat man from last episode suggested it was all going to be okay and referred to things he was going to do upon his return from this dangerous zombie school mission so many times last episode that I will expect a full refund if he doesn’t die heroically and horrifically. “You can thank me when I get back,” said the fat man. R.I.P. “That’s a fine gun, I’ll bring it back,” said the fat man as Rick gave him his gun for literally no reason because he already had a gun. R.I.P. Basically this guy clearly never saw a zombie movie and said all of the things that you just don’t say before you go on a dangerous zombie mission in movies if you don’t want to die. I can’t remember the point of the sandwich story but anyway long story short, Shane was a prankster in highschool and he was back in time to eat his sandwich. Rick eats a sandwich his own self and says that ‘of course, you’ve heard this story a thousand times’. SERIOUSLY, GRIMES? You’ve told your wife the heroic prankster/sandwich story more than twice before? No wonder she was screwing around with the prankster who was back in time to finish his sandwich. PUNK’D. She then suggests that, to be honest, she kind of hopes that their son dies. She’s pretty cool that way.

Glenn and T-Dog (very cool, grown-up name) show up at the farmhouse where the new characters are nursing the wounded Carl and family and Glenn immediately gets a massive boner for the hot farm girl and then doesn’t pick his mouth up off the floor for the rest of this episode. Close your mouth, Glenn! Why is a Korean-American named Glenn, Glenn?

It was brought to my attention last week that the actor that plays T-Dog’s name is IronE Singleton, with that exact irregular capitalisation. Presumably you are supposed to pronounce it ‘irony’ (I’m not positive about that you will have to check with his agEnt) and that’s totally fine if you’re into rad fake names. On his website, he is pictured squatting in front of a wheatfield wearing a cream turtleneck and all the ‘e’s on his website’s navigation bar are capitalised irregularly in the same fashion as his name, which is fine, it’s a normal grown-up decision to make regarding one’s wEbsitE and you should definitely not pick on IronE for doing it. If I catch anyone picking on IronE about his fake name or his super professional website then everyone will have to stay behind after class.

In other fake name news, the star of this show that I’m supposed to be recapping, Andrew ‘The Voice’ Lincoln was born Andrew Clutterbuck and I’m not even making that up. Google it.

Previously Racist Guy and whiney Suicidal Blonde MILF decide to go trekking through the woods in the dark looking for the lost girl despite the fact that the night before (which was her first night missing, best chance of finding her alive) they decided that looking for her in the dark was pointless and forcefully restrained one another from doing it and that’s probably why she’s dead now. Either these characters are really dumb or the writers of this episode didn’t watch the last one.

Shane and the fat man are still slow motion running away from hordes of highschool zombies. Pick up the pace guys! They split up and Shane jumps out a window but a zombie grabs hold of him which doesn’t really make sense because the zombies on this show are usually really slow and clumsy so how would he manage to grab him after he’d already jumped and why wouldn’t his rotten, dead arms just fall right off?

Rick and Lori Grimes continue to talk about how they think it might be best if their son just dies but then he wakes up. Awkward! He is terrified of the strange elderly veterinarian in the suspenders with bushy white eyebrows leaning over him. “Don’t worry, that’s Hershel and this is his house” are the comforting words that Rick chooses. It works though and he gains enough composure to remark on his bullet wound briefly and then start going on about how pretty the deer he saw before he got shot was. Imagine if this kid was your kid? I can’t imagine it. They really did not win the kid lottery, I can see why they want him to die. He goes all weird mid sentence and it reminds us of the Bill Murray death bit in Zombieland and for once one of my references is actually SOMEWHAT RELATED. He then starts having a seizure.

Previously Racist Guy and Blonde MILF stumble upon a zombie hanging from a tree with his legs bitten bare to the bone and it’s really pretty gross. The zombies legs have been eaten off by the other zombies which also doesn’t make sense because if the zombies on this show liked zombie flesh so much why wouldn’t they just eat each other all the time instead of competing in really slow highway marathons and partying it up at the highschool on Friday nights? They use the hanging zombie as an excuse to talk about Blonde MILF’s depression and then they have a sharing, bonding, growing and banding together moment.

Glenn prays to holy Jesus because all the characters on this show are religious for some reason. He believes in an interventionist God, hence the prayer, but one who is an absolute JERK hence the not intervening in the zombie apocalypse despite being an interventionist God. Basically Glenn hasn’t thought this through.

That one absolute babe sneaks up on him and he reveals that this is his first time praying. That makes sense I guess, they always get you when you’re down, those Christians. A zombie apocalypse is perfect. Glenn and the new lady have a sharing, bonding, growing and banding together moment.

Rick spends about ten minutes harping on to the missus about how beautiful and spiritual and miraculous the moment was when they basically just saw a fucking deer in the fucking woods, which is where deer fucking live.  He says “It isn’t all death out there, we just have to be strong enough to believe!” There really isn’t enough barf in the world for this show sometimes. Please stop talking about magic and just fight some god damned zombies! The parts where you all fight the zombies are really good! I’m not joining your Baptist Church!

Shane and Rick hug it up again. Any excuse for a hug, these two! So much neck and face touching every episode too!

Blonde MILF, whose name is actually Andrea and the Older Gentleman in the cool fishing hat continue their “You’re an asshole for stopping me from committing suicide and I will never forgive you because it’s not like I could just commit suicide now, the moment isn’t right anymore” argument which is pretty much the most ridiculous argument to be having twice every episode.

The Grimes’ have a cup of joe in their favourite mugs confident that they came to the right decision on the ‘do we wish our son would die or do we not wish that our son would die’ quandary from earlier.

Shane returns on his own just as Carl’s surgery is about to start. Carl lives! Otis is dead though! The new hottie that Glenn has been ogling since they met is really sad about Otis’ death and Glenn capitalises big time.

A little later on she gives Shane some of Otis’ old clothes and remarks, “they won’t fit well…. they were Otis’ ” HAHAHAHAHAHAH BUUUURN OTIS!  POSTHUMOUS BURN!

In the bathroom Shane notices a patch of hair missing on his head. It flashback reminds him of that one time he shot his new pal Otis in the leg then brutally kicked him a whole bunch, punched him in the face a couple of times for good measure and then shot him again and beat him with the handle of a knife in order to use him as live bait and facilitate his own escape. It’s not his proudest moment and the memory is too much for him to bare with his current haircut and we see him forage frantically for hair clippers. Desperately his fingers fumble over every inch of the bathroom, his dark eyes darting back and forth, the sweat beading and pouring down his brow, stinging his bloodshot eyes, but he welcomes the pain, he deserves it. If only he could find something to cut or style his hair with! It is the most dramatic piece of haircut related television I have ever seen. He finds some clippers and they buzz into action with a jolt, suddenly it all makes sense. This is what it’s been leading to this whole time! It’s perfect, almost too perfect, it’s genius! THIS IS WHY THE OPENING HAIRCUT. Of course! It was right there in front of us the whole time and ‘all the pieces matter’.

Breaking Bad Season 4 Finale ‘Face Off’ Recap: In Which This Show Defies All Narrative Conventions And Yet None Of Them

I’ve been told I should review Breaking Bad before but I had no idea how I’d go about doing it besides quoting my favourite lines (“I am the one who knocks!”, “think about it, it’s brilliant!” etc) or by exclaiming all in caps, ‘Oh my golly gosh this episode was so good, did you see the bit that was really dramatic, the bit where Jesse was perpetually on the verge of crying and then he swallowed it down and you died inside or the bit where Walt was perpetually angry?’. That said however I feel like I can’t let a whole season of my current favourite show go by without acknowledging it at all. So I’m going to do my level best to avoid rapturous, sycophantic hyperbole, or at least keep the rapturous, sycophantic hyperbole to a tolerable murmur. That being said, OH MY GOLLY GOSH THIS EPISODE WAS SO GOOD.

In the wake of the extremely tense anticlimax of last week’s attempted assassination of Gus (which was somehow still really tense even though obviously the big bad wasn’t going to die in the penultimate episode) we are presented with about twenty minutes of black comedy and we’re reminded of how funny this show can be. It begins with Walt clumsily carrying a big bag full o’ bomb through the hospital and getting it magnetically stuck on things with a comedy clang. It’s extra funny in that it’s quite clearly a ladies bag or a cool box or something. CORRECTION: It was a diaper bag, thanks Autumn.

Things get serious for a moment when the police start asking Jesse about the whole poisoned child thing and how he told the kid’s mother that he had been poisoned by a very specific, rare drug but that he couldn’t explain how he knew that. It’s the kind of plot point that usually goes unrealistically unresolved, because no-one really cares about that kid or his mother and their purpose within the story has already been achieved. No-one would blink an eye if nothing came of it, we’d just be expected to believe that the mother decided not to pursue it. But one of the things that makes this show so great is its ability to portray outlandish situations that are still grounded in reality. I can’t vouch for the science stuff, or how realistic it is that only these two guys can make the blue meth and that it’s not just a recipe that can be written down, but that’s science stuff and sorry scientists but complete and total scientific accuracy is not worth scuppering a good potential plot for. But things like this, the way humans behave and interact is worth keeping real. Anyway the coppas are like, “why did you insist that the kid had been poisoned by this one specific, rare substance?” and Jesse is like “I dunno, shot in the dark, saw it on House most likely!” because even though he’s a lovable character and the only real good guy on the show, he’s also pretty stupid. Did you learn nothing from the ‘Better Call Saul’ advertising campaign, Jesse? Eventually, after incriminating himself a buttload, he calls Saul.

Back to the comedy! Walt breaks in to Saul’s office and has a big confrontation with Saul’s secretary that ends with her very obviously trying to bribe him by at first accepting $1700 for the broken window and then suggesting that only $20,000 would cover the cost. Walt gives her major Bart Simpson teeth face.

Oblivious, irate Walt then says the best thing, he says, ” are you insane? Who the hell is going to charge twenty thousand dollars for a plate glass door? THERE IS NO REPUTABLE VENDOR THAT WOULD…” and then he gets it. Hahaha. An exceptional lol.

He goes home to get the money and then, worried that hitmen will be waiting, has the most diabolical idea. He calls his elderly neighbour and asks her to check if he’s left the stove on. During the conversation he is forced pathetically into making hilarious small talk, which when positioned in the middle of one of the most suspenseful season finales of the one of the most suspenseful shows ever is just great.

“Listen, I wa- I.. I… I’m fine, how are you? Oh good, good. Yes, cats are… Listen.”

He watches from a distance through some pretty cool binoculars as the cane wielding older woman potentially walks into a volley of bullets intended for him. It’s hilarious and it’s indicative of just how far this character has fallen. It’s easy to over look it since it’s so funny but it’s basically one of the m0st subtly evil things he has ever done (or is it? SPOILER ALERT).

At this point I’d like to fess up that I’ve already watched this whole episode. So anything I say in relation to his character and the “TOLD YOU SO” moments that come later should be treated with extreme suspicion. That said though, I DID see the ending revelation coming, I PROMISE. No really though. I was really excited about Walt becoming the villain and he and Jesse being paired against one another once and for all for the final season. Because I think it was pretty obvious to everyone that Gus’ days were numbered, due to his backstory being both revealed and then resolved this year, his  journey has obviously come to an end. What cinched it for me though was an interview Bryan Cranston gave just before the finale in which he would not stop talking about Walt’s darkness, which seemed strange in the wake of an episode in which he and Jesse finally (seemingly) reunite to fight the good fight against a villain who this show has spent several episodes humanising and making us all adore.

Luckily enough, little old Mrs Simmons isn’t met with machine gun fire or a garrotte wire, the would be hitmen slip out the back. Walt retrieves the money and then does a pratfall over the garden wall on his way out.

Saul comes to Jesse’s rescue, gets the old people’s home tip from Jesse and passes it on to Walt, who goes to visit Salamanca. As with any good show, all the seemingly unconnected plot points of the past season are coming together, and if you’d guessed that the resolution to the Gus problem was going to be through an uneasy alliance between Walt and Salamanca I would have to respectfully say to you, “no duh”. That is not to say that it isn’t a good resolution, one that works, but I’d hoped for something a little more out of left field perhaps. I’ll take it either way though. They get us on Salamanca’s side a little bit before the inevitable happens, through an obnoxiously disrespectful idiot nurse that treats him like a child.

Walt puts the plan into action, harnassing Salamanca’s depressingly disempowered state paired with his desperate need for revenge to achieve a mutual goal to kill two birds with one stone, because Salamanca, you will remember knows Walt’s full name and address and as such, is a loose end in this whole mess. He’ll have Salamanca talk to the D.E.A. thereby prompting Gus to swoop in and take definitive action against his enemy, giving Walt the chance to strike.

At Hank and Marie’s house, Hank is told that Salamanca is at the station and wants see him in person to tell him something. Everyone objects but then Marie who we all despise just flat out orders Hank not to go. She then holds the BEST bitch face in silence for about ten seconds while we all wait for the scene to cut to Hank at the station. The shot lasts the perfect amount of time for full comedic effect.

Salamanca uses the painfully slow bell spelling process to tell Hank to suck his dick and then to fuck off. It is great. We now love this character that was a total d-bag and killed our pal, Gus’ probable boyfriend. It doesn’t matter either way, it’s his presence there that incriminates him. He’ll incur the wrath of Gus, luring him into the trap without actually having to destroy his hardcore cartel bad ass reputation.

It works, Gus has the old folk’s home checked out in preparation for his arrival by the henchman with the ladies face (who doesn’t look like Tyrese and my girlfriend is a racist for suggesting that quite frankly). Walt, who is waiting outside the window for some reason is almost caught because this one old lady with pink sixties cat-eye glasses is all like ‘coooey, helloooo!’

Hahahahaha. Love that lady, sure hope no-one blows up the room right next to her, that would really suck for her. In my mind, Walt takes her to the cafeteria to play backgammon and talk about her grandchildren to get her out of harms way. He doesn’t though, he gets in his car and drives away. RIP PINK GLASSES OLD LADY.

Jesse is tazed and bundled into the back of a van. OH NO BUT HE’S MY FAVOURITE! GET OFF HIM!

Gus shows up at the home and stares blankly ahead as his man checks the scene out again. At first I wasn’t sure about how credible Gus not knowing what was up at this point was. I felt like he surely must have cottoned on, he figured out the car bomb ploy with an almost preternatural omniscience so this should have been a walk in the park for him. But then I considered that ah, of course, his nemesis (the original kind, the fatal flaw that brings about a character’s demise, not the misunderstood modern usage) is his passion for the one he lost, the other Chicken Brother™ and his seething hatred of his killer (The Other Chicken Brother™, coincidentally is the name of my new band). It’s brilliant when you think about how calculating and unemotional this guy appears to the rest of the world. And so this is the one area in which his judgment is clouded. Losing a brother, a partner and quite possibly a ‘life partner’ (right? Who’s with me on that?) would most likely prevent you from thinking clearly in relation to his killer. Whether he is aware or unaware of what he is walking into, he walks. We’re treated to a gloriously extended over the shoulder shot of his adjusting his outfit in true Gus style and walking slowly and proudly into the jaws of death. I’m going to miss him so very much!

Massive frowny face. I’M WELLING UP JESSE STYLE OVER HERE.

and then KABLAMOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!

Then this. Remember how this episode is called ‘Face Off’?

I could have done without this to be honest, it seems kind of cheap, which this show isn’t. Not to mention incredibly unrealistic. Why wouldn’t he go flying along with the door? In my version of this episode, this amazing character is treated with respect and isn’t shown with half a CGI face with a full on moving eye stalk. Anyone else catch the moving eye-stalk when his other eye moved? JESUS CHRIST. Obviously they were going for the OMG response and fair enough really because this was extremely shocking and was probably tweeted about a zillion times, which is good news for the show. But on the other hand it’s a cheap exploitative shock tactic that isn’t in keeping with the quality of the rest of this show.

Walt hears on the radio that three died in the explosion. He’s just listening to make sure that the plan worked and that Gus is dead but I like to imagine that he is listening in because he’s worried that pink glasses lady will be a casualty. It’s totally just the first thing though because Walt is basically devoid of any goodness or humanity now. Yikes.

He then rescues Jesse who is being held captive at the lab by shooting a guy a whole bunch. It’s not a cheer-worthy moment of heroism at all, it’s just plain scary because this guy is terrifying now, he’s reached a point of no return, pissed all over that point and then killed every one that that point ever knew or loved in the name of self preservation. He drops the gun to the floor. You might think this symbolises that the violence is over, that Walt has saved his loved ones by doing what needed to be done. But really it’s because the gun needs to be destroyed in the fire. Walt’s kill count is going to stack even higher next season as he and Jesse are pitted finally and fatally against one another, of that I am sure. They burn the lab to the ground, or to the basement I suppose.

In a beautiful pastel coloured dusk rooftop scene Jesse and Walt bask in their success and Jesse tells Walt that the boy will pull through and that a scrumptious but deadly poisonous berry named Lilly Of The Valley is responsible. Walt calls his wife to declare with sinister vitriol, “I won” and a final shot reveals the Lilly of the Valley growing in a plant pot in Walt’s garden, the very same plant pot that his spinning gun landed on, giving him the wicked idea that would lead to the triple bluff of turning Jesse against Gus. “Think about it, it’s brilliant” takes on scary, devilishly narcissistic new meaning.

And so Gus, the bad guy who is revealed to be a good guy has been defeated by Walt, the good guy who is revealed to be be the bad guy. Somehow this show manages to defy all narrative conventions and yet none of them. It boldly inverts the traditional resolution of a moral narrative without alienating its viewer in any way whatsoever.  The good guy wins, like they always do, but the good guy is now the bad guy. It defies convention whilst still being believable and satisfying. Love this show.

Weekly lol: Welcome Back, Pals!

Community S03E01 ‘Biology 101′

“You are human tennis elbow, you are pizza burn on the roof of the world’s mouth, you are the opposite of Batman!”

Oh good all the shows are back! Hi, pals! Okay, so, we all saw Alison Brie’s underwear at the beginning, let’s just be grown ups and move on and let’s certainly not blog about it. The opening musical dream sequence explains how great this season is going to be and alludes to its intrigue and plot points, for example by outright stating that Annie and Jeff are going to sleep together. It reminds us how self-reflexive this show is, that this isn’t just another sit-com, it’s a sit-com for people that have seen too many sit-coms and are wise to their trite formulaic structures but love them anyway.  Michael K. Williams! For those of you that aren’t extremely in love with Michael K. Williams, he played Omar Little, the best character on the best television show ever, The Wire. Okay, I know people are always saying things are the best thing on thing ever but The Wire is definitely one of the ‘The Best Television Show Ever’s, and by that I don’t mean it’s one of the best television shows ever I mean it is one of the ‘The Best Television Show Ever’s and there’s a big difference. Where was I? Community was great! Michael K. Willians proves Larry David’s black man with glasses theory and expounds upon it by introducing being a black man with glasses and a scar that you got from a knife fight. I mean that is basically ideal! That’s what I want to be when I grow up. John Goodman too! John Goodman from movies! Cougarton Abbey! Inspector Spacetime! That cool 2001: A Space Odyssey homage bit! Community does this thing where it wraps things up in a learning and growing and sharing morality ribbon but one that is so ridiculous and constructed out of pure irony that it works as both a sit-com and a parody of a sit-com and its rote customs and I admire it a great deal for being able to do this. Then there wasn’t a Troy Abed after the end credits bit! Why not!?

Modern Family (S03E01&2) ‘Dude Ranch’ & ‘When Good Kids Go Bad’

“After this, we’re gonna have some angry birds.”
“Yeah, it’s gonna be bye-bye birdie!”

Modern Family was everything we’ve come to expect from Modern Family. By which I mean a whole bunch of funny moments and an unhealthily large dose of earnest, unironic learning and growing and barfing to wrap it all up. Its not Scrubs barfy, but there is an inordinate amount of lessons learned. I feel like I learned all the gentle comedy lessons from The Simpsons growing up and wish this show would get off my back about being an amazing person. I’ll say this though, if you watch Modern Family straight after Community it’s a lot more enjoyable because while I do love the tongue in cheek, wink and a nod irony of Community, it can get tiring sometimes living your entire life wrapped in an irony blanket inside an irony box and the unadulterated, earnest wholesomeness of Modern Family is the perfect antidote to it. Sometimes we just need to take our ironic heads out of our ironic asses and smell the wholesome learning and growing barf coffee. Or something? I wish I hadn’t written barf coffee while I’m drinking tepid coffee. I’m not going to drink the rest of this tepid coffee. In addition to the moral resolution trite sit-com custom, the return of Modern Family also presented the season premiere cast beautification custom, a few of its characters had new haircuts, dye jobs, tans, bigger boobs/biceps, thinner waists, etc (‘cept Cam, obviously. Love you Cam!). Which brings me neatly on to Always Sunny which did something special in that regard.

 

It’s Always Sunny In Philadelphia (S07E01&2) ‘Frank’s Pretty Woman’ & ‘The Gang Goes to the Jersey Shore’

“Now this ocean explain it to me, it goes on forever or…. What’s on the other side of that there?”
“…Europe.”

“How long would it take”
“Do not try to swim to Europe!”

In direct contrast to the cast beautification and the learning and growing of Modern Family stands Fat Mac, projectile blood vomit, a dead hooker and then the whole of the jersey shore episode. Rob McElhenney gained fifty pounds of fat for the return of Always Sunny in the name of parodying the gradual beautification of sit-com stars in line with the increase in salary, particularly evident when a new season premieres and everyone has noticeably gone up by 20 attractive points. In gaining the weight Rob McElhenney pushes Always Sunny even further into the anti-sitcom territory. Proudly boasting the least relate-able story lines, the least likable characters, the most cringe worthy moments and the never ever wrapping the episodes up with any kind of moral structure. Favourite moments include Mac insisting that Denis try to ‘move him’ as though not being moveable is an enviable quality, the hooker calling the sales assistant ‘gay boy’ and Dee suggesting this would be one thing if he weren’t gay but he clearly is, the DIABET-TUS, the braid incident and rum ham. Either they are gearing things up a bit with the gross or else I think I must have gone soft during the hiatus because there were a whole lot of hand over mouth moments for me. Charlie and the waitresses night on the beach was lovely too because Charlie is the best.

Parks and Recreation (S04E01) ‘I’m Leslie Knope’

Parks wasn’t all it could be, I mean it was enjoyable, certainly, but it can do better and it didn’t exactly set the lol bar very high. It  did get the ball rolling on the seasons major plotline of Leslie running for office so let’s just take it from there and let the hilarity commence. I’m sure we’re all glad that our pals have returned, including the most iconic comedy character of our time Ron effing Swanson and just a few of the women we are all in love with. Speaking of which, Aubrey Plaza’s hair changed which was a downer because her previous haircut was my favourite haircut. Someone else’s hair was different too. Rob Lowe’s hair. Rob Lowe’s hair was so weird. What was up with Rob Lowe’s hair? I thought there was going to be a plot point to explain his hair but it just hung in the air like a bad smellcut and no-one was made accountable at all.

Up All Night (S01E01&2) ‘Pilot’ & ‘Cool Neighbors’

Up All Night was the only brand new show that I thoroughly enjoyed. I had to go out and buy a macbook pro that I can’t afford and am going to have to return immediately after watching its second episode, but even with that taken into consideration I am still completely enamored by it. This is a show that is almost impossible to make sound funny when describing its basic premise because the basic premise is that of a married couple with a new baby which sounds really boring. It’s a clever piece of well-written, expertly paced hilariously acted comedy gold though. Neither character is a weak link, neither character is in any way irritating, the whole baby situation doesn’t eat up too much of the action and it all works out just very very well. Teqwilla! Right? Right! I don’t watch Oprah but the Ava character and the Ava show-within-a-show is a take-off of Oprah, right? LOVE IT! Loved the facebook bit the most though.

“We’ve got to make sure that our Facebook pictures look good before he requests us,”

“You like soup? You like the news? You’ve really gotta cool it on the likes!’  

“A lot of these are ironic!”

I hadn’t held out much hope for this one after a good few disappointing new series (I’m looking at you 2 Broke Girls and New Girl) and the petering out of Running Wilde last year but Will Arnett has found a good home at last and we’re all really happy for him.

The Office (S08E01) ‘The List’

The Office sends up planking fairly well, I think we can all agree on that even though planking has been OVER (shell art is over!) for ages. Andy is Manager, fat James Spader is C.E.O and Pam is pregnant again and so is Angela! Basically The Office’s job for the last few seasons has been justifying its existence, that climate of insecurity is at fever pitch in the absence of Steve Carell but I have to say they did it once again. The list! The list! Who remembers that show Lost? Remember the lists on Lost? Remember also how The Office used to reference Lost sometimes? I really miss Lost.

Archer (S03E01&2) ‘Heart of Archness Parts 1 & 2′

For those not in the know, which for some reason seems to be a lot of people, Archer is a show that is part spy movie parody and part office sit-com and it is just the bawdiest most enjoyable animated television show I’ve watched. The new series saw two genius castings, Patrick Warburton and David Cross. It was good. I’m tired of doing these reviews now but Archer was good. We went to the park and had ice-cream and it was good.

’2 Broke Girls’ Pilot Review: Misinformed Hipster Humour and Racial Yuks Done Wrong

I wanted to like 2 Broke Girls, I actually did. I find Kat Dennings’ dry wit and sarcasm very charming and funny and I (don’t shoot me) rather enjoyed Nick and Norah’s Infinite Playlist. That said, this show isn’t great. It’s not even good and I think it might be bad and veering dangerously close to stupid. Kat Dennings is great in it, she has excellent comic timing and her own droll humour spills over into every line. The problem is with the lines themselves, and the characters, and everything else.

The show is about two financially challenged twenty somethings that work in a sketchy diner, as far as sitcom premises go it isn’t bad but it isn’t ground breaking, almost every sitcom dedicates a portion of its action to a diner, cafe or restaurant, but it’s not the worst. Fifty seconds into 2 Broke Girls however I had already decided that it was one of the worst sitcoms I had ever seen. That doesn’t mean it actually is, because it is a flaw of mine that I don’t make a point of watching things that look like they are going to be terrible (except for, yeah except for that one show, the reviews of which constitute most of this blog so far). So when I say it’s one of the worst sitcoms I’ve ever seen I mean out of all the sitcoms that would seem, by their cast, concept and presentation to be passable this one in particular stood out for me as being exceptionally mediocre. By ‘stood out’ I suppose I mean the opposite of that, I mean to describe something that in the strictest sense is so adamantly determined to conform to the standards set by such trite, mediocrity as How I Met Your Mother and Two And A Half Men that it makes itself into a peculiar unknowing parody of their mediocrity.

One of the supposed biggest laughs if the canned laughter is anything to go buy was calling a guy a hipster because he was wearing a wool hat indoors and referencing the fact that he did it because hipsters love COLDPLAY! WHAT? Whoever wrote this episode, and the team of people that this script was handed to for examination and the team of execs that approved it actually think that Coldplay are THE band that hipsters love. Great job, guys! Correct me if I’m wrong but I’m fairly sure that Coldplay are the polar opposite of hipster. It may be Nickelback, but it’s probably Coldplay. I mean, call me a stickler for rules but if I’m going to watch a show that derives a large part of its humour from popular culture and what ‘the kids’ are into I want the people making it to have some understanding of those things. That’s just a general rule of thumb. Maybe that’s just me.

Three minutes in and oh good a racist caricature! I was hoping there would be one of those! Watch your back, The Big Bang Theory! This character lead to a discussion with a friend of mine about what does and doesn’t qualify as racist humour. Basically, in my opinion, with racially exaggerated characterisation based jokes it can go two ways, it can go the way of Outsourced and at times The Big Bang Theory and strive to get cheap laughs out of exploiting racist stereotypes, for example, this stutterering ‘r’ and ‘l’ confusing Asian character in 2 Broke Girls. We learn that the character has ‘change name’ from Han Lee to Bryce Lee. YIIIIIIIIIKES! The other type of racial humour aims to get a laugh out of people that hold those stereotypes to be true. For example, the entirety of Goodness Gracious Me, in which a cast of British Asians (East Indians, for the American reader) either exaggerate racial stereotypes beyond recognition in order to delineate how arbitrary and absurd they are, or they mirror them, having Asian characters eating British food in a way that it’s not meant to be eaten, insisting ‘this is how you eat this kind of food’ or having Asian characters unable to pronounce a British name and suggesting that a British person ought to change his ridiculous foreign (British) name in order to better fit in. A stark contrast to the name change of the character in 2 Broke Girls whose actions attain laughs at the expense of the ignorant alien culture and the child-like desperation that goes along with it.

I didn’t intend for this review to get serious, when I began writing it was going to be concerned primarily with this show being kind of dumb. Which it is. Kind of. It’s not Two And A Half Men bad but it could get there, let’s give it another chance for our good friend Kat Dennings who we are basically in love with and wish all the best and I hope she doesn’t read this because then maybe we won’t get married.

True Blood S04E12 Season Finale Recap

It’s that time again! Time to catch up on all our pals before saying adios for a few blissful months!

The newly possessed Lafayette is being weirdly silent and still with his hands on his lap and is just generally being really stabby looking while not eating  his breakfast, Jesus keeps the conversation going his end though. Hahah, Lafayette is being so weird but Jesus just keeps talking and talking and doesn’t see it coming even when Lafayette holds his fork up in the air while making dagger eyes for the longest time. Then surprise, forks him right in the hand! Didn’t see that coming! As an aside, I find it kind of funny that after Marnie possessed Lafayette at bedtime the night before instead of getting on with her evil plans straight away she thought she’d get a good night’s kip first. I also find it funny that she woke up the next day and put a cute, sassy, outfit together the next day! Let’s critique what Marnie the evil witch picked out for the fall season. A japanese silk robe thing, some fetching diamond earrings, purple slippers and some orange Adidas track pants. Good look, Marnie! Looking fierce! Very Marnie, that outfit.

At the Stackhouse residence Sookie sits down to breakfast with Tara and asks her “Do you think Gran’s in heaven, Tara?” which is a pretty funny thing for an adult to say to another adult. They wax lyrical about what kind of advice Gran would give them and they settle on “to be good to each other” and “to wear sunscreen” just like that Mary Schmich essay that all my 90′s child brethren will remember was turned into a hit single by Baz Luhrmann. I sort of want to do a cover version of this song now in which Granny Stackhouse imparts such wisdom and advice as ‘if you travel to fairy land don’t eat the fruit, if you decide not to eat the fruit, be aware that a deadly game of fairy volleyball will take place for some reason, by the way, being a fairy runs in the family and you are a fairy, if a man tortures your close personal friend, fang rapes you and then eats your fairy godmother don’t let him into your heart, always wear sunscreen, stop having sex all over my house with everyone. Stuff like that. Gran stuff.

Sam has a funeral for his super amazing brother that we are all going to miss and who is surely in heaven with Gran, without a doubt. The marker is basically one of those little metal things that tells you what plant a plant is! Haha. Hoyt’s mom says a few words, she says despite being a devious son of a bitch, he did have a good heart. WHAT? WHEN? I’d like to be reminded of a time that he had a heart, was it while he was tricking his brother’s girlfriend into having sex with him or when he was extorting you for every penny you are worth, lady? She then admits that of course he did steal a bunch of her clothes and even took a pair of her underwear. Hahah, excellent thing to say at someones funeral.

Jason comes clean with Hoyt and fesses up to having had sex with Jessica then tells him all the positions they used. Classic Jason! he obviously gets the shit kicked out of him.

It’s Halloween at Merlotte’s! Arlene and Terry are made up as zombies because as she says “zombies are the new vampires”. Hahah, what? Sam is in the office reading a hilarious suicide note from Tommy. I LOVE THIS NOTE, JUST LOOK AT IT!

I absolutely love this note, I love that these were his planned final words, I know we shouldn’t find humour in such a tragic learning disability but it’s kind of hard not to. I love that he even bothers to try correcting himself but more than that I love that he just gave up with it before he was done! It’s just such a great suicide note to leave someone, probably my favourite suicide note of all time.

Lafayette and Jesus get blood absolutely everywhere, the fake blood expenses for this episode must have been through the roof! Lafayette borrows Jesus’ super cool Avatar™ with scenester ear gauges face by stabbing him and licking the knife. Then he makes the weirdest face.

Back at Merlotte’s a girl of about twelve is dressed up as a pregnant teen mom. Good costume, kiddo. Definitely a costume I would allow my twelve year old to wear. Sam is Hugh Hefner I guess? Or an actual steam boat captain? It’s a multi-purpose costume, the boat captain hat! Terry’s army buddy, who I remember from Dawson’s Creek and Felicity and absolutely nothing else shows up and then doesn’t appear in the rest of the episode. This is a perfect time to introduce a new sub plot, what is there, thirty minutes remaining of the season? Just cram a couple more in there, guys. Alcide gets a phone call. He has an iphone, neat!

Things suddenly start speeding up, Tara finds Jesus’ body, immediately assumes for the purposes of speeding up the plot that Marnie has possessed Lafayette, goes to get Sookie and that one witch that looks like Hugo Weaving and they head out to fight the big bad with some salt and sage because magic is real. At the Vampire Whitehouse, Marnie has already done a bunch of ass kicking off camera I guess. She’s killed all the guards and chained Bill and Eric to a stake atop an unlit bonfire. I’m kind of pissed that this all happened off camera? What’s the deal with that? I mean I would have happily sacrificed one or two of the lengthy hugging, consoling, gentle conversation scenes that have made up most of this episode so far to see a witch with a demons head fight and over-power a team of super strong, super fast vampires. It’s not like the characters on this show are believable, relateable or interesting in any way, so what’s with all the weepy talky scenes dominating the finale? Also, WHY ARE THEY SHIRTLESS?

Someone please explain to me why they are shirtless? Did Marnie really go out of her way to take their shirts off. I want to see the scene where she struggled to remove their shirts and they were like “No, witch, leave my shirt alone, unhand me!”. Undressing our heroes to the waist for no reason at all (the reason is for the ladies, clearly) isn’t the only thing our big bad guy has been doing off camera, she/he has also had an outfit change and you will never guess what she/he has chosen to wear to the climactic battle scene.

HOLY FUCKING BALLS THAT IS A HILARIOUSLY OVER-SIZED KAFTAN. Excellent costume, choice! Terrifying! Love it!

While Marnie is giving her evil plan speech Hugo Weaving Fairy starts really obviously pouring salt in a circle around them all and our villain is just totally okay with that happening for some reason? Marnie lights the fire and Sookie decides to use that one really cool fairy trick that she should probably have done BEFORE the fire was lit.

Marnie/Lafayette lands on his/her ass, bloomers on display and all. Oh and by the way, COWBOOT BOOTS WITH THAT KAFTAN?! Guuuuuuuuuurrrrrrrrlll.

She/he is pissed. Still totally fine with the salt circle formation that is still happening though.  Sure enough, the salt circle is complete by the time Marnie Monster is done roaring and our pals are now safe and protected by a forecefield. They do a magic spell real quick and awaken all the spirits of the dead, strengthened by the spirit of Halloween (lol). Marnie would also be strengthened by the spirit of Halloween though presumably. There are exactly eighteen ghosts in this town, there are about three modern ones and the rest are wearing period garments, one of them is a cowboy! The spirit of Antonia comes back too and just blows out the fire? WTF? Ghosts can just do shit like that now? If she could just do shit like that in ghost form then why did she bother with the possession in the first place? UGH, THIS SHOW! So annoying when they do this! Seriously writers, not even trying.

THEN GHOST GRAN APPEARS AND DOES THIS!

If there’s one thing that an all-powerful witch who has been strengthened by a demonic entity has NO CHANCE against it is the ghost of some old lady apparently! So ghosts can just, they can just defeat witches now too? Regular ghosts are more powerful than witches? Huh? FUCK THIS SHOW.

Marnie explains once again that she is all crazy and homicidal because people treat her like a freak? Are we never going to get any more exposition than that about her character? She’s a maniac because she was picked on? Antonia over there was raped and burned alive, and she is totally chill, man! What is Marnie’s problem? What was the point of all the Antonia flashback rapefest stuff in the first place if she was going to be totally chill? Why didn’t we get any Marnie back-story to explains why she is such a JERK? Why is this show still on television? This show is so fucking sloppy, it’s like bad Buffy the Vampire Slayer fan fiction written by a teenager. Antonia and Super Gran have a few words and Marnie decides to stop being evil. The other eighteen ghosts just stand there in a line as if they’re about to start formation dancing to Michael Jackson’s Thriller at any moment. Super Gran tells Sookie she is all alone then joins the rest of the ghosts who turn around, walk a few feet and then disappear. Great day out, ghosts! Lots of fun! Let’s do this again real soon.

Jessica turns up at Jason’s house dressed as Slutty Red Riding Hood and they bone but she awkwardly covers her nipples with her hand again for some reason.

Eric and Bill spit roast Sookie in matching robes! It’s so adorbz! Looking GREAT, guys!

The robes even have little embroidered emblems on them! GO RAVENCLAW!

They then have the most AWKWARD conversation I’ve ever witnessed in my life about how much they love each other and “you’ve loved me every bit as much as I’ve loved you” and she loves them both so very much and that’s why she can’t be with either of them and it’s BARF BARF BARF I just can’t stop cringe barfing. It’s the barfiest thing I’ve ever witnessed. It is just not a conversation that three adults, let alone one adult and two ancient vampires have!

I’m not sure what is more impressive about this scene, that they got through it without dying of laughter first or that Anna Paquin managed to produce REAL ACTUAL ACTOR TEARS! Give this woman an Oscar, it’s over, she is in floods of actor tears because the character she plays can’t choose between the love of two vampires in ridiculous matching robes! COME ON! Anna Paquin is the greatest actor of our time!

Jesus appears to Lafayette, because ghosts can do that whenever they want on this show I guess and being dead isn’t so bad afterall. He tells Lafayette that he is fine with being murdered because he would probably have died of cancer one day anyway. HAHAHAHAHAHAHAH! Okay! Reasonable argument, there! Can’t fault that air tight logic! Now excuse me while I murderer myself and my family because what’s the difference anyway? We’ve all gotta go sometime, may as well be right now! Who cares! C’est la vie!

Everyone hugs and kisses and Jessica says to Jason that she wants to ‘try oral’ next time because that’s a normal thing someone would say to their significant other. Jason gets all clingy, slow down, man. Jessica says that “fuckin’ you made me hungry” which is a gross thing to say really, I think that’s gross anyway. Then Jason says she is kind of like a hooker and she smiles and says she could pretend to be a hooker for him if he likes that and just STOP IT, guys! You’re getting barfy! She eventually leaves and when she does there’s a knock on the door that is obviously not her but they play the SURPRISE sound effect anyway. It’s that Reverend vampire from last season or the season before, I forget which. No biggie though because vampires have to be invited in on this show. There’s no way they would forget that would they? I totally DO NOT ACCEPT this as a cliffhanger, as it is meant to be, because seriously Jason, just say “not today thankyou” and go sit back down on your couch, he can’t come in. Rules!

Alcide finds out that Russel Edgington has escaped from under two feet of concrete and that’s supposed to be exciting I suppose. Ugh. So we’re going to have to relive last season again next season? I can’t wait for the thrilling conclusion to that in next years season finale after which Marnie will reappear and possess someone again right at the end. Rinse and repeat.

That bitchy vampire president or queen or whatever comes to visit Eric and Bill and Eric calls her stormtroopers gay, he actually calls them gay like he’s a tenth grader or something. Grow up, Eric! What are you, a thousand years old? There is way too much dialogue and then they explode her all over themselves.

Then Debbie pops up to kill Sookie but Tara jumps in and takes the shot for her even though that isn’t how shotguns work. Sookie shoots Debbie right in the face and wow that was weird. I am positive Tara will just walk it off next season. Can we all agree that this has without a doubt been the worst, most stunted, ineffective and just terribly deformed, half-birthed finale episode of any show ever? What even in the hell was that? Everyone involved needs to be fired yesterday.

True Blood S04E11 ‘Going To The Store’ Recap

The Vampire Gestapo are still slowly approaching the Wicca shop. Inside the shop fucking ROY is like blah blah blah Hotel California, yee haw. Hurry up and die, Roy! I don’t even understand what your character is or why you started getting so much screen time so suddenly! I thought it was so you could die that same or the next episode! Sookie and Lafayette are fine, they are inside the store now. Last episode when Marnie dramatically and magically made them disappear in front of Jason’s eyes she really just teleported them about twenty feet for some reason, end of. This is a prime example of why this show sucks so hard. Marnie tells them they can leave if they want but they’re all scared to because the vampires will kill them, which isn’t really, I mean obviously the vampires wouldn’t kill them, they are hostages. One of them goes for the getting stabbed option and the camera pans to Sookie’s face as she wonders whether or not to use her magic fairy ‘Get Out Of  Plotline Free’ powers or not. No? Okay.

Just as the Vampire Gestapo is readying the rocket launcher Jason runs out from around the corner. Hahahaha, he was taking a leak nearby or something. He gives them a counter pep talk and effectively removes all pep.

Mr. Cool Haircut, Marcus has now kidnapped his daughter as well as murdered Tommy so everyone is really mad about that. My favourite article of clothing from the first episode of this season reappears:

Is that not exactly the same teeny tiny vest that Lafayette wore? I seriously think it is. I assumed that he had pilfered it from a G.I. Joe but it appears otherwise.

Jesus and Lafayette take the dead body into the bathroom under the pretense that she’s alive and that they’re going to help her. Marnie who is a cold-blooded killer and evil tyrant who just threw a knife into said corpse because the girl walked towards her too fast and whose authority is being unanimously contested is like, ‘sure, don’t save her here though, do it in a small room where I can’t see what you are doing for the whole episode, please’. Sookie and the other blonde one who looks like Hugo Weaving in ’The Adventures of Priscilla, Queen of the Desert’ (I only just noticed this but she really does!) try to reason with her some more and is still appears that she’s a homicidal maniac because she was picked on in school. Sookie says ‘I know what it’s like to be picked on too’ because apparently lithe, vivacious cheerleaders get picked on all the time.

Andy is busy hurrrr durrrr-ing his way through the forest when a mother fucking fairy appears right in fucking front of him. This fairy literally appears exactly front of him, in his path and then tells HIM to back off! The fairy then magic blasts him through the air and knocks him out cold. RUDE! This is the fairy equivalent of the shoulder barge fight start. This fairy is an absolute fairy god-JERK. This guy knows what she’s fairying about.

The Vampire Gestapo try to interrogate the zombie mind-controlled vampire for some reason and then they are like ‘oh right I forgot, she is under zombie mind control’. Is there even one brain to share between all the characters on this show? Hundreds of years old and they have the problem solving abilities of confused, stupid teenagers. Marnie comes out and kills that one unimportant vampire and makes a crack about Pam’s lips falling off. So is Pam totally fine now because of the super believable,  thing that could actually exist, 9 out of 10 corpses approved anti-rotting skin balm? I guess she’s fine now. Seriously, writers of this show, you’re not even trying. Marnie says she’ll let Sookie go if Eric and Bill kill themselves. Bill wins the ‘I accept’ race then starts saying how she had better keep her end of the deal, etc, etc and you can tell he is totally just stalling!

Bill says, “I will shoot you and then Pam you will shoot me,” LOL OKAY, GOOD PLAN, HERO. CAN I HAVE YOUR AUTOGRAPH FIRST? Kind of undoes the chivalry of being the first to volunteer, that. Bill and Eric both give Sookie long meaningful glances, it looks like they’re saying goodbye but they are probably both waiting for her to maybe object? Hahah, she doesn’t object at all. This is just getting awkward. I’m really anxious about this scene, you guys. I am so upset that two of our main characters are going to die, it is just killing me and this is serious edge-of-your-seat, thrilling television at it’s best, I can barely contain myself. But nope, Pam fires a rocket into the forcefield right next to everyone’s FACES (especially Jason’s face. lol) instead. While we’re here, the whole vampires shooting each other thing is stupid because their bullets wouldn’t kill each other in the first place, unless of course they were carrying wooden bullets in addition to regular witch killing bullets, which begs the question WHY WOULD THE VAMPIRE GESTAPO BE CARRYING WOODEN BULLETS TO KILL A WITCH?

Alcide and Sam bust in on Mr. Balding Elf Hair and things get violent. Sam is just absolutely grief stricken over the death of his really cool brother who he loved so much and was always very close with. They fight and it’s actually fairly tense and well done and not over in ten seconds and no-one just straight up cheats by fairy blasting, good job this show, you made one good short scene this season, the rest was garbage. Alcide kills Balding Elf Haircut and Debbie’s vagina is visible through her transparent undies the whole time even when the child is present.

Back at the under siege wiccan store Roy (ROY! Our pal Roy!) gets really excited about EVERYTHING again and goes in for a high five with Marnie which is hilarious.

Roy: “Up top, Marnie!”

Marnie: “Ugh, don’t you have a Grateful Dead concert to get to?”

In the bathroom Jesus is all like blah blah blah magic, brujah, demon spiky head face, sticking my fingers in a dead body and licking the blood. You know, normal Mexican stuff.

Outside, the vampires are all healed up super fast, there is this bit where Jessica and Bill are chit chatting for about twenty seconds and then you notice that Jason is in the background of the shot and basically has third degree burns, his face is barely even there anymore and it’s funny for some reason. Jessica gives him her blood so no harm done. In the forest, the fairy that randomly attacked Andy is now straddling him as he comes to. OH NO THINGS ARE ABOUT TO GET BARF. She starts acting like a cock hungry air-headed whatever offensive porno something just like every female character on Californication. Yep, things get barfy. She’s like “Make love to me you bald, ugly, stupid stranger I just knocked unconscious for basically no reason, I simply MUST have you!”. It really doesn’t make much sense.

She makes him do an E.T pinkie swear thing before they bone. Alright. Twinkly Disney music plays in the background. Okay. WHAT IS EVEN GOING ON WITH THIS SCENE?

Marnie totally spoilers herself by doing an evil stepmother from Snow White crystal ball thing where she see’s the future and she’s dead. SPOILER ALERT! She then sweet talks everyone into being bad guys again really fucking easily, it is the worst. She does it the same way as before by simply saying “the vamps will totes kill all you guys” and Sookie doesn’t bother saying “actually that definitely won’t happen” because this show is the worst and the plot is lazy and predictable and doesn’t make any sense and is therefore not interesting or suspenseful. Outside that nasty bit of CGI on Jason’s face clears up and then the vamps all start walking totally normally towards the Wicca store.

Hahahahahahahahah, great possessed walking guys. Bartender, a  round of Best Actor Nominations for my friends here, we’re celebrating. The thing that makes this extra funny is that it isn’t presented or intended as comical at all, the music gets all the more dramatic as it occurs in fact. No hint at comedy here, yet these kind of pathetically absurd scenes are what makes this show worth watching. OH NO WHAT IS GOING TO HAPPEN, ARE ALL OUR BELOVED CHARACTERS GOING TO DIE? It is very tense, anything could happen and I know I’ve said this before, but this show is just really very good at nail-bitingly dramatic scenes because literally anything could happen here. Who knows which characters are going to make it out alive? Some important ones? Some unimportant ones? Anything goes in this brave, well-written television experience. The only thing that could save us now is if Sookie did here magic… yep… YEP SHE DID IT. MAGIC FAIRY PREDICTABLE PLOTLINE RESOLUTION. DONE.

Jesus goes all demon and brings the force-field down, guess Marnie shouldn’t have let them hang out in the bathroom for the whole episode. In fact, Marnie said herself that Jesus was her right hand man, that she couldn’t do it without him. So why didn’t she call him over for the big spell? UGH, THIS SHOW. TRY HARDER. The vampires burst in and Sookie says “those guys are all innocent, they were being held hostage”  because that was never an issue and they obviously didn’t need to do the spell in fear of the vampires killing them. Again, ugh, this show.

There is about ten minutes of hugging and crying and softly whispered words and then as Jesus and Lafayette are done being gay for the night and have just closed their eyes to sleep the ghost of Marnie hovers above Lafayette, leather jacket and all. It is possibly the creepiest thing I’ve ever seen Fiona Shaw do and I’ve seen a single shot film of Fiona Shaw buried to the neck for two hours in Samuel Beckett’s Happy Days. Yeah big deal, you went to college, but my point is that she played with guns and umbrellas while buried to her neck for two hours in that and this ten second sequence is far creepier somehow. She then straight up pole vaults into his gob! Okay! Seriously just give up, Marnie. Sookie is only going to fairy you right in the face again next week and that will be that!