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Saturday, Jul 4, 2009
Time to program your DVRs! From new shows like "Dollhouse" and "The United States of Tara" to countless returning favorites, an embarrassment of mid-season riches is upon us!
By Heather Havrilesky
Read more: TV, Toni Collette, Arts & Entertainment, Heather Havrilesky, Battlestar Galactica, 24, I Like to Watch
Jan. 11, 2009 | It takes about a week to adjust to being on vacation. At first, the mind can't relax. It makes lists. It gets fussy over dinner, or obsesses over college savings plans. By the middle of the second week, the mind finally loosens up. That's when you find yourself flipping through catalogs for hours, or picking lint off your sweater in a semi-hypnotic state, until you forget who you are, where you are and what you were doing.
In this cruel modern world, just as the stress of your work life finally subsides, just as you start to feel happy and numb like an overfed donkey, it's time to get back to work. I need four weeks of vacation time, minimum! I want to wander aimlessly, nibbling on clover, in a daze. Instead, just as I get the laundry done and sit down to read a book, my holiday break is over.
And it takes about two weeks to adjust to being back at work. I tried to explain this to my husband yesterday: The mind doesn't want to do a job. The mind wants to go to the mall and gaze at the intricate, almost balletic movements of the hot-dog-rolling machine at Orange Julius. The mind wants to take a nap. The mind wants a doughnut.
My husband had to run. He had stuff to do. The mind felt jilted. But the mind thought that some stale gingerbread cookies might take the mind's mind off how jilted it felt.
Brand new menu!
But don't feel too bad, my fellow struggling, slow donkey friends, because the winter season of television is upon us, and it's about 50 trillion times more exciting than the fall television season was.
Why do they hold out on us like this? Network executives should make it official and shift all the best shows to January, and then I can spend September and October writing rambling essays about napping and fat donkeys and really good cheese instead of making elaborate charts detailing all of the shitty shows none of us want to watch anyway, because they suck ass. (After a long-but-not-long-enough vacation, the mind is drawn to vulgarity -- and things that are filled with custard.)
A bunch of new shows are about to flicker onto your TV screens in the coming weeks, shows that are so fresh and delectable, they might as well be filled with custard. My top three favorites so far? I'm so glad you asked.
1) Fox's "Lie to Me" (Premieres 9 p.m. Wednesday, Jan. 21) Starring Tim Roth as a "deception detection" specialist, this show is like a mix between CBS's "The Mentalist" and Fox's "House": There are lots of creepy, "How did he know that?" expert moments, just as cheesy and delicious as they are in Simon Baker's hands, but with an edge. Unlike blue-eyed Baker, who's soft and pretty and truly belongs among the filtered lenses and ample-breasted ghost-soothers of CBS, Roth is sort of beady-eyed and unlikable -- you know, how you'd imagine a Fox executive might look, if you were barreling toward him in your car at night. Something tells us that Roth's character, Cal Lightman, has seen more than his fair share of big, fat lies and the lying liars who tell them. But Lightman doesn't wallow like Hugh Laurie's Dr. Gregory House does. No way, he's more chipper than that. Plus, he has a sexy sidekick (Kelli Williams from "The Practice") and some sexy underlings who flirt with him and each other -- you know, anything to keep the whole picture funny but edgy, upbeat but heavy. Think "Bones." Think "Fringe." This is the signature flavor of Fox: salty, greasy goodness in every bite, and no one can eat just one. This network knows how to get us hooked. Which leads us to my second favorite new, exciting show of the winter season ...
2) Fox's "Dollhouse" (Premieres 9 p.m. Friday, Feb. 13) Yes, we've all been waiting for Joss Whedon's new sci-fi drama, about a bunch of hot people who have their memories erased so that they can act as anonymous agents for a high-end firm that provides fantasy dates, secret missions of various kinds, hostage negotiations ... It's not entirely clear what goes down at the Dollhouse or who runs it or how they got started or whether they're good or evil, and that, my dear, is the custard filling in this big, sugary doughnut of a drama. If you take off the rose-colored, Joss Whedon-loving glasses, of course, you'll notice that the first episode of "Dollhouse" is a little bit dorky and uneven at times. But Eliza Dushku fills that "Buffy"-esque dazed-but-sharp babe quotient nicely, and I guarantee that after the first episode, you'll want to see more, more, more, more, as soon as you can. Personally, I can't wait for this show to kick into high gear. Weird, witty, smart, suspenseful, intense? This is what we spent the fall TV season hungering for. That, and something that might actually make us laugh, which brings us to my favorite of them all ...
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