'New Girl' Play By Play: "The Landlord" Recap

'New Girl' Play By Play: "The Landlord"

Minute one: Jess and Nick seem to spend a lot of time driving around in cars. By themselves. This episode is no exception.

Minute two: Schmidt believes that the world is trying to seduce him. What else is new?

Minute three: Nick's 'pouch' is mentioned again. Which is weird, because Jake Johnson is sexy.

Minute four: Does this scene in the basement remind anyone else of when Emily Deschanel went to see her creepy janitor friend in the 'Bones' high school reunion episode?

Minute five: Jess references four roommates when only three are allowed. Does this remind anyone else of the 'Friends' episode where Jennifer Aniston let it slip to her landlord that she was living with Courtney Cox?

Minute sixteen: Remy (landlord guy) and Jess decide they are going to have dinner together. Nick interjects that he'll come too. Clearly someone's not happy sharing his future gf.

Minute twenty-three: Three-some, anyone? (See, even Remy thinks that Jess and Nick are doing it)

Minute twenty-six: "So this is happening, with...this guy. This is happening, Jess". Three-some time!

Minute twenty-seven: "US two...getting it started". Jess feels awkward about kissing Nick. So, that doesn't happen.

Minute twenty-nine: Schmidt is kind of, sort of right about the whole boss/crush thing. Except not really.

Read a more thorough description of tonight's episode HERE.

Eh, not so sexy in this photo.

'New Girl': "The Landlord"

If we're learned anything from 'New Girl', it's that Nick is often right, and Jess is often wrong. That's why they're perfect for each other! But, I digress.

On tonight's episode, initially Nick was once again right, and Jess was once again wrong. See, the gang has this really cranky landlord man, and Nick realizes a friendship with a person like that is pretty tricky to navigate. Jess, on the other hand, who likes polka dots, and singing, and playing with glitter, finds it pretty difficult to accept the fact that someone won't like her. Which is funny, because last week's episode was all about someone (Julia) not liking her.

Despite the fact that she didn't try very hard with Julia (don't tell me that passive-agressive crocheting really resolved anything), Jess is apparently determined to get curmudgeonly old landlord to like her. Mainly because she's a MPDG. But also, she is kind of a nice person (for the most part, except when she may possibly steal Julia's boyfriend in the future).

Weirdly, by the time the first 10 minutes of the episode has passed, Jess already has the landlord eating out of the palm of her hand (that sounds weird, I just mean that he's willing to fix things for her, but not for Nick).

Except, he really has a crush on her, and apparently things that Jess and Nick's joint attention means that they want a threesome. Which they don't. Except neither one of them is willing to admit this, because it would also mean admitting that the other person was initially right about the landlord.

Eventually, when Nick is about to kiss Jess to get the threesome underway, she caves and tells him that he was right.

He always is.

All right, so he's not really that old (see man on left)

When is 'Bones' Returning from Hiatus?

Update 2/9/12: 'Bones' will be be airing all new episodes on April 5th at 9/8C.

Update 2/27/12: FOX has revised its Spring schedule, and 'Bones' is moving to Mondays! The season now returns on Monday, April 2nd at 8 pm.

People keep messaging me, asking me to tell them when new episodes of 'Bones' (Season 7!) are going to air. I have no affiliation with FOX, so the short answer is: I have no idea. That being said, I do know a couple of things:

Yes, this season will be short, but there are going to be a minimum of 17 episodes. Only 13 are officially scheduled, meaning the season may drag into the summer, or (if renewed for an 8th season) return earlier than normal in the fall. They're still filming now*, so if things go incredibly, remarkably smoothly there's even a possibility that there might even be more than 17. But...let's say there will be 17. Six episodes have aired, which means that we are not even half way through the season, and there are (hopefully!) 11 more episodes to look forward to.

The network hasn't officially set a release date for episode seven yet, but actors/producers etc. have alluded to the fact that the show will be returning in the spring.

When 'Bones' finally does return, we'll be watching the seventh episode of the seventh season (there is a kind of eloquence about that), entitled "The Prisoner in the Pipe". According to various internet sites, baby Booth/Bones will be born during the episode! And Brennan will go into labor in a prison!

While you're waiting for 'Bones' to come back, if you're looking for shows in a similar vein to watch, you might want to try 'Castle'. Several die-hard 'Bones' fans are pushing people to watch 'The Finder' (created by Hart Hanson, the man behind 'Bones'). While 'The Finder' is a completely decent show, and needs more viewers in order to be signed for a full season, its tone is not at all similar to that of 'Bones'. In fact, the only similarities I can see are the occasional character cross-overs (John Francis Daley guest-starred in the show's second episode).

I will update this post as more information becomes available from FOX, the producers, and the rest of the cast and crew.

*I'm not entirely sure what episode they're working on now, but they've finished through episode 10.

'Castle' Does Film Noir

Let me just say this: 'Castle' does special theme episodes way better than any other show I've seen (sorry, 'Grey's Anatomy', you lose).

Tonight's film noir episode was much anticipated, and it almost lived up to its hype. To be honest, I'm not sure what else they could have done to make it better, but after all the built up anticipation it was impossible for them to achieve complete perfection.

That being said, check this out:

Real Film Noir

Castle Film Noir

The episode centers around the story of a present-day treasure hunter who is found murdered during his search for a necklace in the shape of a butterfly. Castle and Beckett discover a journal with his body, and it turns out it was written by a PI in the 1940s. Throughout the episode Castle imagines events from the journal, envisioning himself as the PI, and Beckett as the PI's love interest/a gangster's moll. The episode shifted back and forth between these distant flashbacks and the present day case.

The journal parts of the episode used a lot of film noir tropes, including a vaguely femme fatale character (Sally, who in an interesting twist is played by Molly Quinn, who normally plays Alexis), a controlling gangster, and plenty of traditional voiceovers and repartee. Even the use of the journal as flashback is a play on the use of time within traditional film noirs. Many film noirs play with temporal shifts, using both remembered and real time...and this episode of 'Castle' certainly did that.

My favorite part of the episode may have been near the beginning, when the writers gave film noir enthusiasts a laugh. Present day Castle started verbalizing his thoughts, like an onscreen voiceover, and suddenly interrupted himself, asking, "why am I narrating?".

Molly Quinn as Sally

 Boy, those 'Castle' writers clearly did their film studies homework.

Now that I think about it, you know what I could have used more of? Innuendo. After that visual innuendo (hand stroking) last week, you'd think they could have given us a little more verbal innuendo this week.

Perfect inneundo:




Come back tomorrow for my complete summary of "The Blue Butterfly"

'Castle' is new again...

...and all film noir-ish. Tonight!

I was a little concerned that the much anticipated film noir episode was going to turn into some horrible mistake (a la the 'Grey's Anatomy' musical), but luckily, it looks like much of the episode is actually based in present day. The film noir moments are Nathan Fillion dreams (aka daydreams that Castle is having, not dreams about the actor Nathan Fillion, though that would be pretty sweet too), and they relate to the present-day murder mystery.

Can't wait? Watch the first 11 minutes right now.

Watch Castle Monday nights at 9/10C on ABC'

Sunday Rant: Hulu Plus

Now that we lost the Super Bowl (and no, I won't talk about that...this is the last time it will be mentioned), I feel like ranting about something. After a recent discussion with my friend (who luckily feels exactly the way I do), I've settled on a topic that I could complain about endlessly: Hulu Plus.

I'm annoyed at Hulu Plus. And not for the usual reasons. Sure, everyone agrees that having to pay to watch certain TV shows is annoying. And being forced to endure a minute and a half of the same commercials over and over again, after having paid to watch said TV shows, is particularly annoying.

You know what's even worse? Having a Hulu Plus account and being told that certain content is only available "on the web". For goodness sake, we already paid, didn't we? We're enduring the financial burden, and your annoying commercials, and you're telling us that we can't stream all of your content to our televisions? Also, how is my Roku player not "on the web"...it's connected to my wireless internet. So is my computer. How is this any different?

Sometimes, a girl just wants to sit down on a Friday night with a couple of friends and watch '30 Rock'. But no. Evidently that content is only available "on the web", so streaming it onto my TV is impossible. I'm sorry, but for $7.99 a month I'm not willing to huddle around a laptop.

P.S. Yes, I know this has to do with licensing agreements. Sure, Hulu.com originally signed agreements to only stream on computers, and when they branched out to Hulu Plus they had to get new licensing to stream on all devices. I get it. But it's been 585 days since they first rolled out Hulu Plus. Also, why are all other NBC shows available except '30 Rock'?

P.P.S. I realize that some parts of this rant are nonsensical, it wouldn't be a good rant if they weren't.

All right, Will Arnett, I guess I won't hold it against you.
(But only because you were in 'Arrested Development').

'Grey's Anatomy' Proves that Hair Really Matters

I've already posted about last night's episode of 'Grey's' (S8, Ep13: "If/Then"), so I won't bore you with the details here.

What I want to talk about instead is hair styles. Namely, how crazy it is that simply changing characters' hair styles immediately changes their whole personae.

For instance, I loved Callie's new hair-do, but it certainly made her look way more suburban mom:

Meredith's lack of volume showed how deflated she was with her mother ordering her around:

Bailey's hair-style was a little juvenile, and didn't fit with the harder personality she has in current reality. In alt-reality, where she was under Meredith's mother's thumb, it was perfect:

Cristina's harsh bangs also suited her alt-reality persona, where she was considered unapproachable, and slightly evil:

Hair styles aside, the rest of the costuming was also very well done:

Meredith's day-clothes were almost exclusively pink, signifying how she is still very much a little girl who is controlled by her mother. Her pink watch, and shiny black shoes, reminded me of a suburban child, while her cardigan and button-down screamed preppy: 

 Alex was also screaming preppy with his belt, polo-shirt, and glasses. If they were trying to make Justin Chambers less attractive, they succeeded. If they were trying to make him match Meredith? Yep, that happened too. I think it was particularly well-done because he looked a little over the top, like a boy playing dress up. Considering the fact that he was faking his affection for Meredith (presumably, in part, to please her mother) this outfit makes sense.

Finally, I have to touch on those hideous scrubs. I worked in a hospital for two years, so I know what normal scrubs look like. And no, they don't look like the ones that normally appear on 'Grey's Anatomy'; those are clearly tailored for each specific actor. Still, these ones are especially ugly. And different scrubs for the men and women? That would never fly at any hospital I've ever worked at. Also, why do them at all if you clearly need to outfit Sarah Drew (Kepner) in the normal scrubs due to her real-life (hidden on the show) pregnancy? This is the one costuming decision I don't understand.

photos from givememyremote.com

Grey's Anatomy's "If/Then" Universe Mimics Reality

"...nothing is turning out the way I thought it would, it's like I don't even recognize my own life."-Meredith

Last night 'Grey's Anatomy' pulled a 'Fringe' and handed us an alternative universe. The writers clearly had fun coming up with if/then scenarios: Meredith was engaged to Alex, Dr. Webber was her step-father, Bailey was completely over-powered by Meredith's still-living mother, and Callie was married to Owen (with three kids!).

That being said, a lot of the alt-reality scenarios weren't that different: Addison and Derek, while still married, were on rocky ground throughout the episode. Mark Sloan even showed up at the end, admitting that he was the father of Addison's baby. Basically it was just a slightly alternative version of what happened in the First Season of 'Grey's'.

Other very familiar scenarios? Alex cheating on Meredith with Kepner. He's always been portrayed as a bit of a hound-dog, and having sex with colleagues in hospital rooms? Very 'Grey's Anatomy' Season One. I'm sure I'm not the only one who has been wondering for a while if Alex and Kepner will get together, so seeing them making out wasn't a real surprise. They certainly have more chemistry than Meredith and Alex who, we all now know, should never, ever get together on the show for real. Seriously, no chemistry. At all.

Avery flirting with screwed-up/drug-addict/alt-reality Lexie was clearly a throwback to their relationship earlier this season, while the scene where Mark Sloan tried to save her life just made me wish harder for a Lexie/Sloan reconciliation.

At the end of the episode, we were left with the distinct feeling that lots of things were going to change, and that current reality wasn't too far away: Cristina knew Owen's secrets, and Callie was clearly attracted to Arizona. Also, Meredith and Cristina did shots of tequila at a bar (again, hello Season One!), and even quoted verbatim from the pilot episode. Oh, and at the very end of the episode, drunk Derek met drunk Meredith in a bar, and we all know where that led.

The episode concluded with Meredith's voice-over:
"Some things are going to work out as though they were destined to happen"

And that's fine. But, while the hour was fun for die-hard fans, I'm not sure what the purpose of this episode really was. Unlike on 'Fringe', this alternative reality is going away as quickly as it came. I do know one thing though, if the pilot episode of 'Grey's' had been this episode, I still would have watched the show.

British People Have Television Too

I'm English. And American. I have dual citizenship, and I was raised in both countries. This means that I don't just watch U.S. television shows, but British ones too. Doubly important, I can understand all the accents!

What I've noticed recently, that I somehow managed to completely miss as a child, is that there is a stark difference between British shows and American shows, even after you remove locale and accents. That difference is attractiveness.

American television stars are, more often than not, attractive. Sometimes they're really, really attractive. Plus, even when they're not traditionally 'good looking', they still get perfect make-up, and proper lighting, and intense post-production. This happens even when the show is trying to show that the character is slovenly. Take 'The Middle' for instance, Patricia Heaton's character doesn't have good hair or good clothes, but damn does she look good on film.

If you don't watch a lot of British television you'll have no idea what I'm talking about. Because for people raised on U.S. television a character like Doug Heffernon isn't 'attractive'. I hate to tell you all, but you're missing out on what real on-air unattractiveness is. Maybe that's a little harsh, what I mean is that American television's version of a normal person is horribly skewed.

In the U.K. television shows are often filmed with a more realist approach (I use the word 'realist' in the loosest possible sense; I'm not trying to relate to Ray or Rosellini, because luckily this isn't a film class). What I mean by 'realist approach' is that everything looks more...real. Their lighting isn't as good, their actors aren't always chosen because they looked best in a screen test, and their post-production isn't as snazzy. The closest thing that American TV has are its soap operas. But, that's not to say that those British shows aren't brilliant.


Which is why American television ideals sometimes make me sad. There are so many great British shows that I want my U.S. friends to enjoy. A lot of them are even on Netflix Instant (so you don't have to suffer through a six-hour plane ride!). My favorite, slightly-older British show at the moment is 'Gavin & Stacey'. It's absolutely brilliant; it's funny, it's heart-warming, and it's just as quirky as 'Arrested Development'. Unfortunately, when I tried to persuade a group of American friends to watch it with me, it was quickly rejected because "no one in that show is attractive". Are we really at the point where we can't watch a show if the main characters aren't hot? My British friends are able to easily acclimate to the gorgeous Americans on their screens, but my U.S. friends can't see the beauty in the British-style of TV. The sad thing is, they don't know how much quality television they're missing.


So, if you're American (or any nationality, I'm really not picky) go to Netflix Instant and give a British TV show a try. Accept that the accents are different, and the footage is often grainier, and enjoy the quality of the plot. I promise, it's there.


I highly recommend: 'Gavin & Stacey', 'Peep Show', and 'Doc Martin'. 

The cast of 'Gavin & Stacey'