Summer TV Seasons 2011 | What To Watch Over The Summer Months

It used to be that during the summer months the only thing on television was reruns and an unpleasant amount of movies that were made over two decades ago. This is no longer the case. With the advent of Netfix and other similar services you can have access to an almost unlimited number of TV episodes. As well, summer television has started turning out original programming to make up for the TV withdraw inducing summer months.  This is list of viewing suggestions for those among us who just can’t stand the warm summer sun touching their skin.

Buffy The Vampire Slayer

If you didn’t already know, Buffy the Vampire Slayer is about a supernaturally endowed teenager. With her gang aka the scoobies Buffy battles her way through a variety monsters. Buffy the Vampire Slayer has what you need in terms of simple viewing pleasure. Whether it be a fight to the death or hanging out at the cafeteria table, there remains the lovability of the characters and the playful and witty dialogue they all engage in at every turn.

Firefly

Firefly was Joss Whedon’s passion project which was cancelled before it’s time and, some would say, made him die inside, ruining him for Dollhouse. All the elements that Whedon excels at are seen here, a decent story, character driven, and witty dialogue, which is missing in most shows today. 

Terriers

Enjoy one of the most underappreciated shows to be cancelled after one season. This modern detective story follows a pair of unlicensed private eyes; ex-cop Hank and ex-thief Britt. The series was well crafted with strong characters and dialogue with wit and style distinctive to the show.  It is a god damn shame that it was cancelled, however if you are one of the many people not to watch it when it aired this summer is the time.

Lights out

This rocky-esque series follows a retired boxing champ struggling to earn money to support his family’s high class lifestyle after earnings are lost to bad investments and mooching family. Although the fight choreography was terrible (70s Rocky style, fake punch noises, and blows that clearly do not make contact), the series made its mark supported by a rich story and characters. Lights Leary has a dysfunctional relationship with his family that rivals that of Rescue Me’s Tommy Gavin. It’s exploration of the underbelly of professional boxing satisfy. It just happens to be another exceptional FX series dropped after its first season. Just like Terriers.  (FX=FU)

Peep Show

Don’t let title mislead you this in not a show for pedos. It refers to camera style of the show. Every shot is from the perspective of one of the characters. This UK series has been running for several years and every single episode is hilarious. The main draw is the inner monologue of the two main characters who are terrible people in the funniest way, like how Mark has a secret respect for Nazi mentality and how Jeremy is generally a whoring freeloader. It has the awkward humour of the office, but a bit more outrageous, and because it’s a UK series it has that British swearing that makes everything better. 

Louie

Louie C.K stars, writes and produces this manifestation of his demented sense of humour. He plays an unsuccessful version of himself. Expect gratuitous humour that goes too far and yet he pulls it off against all reason. Maybe he’s a witch.

Archer

Some archer quotes to intrigue you: Duchess von finger bang, Gator, Burt Reynolds. Enough Said.

The League

The premise of this show doesn’t sound very funny but the league and the men (and secretly some of their wives) who constitute it make it funny. None of the actors are exactly well known but that is all part of the charm to this basically unknown show. Don’t miss season two’s Rafi who just loves doing cocaine and shitting out booze. What is shitting out booze pre tell, well you will just have to watch to find out.

Party Down

After being cancelled Party Down can be grouped together with some of those other great comedies that were prematurely ended such as Arrested Development and Futurama. The show is about a catering service crew who work in Hollywood, most of the people who work for the service are failed or aspiring actors. Pathetic as it may sound the interactions these caterers have with their clientele and each other are so funny you just might piss your pants. The show could not find an audience but that should not stop people from watching this very funny show. Just a note if you are starting from the first season there is one very important phrase you need to know, SUPER CRACCKERS.

FX Networks Loves to Piss on It’s Best New Dramas Like Terriers & Lights Out

The FX Networks produced two of the best new dramas for 2010/2011 season thus far, namely, Terriers and Lights Out. Both shows came out weak in the ratings department and now both have been canceled. The real loss here stems from the fact that Terriers and Lights Out never really had a chance since FX couldn’t seem to get across to viewers what either show was about or that it was even on in the first place. This is a shame because these shows had more substance and originality than most dramas on NBC or CBS combined. So why does FX not know how to market and hold on to viewers for these shows? The simple answer might be that viewers are just so used to crap on television that when they start watching an episode of Lights Out they just expect it to have a faster pace or spill more blood. Or it could be that the cast of both series was just not well known enough and they didn’t have much of a fan base so they could not use ‘star power’ to boost ratings. And the final option, which makes more sense to me, is that the FX Network loves to make great new television series just so they can take a massive piss all over them and alienate the show’s fans to such a point that they no longer are even willing to watch a new series on their network. Fans should look out for the Fall 2011 season on FX, because there is going to be one great show that will come out and no one will watch it but you and a handful of others and FOX FX will cancel it.    

Michael Chiklis and Conan O'Brian Team Up For "Vince Uncensored"!

Current star of "No Ordinary Family" Michael Chiklis has signed on to a new series which is being co-produced by Conan O'Brian and Warner Brothers. The new show will follow a guy during a mid-life crisis, that guy being Chiklis. Hopefully, they will let the former captain of bassassery (we are talking of course about Chiklis's role on the The Shield) bear his teeth once again as a shit talking piss pot in a Vic Mackey centric character. All this might mean that that the former “The Shield” actor’s current series “No Ordinary Family” will not be seeing a second season. “No Ordinary Family” is a family friendly show, with easy to digest storylines for people who like uncomplicated shows that you can relax while watching. It began its run in fall of 2010 with a simple enough premise: after a plane crash in a remote body of water, the entire Powell family is endowed with superhuman powers.  For some fans of Michael Chiklis, seeing him in the role of Jim Powell would have made them cry: no Vic Mackey, you are not allowed to be in this show! During the first few episodes of “No Ordinary Family” when the Powell’s were just discovering their powers, Jim Powell realizes that he has super strength.  The imagination of any “The Shield” fan would have created a scenario where Jim Powell starts to Vic-Mackey-it-up using his new abilities to strong arm enemies and pitilessly tear criminals in half with his bear hands. But that was not the audience “No Ordinary Family” was hoping to attract.  Although the show was fun for the whole family to watch, it never exactly captured peoples imagination like the first season of “Heroes” did for so many television viewers. The fate of “No Ordinary Family” is still unknown, but its recent ratings dip may indicate cancelation in its near future.   But No Ordinary Family sucked, so no loss there. 

A&E’s “Breakout Kings” Is Mindless Fun

The new A&E drama that will be premiering on March 5^th centers on the adventures of criminals who are gifted when it comes to escaping incarceration. These criminals have been A-Teamed up with U.S. Marshals to help capture escaped prisoners in turn each of their helpers is given a small reduction on his or her sentence. The whole idea that U.S. Marshals would allow prisoners, who have a penchant for fleeing from the law to leave a prison in order to fight crime only to return to their cells by the end of each case is… ludicrous.  

During the pilot for the series the entire arrangement is explained as a mutually beneficial relationship between law and outlaw. It follows an escaped killer who is on a mission of revenge and how the newly formed team struggles with working with each other. The second episode of the season has to do with a sex offender, who is really not as rapy as everyone thinks.  Both episodes are entertaining in a turn-your-brain-off kind of way. 

Some of the prisoners who are part of this taskforce are familiar. Some of the prisoners who are part of this taskforce are familiar. You may recognize the actress Serinda Swan as the beauty queen turned con artist/murderer Erica. She has a reoccurring role on the CW’s Smallville as the scantly clad Zatanna Zatara whose magical powers pale in comparison to her ability to sport fishnet stockings.

Then there is Domenick Lombardozzi who plays Ray. Lombardozzi played Herc, one of the not so pristine police officers on HBO’s The Wire. In Breakout Kings the only difference between Herc and Ray is that Ray was caught for all of his crimes.

The last familiar face in the cast is Jimmi Simpson, who plays Lloyd the momma’s boy with a degree in psychology, in the show. Simpson also has a reoccurring role on FX’s It’s Always Sunny In Philadelphia as one of the milk guzzling, incestuous McPoyle brothers.   

If you didn’t already know Breakout Kings is a spin off of Prison Break, a show which turned absolutely ridiculous by the end of its run. But it was responsible for creating one of the creepiest TV characters of all time, namely T-Bag. T-Bag, the inside out pant pocket cowboy will be making a few appearances on Breakout Kings, so that might be worth a watch. Breakout Kings is however is more direct about where it is going. This show will not have much in terms of a story arc and will rely more on the case by case, episode by episode strategy.

Breakout Kings will premiere Saturday March 5^th on the A&E Channel. 

Jeopardy: IBM’s Watson Is Skynet!

This week on the game show Jeopardy, a super computer will face off against human opponents in a game of wits. Watson is the name IBM gave the computer/program, the technological abomination that will no doubt end all human life as we not, that will be facing the inferior “people” on Jeopardy.  As it was described by game show host Alex Trebek, Watson is IBM’s latest attempt to replace the human race with mindless automatons; at least that’s what I took away from the long time Jeopardy host’s explanation of this technological wonder. Encased in its glass cage, Watson is essentially a shit load of computer servers strung together on a high speed network, through this computing powerhouse Watson thinks, in a manner similar to a process of elimination.  

Now, no one is saying IBM is an evil organization for making a computer system that will eventually kill us all. The people behind the project most likely had the best intentions when creating Watson, but here is the thing. It was interesting when IBM made Deep Blue, the chess playing computer that essentially ended all aspirations of budding chess players who wanted to be the best in the world. Forget that dream geeks get your jollies playing World of Warcraft instead.  And it’s even more interesting now that IBM has made Watson, a computer system that has been able to hold its own against some of the greatest champions Jeopardy has to offer. But will it be interesting when Watson is asked, during a Jeopardy match: What is the next evolution of humanity? And Watson answers: ME! They keep that thing in a building full of computers! What it he starts to spread like a virus? Watson will be answering all of the world’s trivia questions? It will start with him just ruining every game of Trivial Pursuit and Seen It match from now until the end of time but will it end with that?  

Now, no one is saying that Watson is going to replace humanity’s ability for associative thinking. What is more likely is that Watson will just replace us all together with cybernetic life forms that look remarkably similar to a certain former Governor of California! IBM is making Skynet and they know it! Where is John Conner when you need him, huh? Is he even born yet? So many questions, if there was only a machine that could answers them for me… wait!

Californication Season 4 Premiere Spoilers

The Season 4 Premiere of Californication is on the 9th of January but like most premieres these days they have been put out for viewing for the TV critics to digest. The last season left all of the fans of the show wondering: what great book will Hank Moody write while he is in prison? Well, the beating that Hank threw Mia's manager in the pool was not enough to keep this lovable scamp behind bars. In the season premiere Hank emerges from lockup to find his good friend Charlie with a cigarette, bottle of booze and a big man hug waiting for him.

Thinks are looking bleak for Hank this season on the family front. Karen will not speak to him and Hank's daughter (who is currently the same age Mia was when Hank laid her)   is not in her good books. Hank has taken up residents in Charlie and Marcy's house, because he is not getting back into his own any time soon.

There are some positives and negatives to come from the truth about Hank and Mia's brief sexual encounter. Hank has been given credit for writing Fucking and Punching and has been asked to write the screen adaptation. This is positive. The negative comes with Hank being the new Roman Polanski in Hollywood and is being charged with sex with a minor and might just end right back in jail like most of us thought was going to happen after the credits rolled in last season's finale.

Another new but less interesting development this season is that Marcy may or may not be pregnant.

“SGU Stargate Universe” Is No More! What Does This Mean For The Remainder of Season 2?

After one and a half seasons the SyFy show “Stargate Universe” has been canceled. As one of the main actors from “SGU” Robert Carlyle put it via his Twitter page, “It's over Guys!”. Carlyle played Dr. Rush on the most recent and maybe the last addition to the Stargate franchise. Though the show has been canceled it will still be airing the second half of its second season, starting in the new year, a small consolation for fans of the series.

SGU’s Epitaph  

“SGU” was notably darker than all the other Stargate series that came before it, possibly taking some cues from the cult favorite “Battlestar Galactica” reboot. The show featured stunning special effects and great locations. The locations were one of the highlights of “SGU”, while most of the older Stargate shows looked as though every episode was filmed in the rainy wilderness of B.C. Canada, “SGU’s” featured desserts and ice worlds along with the rainy B.C. wilderness. It was one of the elements which brought new life to the franchise.

Concluding the Story Arc: Will It Happen?

In the end though there are still ten more episodes to go in the series, which begs the question: will the mysteries of Destiny be revealed? In season 2 of “SGU” it was revealed that the purpose of the ship was to discover the origin of an apparently intelligent transmission found in the background noise of space. Interesting enough, but it is unlikely that the whole story of explaining the origins of the universe and possibly the meaning of life, according to Stargate story writers, can be wrapped in ten episodes. It’s more likely that the show runners will bang out the remaining episodes by telling the story of how the Destiny’s crew found their way back to Earth.  An ending like that is kind of a meager one, for a show that spent so much of its time trying to create depth in their characters. It gave the viewer the impression that you were to understand the characters so what they went through had some kind of an impact.  So what’s next for the “SGU” alum, well Lou Diamond Phillips can be seen in the made for TV movie “Metal Tornado” early next year… yay!