I'm not a big fan of regular TV. I have a couple of shows that I make sure to catch weekly, ya know when there's not a writer's strike. I don't like reality shows, lawyer shows, doctor shows, cop shows so you can forget seeing American Law & Order's CSI ER Idol, or whatever on my year end list. So here are my top 5 favorite TV shows of 2007.
5. Rescue Me (FX)
One of the few shows that gives you something entertaining to watch during the summer. This year marked the fourth season of Denis Leary's show focusing on the professional and personal lives of a group of NY firefighters. Leary continues to shine on this show as one of the most real and flawed characters on TV. If you haven't seen it, I recommend picking up the season sets on DVD.
4. The Office (NBC)
The U.S. version of Ricky Gervais's classic British comedy is still one of the funniest shows on TV. Season 3 ended strong back in the spring of 2007. However, season 4 started out a little rough when the network decided to stretch the episodes into an hour. The show works perfect in a 30-minute format. The "Branch Wars" episode marked the high point for me when Karen tried to steal Stanley from the Scranton office. Michael's plan for revenge on the other branch office goes horribly and hilariously wrong.
3. Reaper (CW)
Easily the best new show of the fall season for me. When Sam Oliver (Bret Harrison) turns 21 he discovers that his parents sold his soul to the devil. The devil (Ray Wise) comes to visit and begins to employ Sam as his bounty hunter to hunt down souls that have escaped from hell. Sam is joined by two of his buddies, Sock (Taylor Labine) and Ben(Ricky Gonzalez). The show provides plenty of laughs as Sam deals with his commitment to the devil. Ray Wise is perfect as the devil giving him a sly personality with that hidden depth of evil. The CW is still showing reruns of this show on Tuesday nights. Definitely worth your time.
2. Heroes (NBC)
This would have been my favorite show of 2007, but the second season started off really slow. Hiro's (Masi Oka) time travels lasted too long, the Hispanic wonder twins were just awful, and Claire's (Hayden Panetierre) horribly misguided romance with loser flyboy West. The end of season one last spring elevated this show to my favorite show at the time, but the fall episodes did try my patience at times. Luckily creator Tim Kring realized season two was struggling and made changes. The final episodes in the fall put the show back in strong standing for me.
1. How I Met Your Mother (CBS)
This was the one show in 2007 that I watched every week whether it was a rerun or not. I first watched the show last spring with their Super Bowl episode where the group pledged not to watch the game until the next day when they can all watch it together. I was hooked on this clever show about Ted (Josh Radnor) who in the future is recounting to his kids the story of how he met their mother. Ted's friends are a fun bunch of characters especially Barney played by Neil Patrick Harris. I've since gone on to buy seasons one and two on DVD.
Some honorable mentions go to Gilmore Girls on its final season, The Simpsons for making me laugh on the small and big screen, Weeds for Mary-Louise Parker, and G4's Attack of the Show for covering all the things I need to know every weekday.
Next time, more favorites from 2007.
Saturday, January 26, 2008
Tuesday, January 22, 2008
Year in Review - 2007
I've been thinking about 2007 and wanted to post some thoughts about some of my favorites things over the course of the year. I'm going to break this up into a few segments to cover books, comics, TV, music, movies, and video games.
Please check back over the next few days to see my thoughts on the year that was in entertainment.
Please check back over the next few days to see my thoughts on the year that was in entertainment.
Sunday, January 20, 2008
Twin Cinema
It's rare that I watch one movie a month, but I was able to catch two movies over the weekend.
The first was on Friday night. I went to the Angelika Film Center in Plano to see The Kite Runner. My friend K let me borrow the book months ago and I finally finished reading it this past week so that we could see the movie. I really enjoyed reading the book by Khaled Hosseini and found his story captivating. I thought the movie was a rather well done adaptation of the book. The biggest change I noticed was that, while the book is linear in time, the movie is not. It makes sense to me that director Marc Forster created it this way. The movie begins by depicting the main character, Amir, as an adult receiving a phone call to return to Afghanistan. Thoughout his journey there and back, the movie explains the events of his childhood that led to his return. Four Stars.
The second was on Saturday night at the Angelika Film Center in Dallas to see The Savages. Thanks to some nice gift certificates by my friend M, my friend J and I were able to enjoy the movie. The film illustrates the hopeful Wendy (Laura Linney) and the cynical Jon (Phillip Seymour Hoffman) as brother and sister struggling to find the best situation for their elderly and estranged father who has recently been diagnosed with dimentia. I was captured by the difficult struggle that both of them went through to provide their father with the best situation that they could find for him in the remaining days of his life, despite his lack of concern for them during his life. Three Stars.
Saturday, January 5, 2008
Best In Show
Each and every year, I make an effort to see about as many shows as I can. Last year was no exception.
I attended four music festivals (SXSW, Sasquatch, Lollapalooza, and Austin City Limits) and various other shows in various other cities. By far, SXSW was the best of the festivals. But it isn't really fair to put that in the same category as the other festivals. I really enjoyed the music and scenery at Sasquatch. The Arcade Fire, Spoon, Black Angels, Neko Case, The Long Winters, Ghostland Observatory, and Interpol along with the beautiful landscape at the Gorge certainly made a trip to central Washington state worth the effort. I also enjoyed Austin City Limits despite The White Stripes backing out. Wilco, The Arcade Fire, and Decemberists took the festival to a new ground. I found it refreshing to discover such wonderfully talented acts during the day times as The Heartless Bastards, Broken West, Fionn Regan, and St. Vincent. But Lollapalooza was, as a whole, the best of the big music festivals of 2007. The first night, I really enjoyed dancing wildly to the music of Daft Punk. The second night, Interpol reminded me again why they are truly one of the best acts in music today. And the third night, hearing Pearl Jam brought me back to my adolescent days of listening to music. There were wonderful acts thought each of the days. I found myself rushing from stage to stage to catch my favorite acts.
But my second trip to SXSW was pretty much was it is always about: discovering new artists. I remember leaving having purchased no fewer than a dozen CDs of artists that I had learned about there. Menomena was probably the most notable as I caught them three times during the week. Others that picked up that week included The Postmarks, Black Angels, Dirty On Purpose, Shearwater, and Loney, Dear. I am attending once again this year and am excited about what is in store.
I started the year by seeing a Jeff Tweedy (Wilco) solo show at the Granada (Dallas, TX). In retrospect, this was probably the show I enjoyed most throughout the year. While in New York City, I caught such great acts as Jesse Sykes and the Sweethereafter, Sparklehorse, Ben Kweller, Shearwater, Loney, Dear, and Low were amongst the best I caught at Webster Hall and Bowery Ballroom. And a Central Park show by the Decemberists and Grizzly Bear was unbelievably great.
I drove to Austin, TX to catch Page France and Bishop Allen. I then caught them the next night in Denton, TX. There was that span during the last two weeks of April and first two weeks of May where it felt like I was at the Granada weekly. I caught Tapes N Tapes for the first time ever, Clap Your Hands Say Yeah, and the greatness of Blonde Redhead. It was also great to catch The Postmarks in another small venue and get to spend time talking to the band after the show. Modest Mouse with Smiths guitarist Johnny Marr was another outstanding show that I caught Nokia in Grand Prarie, TX. One of the best music nights of the year was going up to Hailey's in Denton to see The Wrens and getting to get up on stage with the band. I got to check out the new House of Blues in Dallas, TX twice seeing legendary bands Meat Puppets and Sonic Youth and then later The New Pornographers and Spoon. I capped off the year by catching the Polyphonic Spree Christmas Show at Lakewood Theatre in Dallas. It was outstanding to hear Tim and the rest of the band sing Christmas songs and get to sing along with them.
I was also so fortunate to catch the This American Life tour at the Lincoln Center in New York City to promote the TV show version of itself. I really enjoyed being in the same room as many of the contributors to the show such as Jonathan Goldstein and Sarah Vowell. But seeing show host Ira Glass was the real treat as I have always admired his vision for the show. Also, Mates of State were the music guest and they were great as always.
So 2007 was a great year for live music. I'll be writing about some of my favorite CD releases of the year next week. Stay tuned.
I attended four music festivals (SXSW, Sasquatch, Lollapalooza, and Austin City Limits) and various other shows in various other cities. By far, SXSW was the best of the festivals. But it isn't really fair to put that in the same category as the other festivals. I really enjoyed the music and scenery at Sasquatch. The Arcade Fire, Spoon, Black Angels, Neko Case, The Long Winters, Ghostland Observatory, and Interpol along with the beautiful landscape at the Gorge certainly made a trip to central Washington state worth the effort. I also enjoyed Austin City Limits despite The White Stripes backing out. Wilco, The Arcade Fire, and Decemberists took the festival to a new ground. I found it refreshing to discover such wonderfully talented acts during the day times as The Heartless Bastards, Broken West, Fionn Regan, and St. Vincent. But Lollapalooza was, as a whole, the best of the big music festivals of 2007. The first night, I really enjoyed dancing wildly to the music of Daft Punk. The second night, Interpol reminded me again why they are truly one of the best acts in music today. And the third night, hearing Pearl Jam brought me back to my adolescent days of listening to music. There were wonderful acts thought each of the days. I found myself rushing from stage to stage to catch my favorite acts.
But my second trip to SXSW was pretty much was it is always about: discovering new artists. I remember leaving having purchased no fewer than a dozen CDs of artists that I had learned about there. Menomena was probably the most notable as I caught them three times during the week. Others that picked up that week included The Postmarks, Black Angels, Dirty On Purpose, Shearwater, and Loney, Dear. I am attending once again this year and am excited about what is in store.
I started the year by seeing a Jeff Tweedy (Wilco) solo show at the Granada (Dallas, TX). In retrospect, this was probably the show I enjoyed most throughout the year. While in New York City, I caught such great acts as Jesse Sykes and the Sweethereafter, Sparklehorse, Ben Kweller, Shearwater, Loney, Dear, and Low were amongst the best I caught at Webster Hall and Bowery Ballroom. And a Central Park show by the Decemberists and Grizzly Bear was unbelievably great.
I drove to Austin, TX to catch Page France and Bishop Allen. I then caught them the next night in Denton, TX. There was that span during the last two weeks of April and first two weeks of May where it felt like I was at the Granada weekly. I caught Tapes N Tapes for the first time ever, Clap Your Hands Say Yeah, and the greatness of Blonde Redhead. It was also great to catch The Postmarks in another small venue and get to spend time talking to the band after the show. Modest Mouse with Smiths guitarist Johnny Marr was another outstanding show that I caught Nokia in Grand Prarie, TX. One of the best music nights of the year was going up to Hailey's in Denton to see The Wrens and getting to get up on stage with the band. I got to check out the new House of Blues in Dallas, TX twice seeing legendary bands Meat Puppets and Sonic Youth and then later The New Pornographers and Spoon. I capped off the year by catching the Polyphonic Spree Christmas Show at Lakewood Theatre in Dallas. It was outstanding to hear Tim and the rest of the band sing Christmas songs and get to sing along with them.
I was also so fortunate to catch the This American Life tour at the Lincoln Center in New York City to promote the TV show version of itself. I really enjoyed being in the same room as many of the contributors to the show such as Jonathan Goldstein and Sarah Vowell. But seeing show host Ira Glass was the real treat as I have always admired his vision for the show. Also, Mates of State were the music guest and they were great as always.
So 2007 was a great year for live music. I'll be writing about some of my favorite CD releases of the year next week. Stay tuned.
Wednesday, January 2, 2008
Return to the Sea
Dearest Blog Readers,
It is with great pleasure that I announce my return to the blogging world. Yep, it's new year's. And it is about that time that I make promises like this that are sure to be broken. So, the next few entries will focus on what I liked about last year (albums, shows, travels, etc.) and then what I am excited about for this year (festivals, upcoming releases, etc.).
Sincerely,
J
It is with great pleasure that I announce my return to the blogging world. Yep, it's new year's. And it is about that time that I make promises like this that are sure to be broken. So, the next few entries will focus on what I liked about last year (albums, shows, travels, etc.) and then what I am excited about for this year (festivals, upcoming releases, etc.).
Sincerely,
J
