'Lost:' 'The Package' . . . Unwraps Yet More Questions

*Warning, spoilers from the recent episode of Lost ahead.*

Waaaaiiittt a minute! Hold on just one second . . .

Sun is pregnant in her sideways-flash? With Jin’s baby or Jae Lee’s, the guy who taught her English? (Or did she not know English in her sideways-flash and had never met Jae Lee in the sideways universe? Wasn't clear on her linguistic abilities in the sideways-flash.) Why weren’t Sun and Jin married and what does their being married have to do with Oceanic not crashing? Why was Martin Keamy working for Sun’s father and not Widmore in the sideways-flash? What’s up with Mikhail (previously known as Patchy, a Dharma-ite) escorting Sun to the bank, only to be, ironically, blinded in one eye by Jin, after Mikhail shot Sun in the stomach?

Questions, questions . . . questions to which I fear we’ll never get satisfactory answers in the handful of episodes remaining, especially when new characters (Zoe with the crooked specs) are introduced at this late date.

I’m getting a bit weary from these massive shifts in momentum. First few seasons, here’s how it went: Get off the island. Get off the island! Get OFF the island!! (And stay away from the smoke, and that mean Ben guy.)

Then, it changed: Hey we’ve got to go BACK to the island to save our friends. We’ve got to go back Kate! We’ve got to go BACK! We’ve got to get a specific group of people (the candidates? the people whom Ben & Locke were collecting) to go back to the island TOGETHER. Remember the oldie but goodie: "Live together, die alone?"

Now that they’re all on the island(s), the mantra has become: We’ve got to get off the island! Oh, and we’ve got to get a certain group of people together in order to do this, however, if we do that, hell will be unleashed upon the earth, so, maybe we shouldn't . . . This time, the Man in Black is the people collector, trying to persuade the remaining candidates to replace Jacob to accompany him off the island.

On this subject, I found intriguing the Man in Black/Locke's comment to Claire about needing Kate to persuade the others to leave the island, even though Kate's no longer a candidate(?): “Once she does, whatever happens, happens.” (Another oldie but a goodie.)

Near the end of "The Package," it struck me that Jack -- after all he’s been through and all his mistakes -- had the chutzpah to act as though he’s the one to be trusted, to lead the group. He once led them some of them off the island. Then he led them back on. Now he seems to be leaning toward going to the Hydra island, where the plane is, and, perhaps, stopping the Man in Black/Locke. (Doesn't Jack look like he's blessing Sun in the above ABC photo? Hmm.)

Of all the scenes in "The Package," the one with Jin looking longingly at the digital photos of his daughter, whom he’d never seen, made me tear up. So while I was feeling great sympathy for Jin, Widmore dropped this nugget into the mix: “If that, thing, masquerading as John Locke ever got off this island, your wife, your daughter, my daughter, everyone we know and love would simply cease to be. I came here to make sure that doesn’t happen.”

“How?” Jin asked.

“Come with me,” Widmore said. “I think it’s time for you to see The Package.”

“What 'package'?”

“It’s not a what, it’s a who.”

Could he be speaking about Desmond? Ack! I allowed myself fall into the trap of trying to figure out what’s happening and trying to make it make sense, even though I vowed I wouldn’t do this. Damn, my head hurts now.

Image credit: Mario Perez/ABC.

'Lost' Bobbleheads Celebrate the End of the Saga

When I saw these Lost bobbleheads on USA Today's Pop Candy blog, I fell in love with them, particularly the one of the ever-bloodied Ben Linus.

However I'm surprised that the company waited so long and is releasing bobbleheads of other characters well after Lost runs its course. While the Ben version is currently sold out, the Richard Alpert one is due out in July, an odd Hurley one in August, along with the rabbit-holding Dharma doc and an orange-holding Locke the same month.

What, no Jack, Sawyer or Kate?

Image credit: Entertainment Earth.

Notes on Politics & Pop Culture: Bye-Bye Bauer, Ethics on 'House'/'Grey's,' and Are Kids Getting Screwed on Health Care?

Bye-Bye Bauer

This current eighth day will be Jack Bauer’s last very bad day. Fox announced over the weekend that it is ending the 8-year-old series, though there’s talk of a 24 movie, which’d be approximately 22 hours shorter than one of Jack’s bad days.

The New York Times ran an interesting story examining the impact of the terrorism-centric series on TV, on the actions of actual U.S. interrogators in the field and on U.S. policy:

“24 first captured America’s attention in late 2001. The first season, which involved the explosion of a passenger plane and an assassination attempt on a presidential candidate, entered production well before the 9/11 attacks, but had its premiere eight weeks afterward. At the time, a review in the New York Times noted the ‘deadly convergence between real life and Hollywood fantasy.’ . . . The series enlivened the country’s political discourse in a way few others have, partly because it brought to life the ticking time-bomb threat that haunted the Cheney faction of the American government in the years after 9/11.”

While I’m on the subject of 24 . . . a few weeks ago I wrote that I’d become irritated by some wildly inane plot lines – particularly the Dana Walsh/Jenny one – on this final season of 24. In the past few weeks, however, things have markedly improved. I think it had to do with the fact that Dana/Jenny’s idiot ex-boyfriend is finally out of the picture, though I haven't warmed to Dana any and I'm still waiting for Brian Hastings to stop walking with a hunch. But I do I like the bomb-at-CTU line.

Ethics on House & Grey’s Anatomy

If you’ve ever watched House or Grey’s Anatomy, I have a question for you: Do you think that the medical professionals portrayed on those dramas behave ethically?

Dr. Greg House routinely dispatches his associates to patients’ homes to search the homes for clues to help him figure out medical mysteries. He employs duplicitous means to administer the treatments he thinks the patients should have, sometimes without their consent or against his boss’ orders. Grey’s Anatomy is rife with intramural bed hopping, bosses regularly sleeping with subordinates, and interns who do things do unsanctioned surgery on one another and cut the L-VAD wire of a heart patients to make him look sicker than he was in order to move him to the top of the transplant list.

So who out there actually expects these characters to be pillars of medical ethics?

Apparently some folks at Johns Hopkins were, at least enough to engage in a year-long study assessing the level of medical professionalism and bioethical issues addressed in one year of each show: “The results indicate that these programs are rife with powerful portrayals of bioethical issues and egregious deviations from the norms of professionalism and contain exemplary depictions of professionalism to a much lesser degree.”

One of the areas which had the most infractions? Sex. “The next most commonly observed departure from professionalism was sexual misconduct, with 58 incidents notched by the second season of Grey’s Anatomy and 11 in House," noted a Baltimore Sun’s TV blogger.

Kids Getting Screwed on Health Care?

I was among those who spent last weekend riveted to, of all things, C-SPAN, watching the “debate” on the health care reform bill (the NCAA tournament was in the picture-in-picture function). I had the TV on all afternoon, during dinner and through the evening, but fell asleep before President Obama’s speech just shy of midnight after the House passed the Senate’s version of the legislation. I watched the televised signing ceremony on Tuesday which, you might have heard, was considered a “big f*&%in’ deal” by the vice president.

An avid follower of the issue, I was frequently disgusted by the dialog and slimy tactics which accompanied the debate/negotiations, and was disheartened when people seem uninterested in engaging in authentic conversations about their genuine concerns without reflexively retreating back into their ideological corners, not even attempting to find a middle ground nor trying to reflect where the American people are on some health care reform issues.

After the health care reform bill became law, all kinds of things were promised. Some things were supposed to change immediately, like the fact that kids with pre-existing conditions were supposed to be able to get health insurance. The New York Times quoted the president saying earlier this month, “Starting this year, insurance companies will be banned forever from denying coverage to children with pre-existing conditions.” That’s an issue on which I think people of most stripes can agree, making sure sick kids obtain the medical treatment they need.

But that aspect of the new health care reform law is being contested – as is the health care bill itself by several state attorneys general -- by insurance companies, according to the New York Times. “Insurers agree that if they provide insurance for a child, they must cover pre-existing conditions,” the paper reported. “But, they say, the law does not require them to write insurance for the child and it does not guarantee the ‘availability of coverage’ for all until 2014.”

Why am I not surprised that we likely have no idea what’s that law will actually mean to you and me or how it’ll actually going to be implemented? I’ll bet we’re going to find out that a lot of this won’t be what it seems.

Image credit: Fox.

Showtime Releases Promo for New Dramedy 'The Big C'

Whenever I think of Laura Linney, I envision her as either in her Emmy winning role of Abigail Adams in the fabulous HBO mini-series John Adams or as the angsty, off-beat mom in The Squid and the Whale. But based on the freshly released trailer for her upcoming Showtime dramedy The Big C -- which is slated to begin this summer -- I think that may change.

Linney's high school teacher character is, according to Showtime's web site, "a reserved suburban wife and mother whose recent cancer diagnosis forces her to shake up her life and find hope, humor and the light side of a dark situation, while managing her immature but well-meaning husband, played by Oliver Platt."

Finding humor in cancer seems like it could be a risky proposition, particularly if the writers have Linney's character's cancer be terminal, as writers have with the Breaking Bad lead character. But can cancer be funny? We'll have to see. Showtime's already managed to walk a fine line and have a show about a suburban mom struggling with multiple personalities work -- plus net its star an Emmy -- so who knows?

Showtime just released a preview -- featuring Gabourey Sidibe (from Precious) as one of her students -- what do you think, can a comedy about a cancer patient work?

Latest 'Lost' Character Music Video Features Sawyer (Mostly Beefcake)

The good news: If you're all into Sawyer . . . or LaFleur or James or Jim or Ford or whatever the heck you call the stringy haired, bare chested, blonde bad boy of Lost, you'll love ABC's character video, "Cowboy Casanova" which is all about him. (Yes, it features the Carrie Underwood song by the same name.)

The bad news: If you were hoping that the latest Lost character video -- ABC is creating them for several of the primary cast members -- would be as witty, snarky and fun as the first one featuring Ben Linus that was released last week, you're going to be disappointed.

I'm hoping the next one is less music video-ish and goes heavy with the ironic, snarky commentary.

'Lost's' 'Ab Aeterno,' Otherwise Known as 'What Fresh Hell is This?'

*Warning, spoilers ahead from the recent episode of Lost.*

Dorothy Parker’s famous line, “What fresh hell is this?” came to my mind immediately upon the conclusion of the most recent episode of Lost, “Ab Aeterno.”

The island’s hell. No it’s not. Richard’s dead. No he’s not. Isabella’s dead. Kind of. Well, she’s a ghost. Maybe. But she can only be seen by Hurley who has suddenly assumed powers held by Whoopi Goldberg in the movie Ghost and can talk to communicate with the dead. Oh, and Hurley can see the dead. Or at least Isabella. (Is Hurley a Miles 2.0?)

Don’t get me wrong, I like the Richard Alpert character. I’ve been patiently waiting for the writers to delve into his backstory and explain why he never ages (Jacob’s gift of eternal life), when he came to the island (1867) and why (crashed on island while on board the Black Rock where he was chained as a slave after being spared hanging for the accidental death of a man with whom he’d been scuffling). And ever since undead/Man in Black/Smoky Locke remarked that it was nice to see Richard out of his chains, I’ve been wondering why Richard was ever in chains to begin with because he always seemed like a decent enough guy.

I was pleased to obtain that information, to see that Richard also had an epic love which ended in a personal tragedy, like many of the other Losties . . . or, like many of the other Losties in the post-Jughead/post-crash world. As for the sideways-flashing Losties, I’ve got no real clue about the status of their love lives. Post-crash/post-Jughead Locke, for example, had lost Helen, the love of his life, but the uncrashed/sideways-flashing version of Locke was, last we saw, getting ready to marry Helen.

I saw a number of parallels between the way Richard now feels about Jacob (betrayed, let down) and my feelings about this final season. I’m trying really hard not to delve too deeply into all of these new developments (I so do not care about Zoe), not to look for loopholes and inconsistencies because, as I’ve said before, I’m (mostly) done with all of that . . . But I can't help myself . . . haven’t the Lost writers said that the island is not an afterlife or some form of limbo? Haven’t they said that or am I mistaken? The island can’t be hell or a place of reckoning where people go to redeem themselves, can it?

In “Ab Aeterno,” (which is Latin for “from the beginning of time”) Jacob told Richard that Jacob’s job was to make sure that the Man in Black remains on the island in order to keep him from unleashing hell on earth.  We also know that there are six remaining “candidates” to potentially replace Jacob as the guardian to keep the Man in Black on the island to spare the world from his wrath.

But wait . . . in Richard’s flashback, didn’t the Man in Black hand Richard the same dagger that Dogen handed Sayid, and issue identical instructions: kill without allowing the man to talk? What in the heck does that mean? How does this all jive with ABC's "The Last Supper" photo where they posed Locke in the center in the Jesus-about-to-be-sacrificed-by-God-and-crucified position?

You know what else I keep getting stuck on? The fact that last season, Jack Shephard was hell-bent (pun intended) on corralling all his plane crash buddies together to go back to the island in order to “save” their friends because Widmore wanted to kill everyone on the island and take it over. The Ajira flight that Jack & Co. took to return to the island brought Ben, who killed Jacob, and it carried Locke’s body which was claimed by the Man in Black. So the whole, “We’ve got to go back,” wasn’t really about saving the Losties left behind but about trying to save humanity? And why is Widmore hanging out in a sub off shore and whose side is he on? Is he God and Jacob and the Man in Black are his Biblically warring sons?

No, no, no . . . not going to try to figure this all out. I'm just going to attempt to ride the final handful of episodes out without trying to work this out in my head because then I’ll end up making myself frustrated that the Lost lore doesn’t all add up, at least not to my satisfaction. However the Lost Untangled recap of “Ab Aeterno” below was hilarious. I like the way the people who write these videos think.



What did you think of “Ab Aeterno?” Of Richard’s backstory? Of the evolving final episode(s) arc about the Losties having to keep the Man in Black on the island in order to save the world from becoming a living hell?

Image credit: Mario Perez/ABC.

Notes on Pop Culture: Showtime's Women-Centric Dramedies, Put-Upon Political Wives & 'Bright Star' Shines

Showtime’s Women-Centric Dramedies

In advance of the season two premieres of Showtime’s Nurse Jackie and the United States of Tara, the Wall Street Journal ran a feature story entitled, “Showtime’s Bad Girls Make Good: A crop of shows with dysfunctional leading women has given the cable network a burst of momentum.”

Writer Amy Chozick pointed out that, in addition to Jackie and Tara, this is the network that airs Weeds and has a new show slated for this summer called The Big C, about a cancer patient starring Laura Linney. Showtime, the article said, “is reinventing itself with original series largely driven by complicated women. Showtime’s strategy: attracting big-name actresses, of a certain age and experience, who are hard-pressed to find juicy, challenging, starring roles elsewhere.” That is something I can definitely applaud, and is another good reason to keep Showtime as one of my pay channels.

After watching the season premiere of Nurse Jackie I reviewed it for CliqueClack TV and found it very promising. As for the Tara premiere, well, let's just say that I’m going to reserve judgment until I see more episodes.

Put-Upon Political Wives on TV and Real Life

CBS’ The Good Wife has been knocking it out of the park recently. (Entertainment Weekly recently ran a cover urging people to watch it.) The tension has been amped up with Peter Florrick -- the disgraced Chicago state’s attorney who was jailed for corruption and who was found to have slept with escorts -- now under house arrest and living in the apartment with his wife Alicia and their two teens. Alicia’s not sure if she’s going to reconcile with him (he’s sleeping in a guest room) or if she even wants to, despite the fact that, in a recent episode, she slept with him for the first time since the scandal broke. I’m thrilled that the show’s writers aren’t rushing things, like having Alicia simply accept his apology or have her just boot him to the curb. It’s been intriguing the way it’s been playing out.

That being said, Peter still went ahead and hired some political consultants to explore the notion of running for office again, without really talking to his wife or thinking about what this would mean to her, to have his indiscretions brought up yet again if he re-enters politics.

TV husbands blowing off their wives’ concerns for their political ambitions – including with Big Love’s Bill Henrickson – are the focal point of my new Mommy Tracked column this week in a piece that asks how much bad behavior wives can and will take when their husbands run for office. Real-life political wife, Elizabeth Edwards, unfortunately, was included in the column because she's plastered on the cover of People after her husband’s mistress and baby mama, Rielle Hunter did a high profile interview with GQ.

Bright Star Shines

While researching a recent column about women’s power in Hollywood in light of Kathryn Bigelow’s Oscar win for best director for The Hurt Locker, I read that a number of film critics had heaped praise upon an indie flick, Bright Star, written and directed by Oscar winning screenwriter Jane Campion. The critics said that the film -- set in 1818 and about the love affair between 23-year-old English poet John Keats and his next door neighbor Fanny Brawne -- was criminally overlooked during awards season yet it still made dozens of critics top 10 lists for best film of 2009.

I finally saw it. (It's out on DVD.) And I loved it. Not only was it beautiful and deeply moving on many levels, it was extremely thoughtful, witty and possessed a quality about it that will linger in your mind long after the film’s last frame. Plus, it’ll make you long for springtime. And butterflies.



Image credit: Entertainment Weekly.

Question for 'Breaking Bad' Fans

Given how much TV I watch for my pop culture work, I find myself embarrassed to admit that I did not watch the first two seasons of AMC's Breaking Bad. Now, as the show is about ready to kick off its third season on Sunday, I'm wondering if I should leap into it or hold off and watch the first two seasons on DVD first.

The critically acclaimed show features the Emmy-winning Bryan Cranston -- whom I adored when he was on Malcolm in the Middle -- as Walter White, a high school chemistry teacher who discovers he has inoperable lung cancer and is terrified that he'll leave his wife and children with nothing, so he teams up with a former student to make and sell the best crystal meth in the area. All without letting his family know what's going on.

My compadres in the TV critic/TV blogging circles are as enthusiastic about this show as I am about Mad Men, which also airs on AMC. As much as I go around practically insisting that people watch Mad Men -- in fact I've been forcing my DVDs of the 1960s drama into my poor brother-in-law's hands -- others have been equally as enthusiastic about this edgy drama.

Entertainment Weekly -- which put the Breaking Bad season three premiere on its "Must List" -- gave it an A-, with reviewer Ken Tucker saying, "No other current TV series balances sensitivity and toughness the way Breaking Bad does . . . Breaking Bad has, in short, everything you could want from an hour-long show: suspense, laughs, danger and poignance."

A colleague at CliqueClack TV, who called it one of if not the best show on TV, says:

"There is certainly a lot of heavy drama, with Walter’s illness and home life, hiding his secret life from his family, and dealing with the dangerous world of drug trafficking. The show also offers a tremendous amount of dark humor. It often works as a perfect balance with the heavier material, giving a more realistic balance to the show and avoiding the trap of melodrama."

With so many accolades being heaped upon this show, I feel I need to at least try it and see if it lives up to the hype. Which brings me to my question, for people who've been watching Breaking Bad:

Should I go ahead and watch the show when it premieres, even though I haven't watched the other two seasons, or should I DVR Breaking Bad's new episodes and start from the beginning by Netflixing seasons one and two?

Image credit: AMC.

Notes on Pop Culture: 'FlashForward' Retooled, 'Nurse Jackie'/'US Tara' Return and 'Wimpy Kid' Flick Premieres

*Warning, spoilers ahead from the latest episode of FlashForward.*

FlashForward Retooled

I wasn't among the FlashForward haters per say, but by the time ABC late last year decided to put FlashForward on hiatus until mid-March, I wasn't sure what that meant for the sci-fi drama's future. New creative folks were brought on board and I wondered if it was the beginning of the end for a show with a promising premise but which didn't consistently deliver and frequently got caught up in intrigue and complexity at the expense of character development.

I watched the two-hour FlashForward return last night -- while checking in on the NCAA tourney games, go underdogs! -- and was pleased by what I saw: Interesting people, thoughtful connections and more depth when it came to the characters. Plus a whole lot of answers. We were told who the guy in the baseball park was who remained awake during the blackout and why (some mysterious ring). We found out more about the flashforwards of Mark Benford, Simon "Charlie from Lost" Campos and Lloyd Simcoe. We learned that Simon's not as evil as he may seem but was instead being played by a sinister uncle who worked for a nameless, faceless sinister boss.

We saw the introduction of a group called Sanctuary -- run by a former window washer who didn't die on the day of the blackout because he believes he was saved by God (Gil Bellows from Ally McBeal) -- and we learned that perhaps Nicole Kirby (who plays Jane Sterling on Mad Men) didn't really see herself being murdered in her flashforward, drowned and punished for something, but maybe she was freaking out during a full body baptism. And that penny wall thing . . . cannot forget the penny wall being created by Nicole's mother, who lit a Bible on fire and wears angel wings over her bathrobe.

If the rest of the season is this intriguing, I'll be there.

Showtime's Nurse Jackie and United States of Tara Return on Monday

I completely bought Edie Falco as an ER nurse Jackie Peyton during the first season of Nurse Jackie. Fierce, strong, compassionate, smart, unfaithful and addicted to pain meds, Falco's former persona of Carmela Soprano quickly fell by the wayside as the episodes unfolded.

By the time the season one finale concluded, her lover Eddie had been fired from the hospital and found out that Jackie was married and had kids, visited Jackie's husband Kevin's bar and then made a drunken scene at the hospital. Plus Jackie had been experiencing adverse reactions to the copious amounts of illegally obtained meds she was consuming. (Paging Dr. House.) My guess is that we haven't heard the last from Eddie or Jackie's drug issues.

Airing after Nurse Jackie is the season two premiere of the United States of Tara, featuring the Emmy-winning Toni Collette playing Tara Gregson, a woman struggling with multiple personalities she can't control. The first season ended with her coming face to face with the person who sexually assaulted her when she was a teenager. This season starts with Tara having been alternate-personality-free for months.

Diary of a Wimpy Kid Movie Premieres

My three kids are thrilled about the fact that a movie based on one of their favorite book series -- Diary of a Wimpy Kid -- is being released today.

Entertainment Weekly gave it a B+ and called it, "a jaunty and forthright production with a lively look reflecting the book’s illustrated pages, [the movie] does a great job of being in two places at once: In the head and gangly bodies of kids, and in the hearts of those of us who have survived grades 6-8."

However a Boston Globe movie reviewer gave it one-and-a-half stars (out of four), saying that the film makes the main character, Greg Hefley, an unlikeable jerk: "In his quest for instant fame, our hero treats his friend like dirt, trash-talks the school’s perfectly reasonable alt-girl (Chloë Moretz), ditches a group of kindergartners in a construction pit in the rain (and blames it on [best friend] Rowley), and otherwise behaves like a little Hun."

Wonder who's right?

Image credit: Craig Sjodin/ABC.

'Lost's' Dr. Linus Gets a Musical Montage Set to Michael Jackson's 'Ben'

Oh my. As a big fan of Lost's Ben Linus character, I LOVE this ABC musical montage dedicated to him and set to the music of Michael Jackson singing, "Ben."



ABC is reportedly planning on releasing a series of these music video tributes to various Lost characters including: John Locke, Jack Shephard, Kate Austin, Hugo Reyes, Desmond Hume, James Ford/Sawyer, Sayid Jarrah, Richard Alpert and Sun & Jin Kwon. Hopefully those videos will be as ironic as Ben's, though it'll be tough to top this one.

Is It Time to Get Rid of Gender-Specific Acting Awards Categories? Not Yet.

Before the Academy Awards aired, the New York Times ran an op/ed where the writer asked whether it's about time for awards ceremonies like the Oscars and the Golden Globes to do away with the actor/actress categories and simply bestow awards for acting excellence. Kim Elsesser from UCLA’s Center for Study of Women wrote:

". . . separate is not equal. While it is certainly acceptable for sports competitions like the Olympics to have separate events for male and female athletes, the biological differences do not affect acting performances. The divided Oscar categories merely insult women, because they suggest that women would not be victorious if the categories were combined. In addition, this segregation helps perpetuate the stereotype that the differences between men and women are so great that the two sexes cannot be evaluated as equals in their professions."

Even though I was thrilled to see Kathryn Bigelow become the first woman to win a best director Oscar (in over 80 years) for her work on the excellent The Hurt Locker, you need to consider the context: Only a paltry 16 percent of the top 250 films from last year were directed, written or produced by women and of the 4,400 “speaking roles in 2009’s top 100 films, only about 30 percent were for women,” Reuters reported. Despite the fact that in the last year U.S. women bought 55 percent of all movie tickets, according to Women & Hollywood's Melissa Silverstein, women still are not yet equal to the men in Hollywood by nearly every measure you can think of.

My Mommy Tracked pop culture column this week asserts that we're a long way away from achieving gender equity when it comes to respecting women's work in the arts. "When women start taking home half the awards in the big gender neutral categories" that's when I'll be all in favor of ditching the actor/actress categories, I concluded.

What say you? Do you think that, if we got rid of gender-specific acting categories, women would best the men or get even half of the nominations?

Image credit: Paul Buck/EPA via The Guardian.

'Lost' Gets All Sawyer-ish with 'Recon' Episode

*Warning, spoilers ahead from the recent episode of Lost.*

So the bare-chested Sawyer (weird that the transported-from-the-1970s-Sawyer is bare-chested, no?) got an episode of his own.

Were there surprises in the new episode? In the sideways-flashing/uncrashed Sawyer’s life, he’s a detective whose partner is Miles. Sawyer was set up on a blind date with Charlotte (Daniel Faraday's daughter) and it went poorly after she snooped in his bureau drawer. There we learned that his dad STILL killed his mother and then himself after James’ cheating mother got conned (even though, as we know from the Locke sideways-flash, Locke was pondering inviting his “father” to his wedding). In fact, Sawyer, er, Jim Ford, was still trying to track down said con man, Anthony Cooper.

Is said con man Locke’s father? Is the con man someone else? What are we to make of the fact that Kate’s car crashed into Jim Ford’s? And, why in the world, in the post-crashed/post-Jughead world would Kate’s dress from her booty call in the cage with Sawyer have been left behind in the cage for Sawyer to find? Wasn’t she wearing that dress when she ran away while Jack was operating on Ben?

I’m trying not to read too deeply into all of this because, as I mentioned when I commented on the frustratingly boggling Locke episode a few weeks ago (still HATE the fact that the character histories we’ve talked about for years have been shelved, at least in the sideways-flashing lives), I’ve stopped trying to make this all make sense because the writers don’t have sufficient time to tie up the loose ends and make it seem reasonable. (If they do, I’ll write up a HUGE blog post saying how very wrong I was.) However in order to try to enjoy the remainder of this series, I’m going to have to put those irritations aside, like the writers did with the character histories they carefully created, and just roll with it.

As for the rest of the episode “Recon,” I engaged in more eye-rolling at the whole Charles Widmore/sub/armed Widmore henchmen thread. Yes, I’m intrigued by the overarching Widmore/Ben/Desmond/Penny story and how that factors into the Island’s lore, but – and I feel like I’ve been repeating myself a lot on this matter – but I’m growing weary of having yet another group of gun-toting people with vague motivations take more of the Losties hostage and leave behind a trail of dead bodies. I thought we were nearly done with this nonsense when Dogen and his sidekick were killed. But with only eight episodes left there’s not much hope that this unfortunately expanding circle of people is going to become smaller, more focused and more intriguing. It looks like it's just going to widen to encompass armies, like a dead post-Jughead Locke/Man in Black/Smoky army, a Widmore army and a loyal-to-Jacob army (which welcomes Ben, kind of, despite the fact that Ben killed Jacob)?

I’d be so much happier with more storylines like the one from “Dr. Linus” last week where we saw Ben become redeemed and where larger, more cerebral issues regarding destiny and fate were explored (Was Ben always going to be evil, regardless of what happened to him or did life's events make him that way? What role did his trip to the Temple when he was a mortally wounded child have on him?) But, alas, that doesn't seem to be the route the writers are heading.



What did you think of the Sawyer-centric episode? About him being a cop -- instead of a con man -- but still obsessed with hunting down the man who conned his mom? About the growing armies on the island?

Image credit: ABC.

Notes on Pop Culture: Heigl Reportedly Working on Exit, 'Grey's' Deals in Power Struggles & Jealousies, 'Private Practice' Love Triangles

*Warning, spoilers ahead from the recent episodes of Grey's Anatomy and Private Practice.*

No More Izzie Stevens?

Have we seen the last of Katherine Heigl as Izzie Stevens on Grey's Anatomy? Was that locker room scene with Alex Karev back in January at Seattle Grace, when she said she was looking for a job out of town, her last? Entertainment Weekly, quoting unnamed sources, says that Heigl is currently negotiating details with ABC brass so she can leave the ABC drama.

Izzie has been mysteriously absent for most of this season. First George O'Malley died. Then she miraculously recovered from cancer that seemed like it was going to kill her. She got canned from Seattle Grace and fled in shame, refusing to make contact with Alex or with her doctors. She popped in a few weeks ago for one episode but then disappeared again making vague statements about looking for work elsewhere.

We knew that in real life, Heigl took time off for a movie and to bond with the baby she recently adopted, but it wasn't publicly clear, until today, that Izzie may not appear on Grey's again. Wonder if the Grey's writers will concoct a story about Izzie dying -- maybe getting George O'Malley'd and hit by a bus? -- or if they'll just never mention her again, kind of like Erica Hahn who disappeared into a parking lot.

It's kind of sad what happened to the once interesting Izzie. (I know, there are plenty of Izzie haters, but -- excluding the Gizzie debacle -- I wasn't one of them.) I would've liked to have learned more about her trailer park background, about the circumstances which led her to give up her daughter for adoption. Her backstory made her interesting. I much prefer her to ANYONE from Mercy West.

Grey's "Push" episode

The latest episode of Grey's, "Push" -- about which I blogged over on CliqueClack TV -- focused largely on a power struggle between Richard Webber and Owen Hunt, Richard and Derek Shepherd and the jealousies experienced by Owen over McSteamy's interest in Teddy Altman (for whom Owen still harbors feelings) and Lexie over McSteamy moving on.

After watching this episode I'm willing to climb out on a limb and make these three predictions. By the end of the season, 1) McSteamy and Callie Torres will be trying to have a baby (given Arizona Robbins' bombshell at the end of "Push") 2) Owen and Cristina will be kaput or circling the drain and 3) Derek will no longer be chief.

My favorite part of the recent episode: Bailey's rant about how she saw no need to wax her "surgical area" and that if her male friend couldn't handle a little "nature" and "God," then he wasn't worth her time. That, and her embarrassment at the prospect of having to pick up condoms for her date, were fantastic.

Private Practice keeps being romantically ridiculous

I'm really growing weary of the romantic storylines on Private Practice this season. I really wish the characters would heed Sheldon Wallace's advice to "grow the hell up" -- including Sheldon.

The sophomoric "I love you . . . No, I love you now . . . No, no, no, YOU'RE my soul mate" blather has gotten really old. I'd much rather see these late thirty- and fortysomething characters start acting like mature professionals who hold people's lives and mental health in their hands, not like teenagers in heat governed solely by their hormones.

It's not that I'm hoping they'll all get married and enjoy placid, loving relationships, but, as I said in my CliqueClack TV review of the latest episode "Triangles," I'm starting to think we need a who's-sleeping-with-whom scorecard in order to figure out Private Practice these days.

Image credit: Michael Desmond/ABC.

RIP: Shel Turtlestein

Loved Modern Family's "Truth Be Told" episode on Wednesday. Shel Turtlestein. Claire's vampy Facebook voices. Phil's high school nickname "Ozone" when he used to break dance. Alex lying to her younger brother Luke by telling him he was adopted and that his father's ex-girlfriend was coming to the house to pick him up because she was his birth mother. The accidental slaughter of Shel Turtlestein. Jay's inept cover up. The "killer raccoon."

All of it. Just. Rocked.

Calling All 'Twilight' Fans: Trailer for 'Eclipse' Features Lots o' Jacob

My Twilight-obsessed daughter -- who's firmly in the Team Jacob camp -- will be thrilled that the trailer for the new installment in the Twilight saga, Eclipse, has just been released. (Film premieres June 30.)

Surprisingly, there's a lot less of R.Patt. than I thought there'd be, with much more emphasis on Taylor Lautner.

Kimmel's on a Roll This Week: Michael Emerson Reveals 'Lost' Secret

I don't normally watch Jimmy Kimmel Live, but based on the last few days I might have to reconsider that decision.

Kimmel asked Michael Emerson, who plays the awesome Ben Linus on Lost (see the review of the latest Ben-centric episode below), to do a short "Secrets of Lost" video for him. And Emerson delivered. In very odd fashion.


However my all time favorite late night Emerson moment remains his appearance last year on Late Night with Jimmy Fallon show where he creepily recited a nursery rhyme (it's a little more than halfway through the video):

For a Mid-Week Smile, Watch This 'Handsome' Kimmel Video

After the Oscars, and after the local news (I was long asleep by that point in the wee hours of Monday morning) Jimmy Kimmel had his fifth annual Oscar special and aired one of his celebrity-heavy spoof videos on Jimmy Kimmel Live.

A few of the usual suspects -- Affleck, Damon -- appeared in it, as did a crowd of other celebs who made sport of their good looks and Kimmel's lack thereof. Only thing missing to make this a complete, smash hit: Jon Hamm.



Kimmel also aired some of the outtakes from filming the video, those were funny too, particularly the bits with Jennifer Garner.

'Lost's' 'Dr. Linus' Made Me Smile (Except for the End)

*Warning, spoilers ahead from the recent episode of Lost.*

For several weeks now, I’ve felt let down and disgruntled by the time I reached the end of each new installment of Lost. (If you've been following along here on the blog, you know why.) But I was thrilled that I did not feel that way after watching the “Dr. Linus” episode and witnessed the redemption of Ben Linus in BOTH of his realities, in his uncrashed life and in his post-crash/post-Jughead life. Such dualities haven’t occurred for the other characters whose sideways-flashes we’ve seen.

After Locke – who’s dead and whose body has been claimed by the Man in Black/Smoky -- my favorite character on Lost was Ben Linus because he was so deliciously evil and unpredictable, yet he also had a vulnerable, insecure underbelly which I found intriguing. So it was a shock to see him, in this final season, rendered largely impotent, a bug-eyed spectator as post-crashed/Man in Black/Smoky Locke assumed control over the island after conning Ben into killing Jacob. Even Lapidus seemed to have more authority than Ben and that was depressing.

The full depth of Ben’s feeling of betrayal hadn’t been explored until this latest episode where he confessed to Jacob’s “bodyguard” – a character about whom I could care less about -- that he’d sacrificed and given everything he had to the island because he had faith in Jacob and that he was doing what he had to do to protect the island. Ben had even allowed the evil Widmore freighter guy to shoot to death Ben’s daughter in front of him because he thought that’s what Jacob would have wanted, for Ben to remain alive to take care of the island even as he had to sacrifice his child to do so. (My guess is that, before he killed Jacob, Ben would’ve justified his actions by quoting scripture about sacrificing a child for God.)

But to see Ben, tearful, exposed and utterly defeated -- like the story he told his history class about Napoleon in exile on the island who might as well have been dead because he was powerless -- because he believed he’d dedicated his life and allowed his daughter to be killed for nothing, was a revelation. It humanized the little nut job, in a good way.

Ben’s sideways-flashing high school history teacher did what the post-crash/post-Jughead Ben could not: Do right by Alex and make sure that she got what she needed to succeed in life, or at least get into Yale. Though still deceptively manipulative in his sweater vest -- as evidenced by the way he persuaded the biology teacher to hack into the school nurse’s e-mail account – this version of Ben had a heart that superceded his ambitions.

The uncrashed Ben was even taking care of his father, making him meals and changing his oxygen tank; by contrast, the post-crash Ben killed his father and donned a gas mask to protect himself from the poison gas he had gotten someone else to release across the Dharma compound in order to stage a coup and put himself in charge. (Get the irony, killed by poison gas in one scenario, made more comfortable with oxygen in the other.) The uncrashed Ben was still Ben, but hadn’t been twisted by the island, hadn't been brought to the Temple when he was mortally wounded as a child after Sayid shot him in order to be "saved," something that likely darkened Ben's heart.

So does this mean that the island – and the presence of the Man in Black/Smoky – twists people, takes the darker parts of themselves that already exist and amplifies them by forcing people to choose between the common good and a selfish good? Do you have to have had contact with Smoky, like child Ben did, in order for this to happen? Who knows?

I haven’t yet read up on the other blogs to see other folks’ reactions to “Dr. Linus,” but I’ll venture to guess that the reactions to the redemption of Ben are mixed. In my own house, my spouse was unimpressed. “I don’t like Redeemed Ben and Bad Sayid,” he grumbled. I’m not a fan of Bad Sayid either – though I’m not totally convinced he’s bad, I HATED Dogen and his weasel sidekick – but I was a fan of last night’s Ben-centric episode.
 
Do you think Ben will remain redeemed for the rest of the series or will Evil Ben rear his scheming head again? Did you roll your eyes at the poorly executed scene with the sub rising out of the ocean and spying on our Losties with Charles Widmore inside of it like I did?

Image credit: Mario Perez/ABC.

'Big Love' Goes Out With a Big Fat Mess

*Warning, spoilers ahead from the season finale of Big Love.*

They were standing there. The four of them. In front of a gathering of supporters and the media at an election night acceptance speech. Their clothing reflecting the colors of the American flag, each wife in a single color, Bill in a combination of all three. But around them, shadows, disallusionment and disappointment . . . oh, and some salivating reporters who know a mega-juicy story when they see one.

The season finale of Big Love concluded with Bill winning his state senate race but losing his soul in order to get there. At the very least, he's lost the confidence and quite possibly the affections of his first wife Barb who begged and pleaded with him to refrain from outing the Henrickson family as polygamists if he won. She feared for their family, fears confirmed by poor Don Embry's son hurling a brick through the Henricksons' front window and cursing Bill for bringing scorn, mockery and humiliation down upon the Embry family by forcing Don to be the fall man at the beginning of Bill's campaign and pretend to be the only polygamist working at Home Plus. The Embry family living "in the light" and being open about their polygamy is a nightmare. Just look at Don's face and tell me he's happy to be living out in the open. Barb feared for her own family's well being while Bill was only concerned about transforming himself into some kind of transcendental leader who'll be forever remembered for moving polygamy into the American mainstream and to heck with the rest of his shortsighted family members. (See the video below.)

So desperate was Barb to grab hold of any rocks on the side of the cliff that she could, lest she and her family fall off it as Bill pushes them, that she was willing to embarass Bill by informing a local TV station on the eve of election day that Bill had fathered an out-of-wedlock child with Ana. She even handed over the results of a paternity test. She'd rather be the wife of a lying cheat (which she already is because Ana's baby was conceived before Ana and Bill were married for about 48 hours) than the first wife of a polygamist, pitied by the likes of Marilyn Densham who thought she was a pathetic sap for allowing her husband's sexual and political appetite run roughshod over her.

Ep. 43: Inside the Episode

But the vain, deluded Bill plodded forward, regardless of the hideous news that was breaking about members of a Kansas polygamist compound being indicted and charged with widespread incest, incest that he knew had ties to Nicki's first husband J.J. who ran the Kansas compound, ties that Bill knew could taint anyone who was publicly known as practicing polygamy.

Even after his wife Nicki was attacked and nearly forcibly inseminated by J.J., after Bill learned that his first wife called the TV station about his baby mama, after Bill's third wife didn't want to go public and had repeatedly asked him to, at the very least, delay publically announcing their polygamist practices, Bill went ahead and did it anyway. And there they stood, hand in hand, everyone looking miserable, Barb in particular.

With only nine episodes in this season, I felt as though we'd been forced to drink wine that hadn't had time to age properly and that hadn't been given time to breathe. The finale felt so rushed because they literally had run out of time to tell the story the writers wanted to tell. I think they could've done fine by using fewer major events and by just simplifying things.

An example of rushing through stories without giving them enough time or decent treatment is the dispensing of the Flutes. After two seasons of Bill courting the Flutes in order to build the casino, Bill summarily ditched them off screen on election day (how did he have time to do all he did on election day?) when they had a member of their family who was dealing drugs at the casino.

Bill has a brother who admitted to committing murder, parents who've tried to kill one another and have illegally transported guns and birds from Mexico, a mother who sliced off someone's arm, a sister-in-law who's tried multiple times to kill people, a mother-in-law who just burned alive two people in a building (Bill doesn't know about that yet), a wife who committed fraud when she stole someone else's identity in order to work at the D.A.'s office and obstruct her father's prosecution for compelling underaged girls to marry older men, and another wife who's in a sham marriage in order to keep the fiance of Bill's baby mama in the country. And the FLUTES are the ones who are the problems who need to be fired? Never mind the fact that Bill perpetrated fraud on the voters by parading Barb and their three kids around like they were his only family members. How long until the recall vote?

Based on the last few episodes, we knew the finale was going to be overstuffed with way too much story, no matter how much I wanted everything to slow down and stop being so over-the-top. Putting those criticisms aside, I found hope in Barb's response to Bill's lunacy. I hope that next season, she'll emerge stronger and wiser and not The Good Wife-polygamist style. And hopefully there'll be more episodes so the writers can slow down.

Your thoughts on the Big Love finale? What do you think will happen to the Henricksons now that their big secret is out?

'Modern Family' Promo More Entertaining Than Oscars

Loved that The Hurt Locker won best picture. Found it refreshing and inspiring to see Academy Award winning director Kathryne Bigelow holding two awards, breaking Oscar's glass ceiling. Found myself cheering when I heard that a fellow journalist got an Oscar for penning the Oscar winning Hurt Locker screenplay. Eyes teared up when I watched the films of my high school years featured during an Academy homage to the late John Hughes.

But all in all, I was not a fan of the 82nd Academy Awards. As much as I like Steve Martin and Alec Baldwin -- Baldwin simply owns 30 Rock -- I found their performance last night to be just so-so. Only about a quarter of their jokes were amusing and their opening monologue (or is it duo-logue) dragged. Comparing the Oscars to the Golden Globe broadcast, I think Ricky Gervais was much more entertaining and cutting edge . . . because I hear that the Academy Awards folks were all into getting them there youngsters to tune in, what with them recruiting the Twilight stars (sans R.Pat.), Zac Efron's hair and the slouching teen known as Miley Cyrus to present awards. If you're reading, Oscar show people: I want Jon Stewart back.

And while, in theory, I like the personal touch of having someone who actually knows the men and women nominated in the best actor/actress categories say something specific about each nominee, by the time we got to that point in the show, it was annoying and it made a long show (ditch the dance number, this is not the Tony Awards!) even longer.

By the way, was anyone else, other than yours truly, confused by the weirdness that was the documentary short acceptance speech where one guy was speaking when a "Lady Kanye," as she's being referred to online, hijacked the mic? Well Salon got to the bottom of that and found out that there was indeed prior conflict over who was going to accept the Oscar in the event of a win because there was behind-the-scenes acrimony. Oh, the cut-throat world of documentary shorts.

I'm ashamed to say that I actually fell asleep and missed the last few big awards. That's what I get for failing to caffeine up. It was the Oscars, for God's sake, I should've known better than to go into it caffeine free. And when I went to watch the rest of the show on DVR, it cut off mid-way through Sandra Bullock's entertainting acceptance speech because the show went beyond the scheduled 11:30 p.m. ending. (Damn Helen Mirren. I knew I should've extended the taping time!) So I had to go to the Oscar web site and watch the remaining acceptance speeches there.

The most amusing thing I saw all night? The Modern Family promo where the characters had a movie-themed night of charades.



What'd you think of the Oscars, both the winners/losers and the show itself?

'Lost' Untangled Takes on 'Bad Man' Sayid & Why I Want More Ben Linus

*Warning, spoilers ahead from recent episode of Lost.*

Sure, he was a torturer for the Republican Guard during the first Gulf War, but aside from that little nasty detail, don't you kind of feel badly for Sayid Jarrah, the poor, heartsick, menancingly lethal Sayid? I do, despite his violent past. The latest Lost installment, "Sundown," focused on Sayid's struggles with coming to terms with that Republican Guard past where, under duress, he was forced to do some very bad things and therefore believed himself to be inherently evil.

In this episode, we got a glimpse of his uncrashed life in which Oceanic 815 landed safely at LAX. In this sideways flash, Sayid brought flowers to the love of his life, Nadia, only Nadia was married to his brother who'd gotten himself into trouble with the mob over some shady business loan. In order to protect his brother, Nadia (who has feelings for Sayid but he doesn't believe he's deserving of her affections) and his niece and nephew, Sayid took out the mob loan guys, whose leader was the evil freighter guy Martin Keamy from the island in the post-crash world who killed Ben's daughter Alex when Ben wouldn't surrender himself. So do Sayid's actions in this sideways flash, shooting the mob guys, make Sayid evil at heart, given that it was in defense and protection of loved ones? I'm not sure.

But what's clear as a bell is that the post-crash/post-Jughead Sayid -- who teamed up with undead Locke/not-Locke because Mr. Smoky promised Sayid that he'd get a chance to see Nadia again (she'd been killed in this version of Sayid's life) -- has decided to go all out bad, drowning the annoying Dogen (yes!) and then killing his scooby of a translator in the murky waters of that ridiculously fake-looking temple.

In both versions of Sayid's life, he's still dealing with that "I am a bad man," feeling and can't escape violence which seems to follow him wherever he goes.

On another matter: I've been attempting to be more positive and lighthearted about Lost since my tirade following the Locke-centered episode a few weeks ago, but please allow me this gripe: They are UNDER-USING Ben, much to my consternation. I care more about Ben than I do about Claire or Dogen or the irritating Other Others or Miles. Ben has been developed into such an amazing character that I've been waiting (im)patiently for him to get more air time. Instead, after being tricked by Smoky Locke into killing Jacob in last season's finale, Ben has been reduced to standing around, looking bug-eyed and confused, almost paralyzed by the fact that he's been rendered irrelevant by Smoky Locke.

In fact, I was considering starting a Twitter campaign -- using the hashtag #morebenlinus -- to lobby for more Ben, not that it would actually change the episodes that have already been written and shot, but at least it'll make me feel better. Then I saw the ABC preview for the next episode which features, wouldn't you know it, sideways flashing/uncrashed Ben as a high school teacher talking about Napoleon losing his power in exile on an island. This little glimpse made me smile:



If next week's episode is anything like I hope it will be, based on this little snippet, I'll be one happy gal next week.

In the meantime, enjoy the always snarky Lost Untangled video which sarcastically dissects "Sundown:'"



Thoughts on Sayid the Bad Man? On whether we need more Ben Linus?

'Parenthood' Enters the Family Drama Arena

The premiere episode of Parenthood, which aired last night on NBC was, like most pilots, overloaded with storylines designed to introduce each character and place them into some kind of context. Once the introductory business is out of the way, the real test of whether a show's got staying power is by watching the next few episodes. I'll be looking to see whether the show can and will delve into what makes each of these characters tick. But I think it has promise.

That being said, in my Pop Culture column on Mommy Tracked I pleaded with the show's writers to NOT -- I repeat, NOT -- go down the road of cliche when it comes to working moms and will refrain from demonizing them. There's this one character who's a workaholic lawyer mom, Julia Braverman-Graham (Erika Christensen), and because she's always fielding work calls, messing with her BlackBerry and working long hours, her young daughter openly favors her at-home dad. A similar dynamic was played out on Brothers & Sisters a few years ago with the Sarah Wheedon Walker (Rachel Griffiths) character, and Sarah was threatened with the loss of custody of her children during her divorce proceedings because of the long hours she worked. Brooke Shields' movie mogul character in Lipstick Jungle also suffered similarly for trying to thrive in a tough career while raising children.

Meanwhile, over on CliqueClack TV, I compared Lauren Graham's iconic role of Lorelai Gilmore in the Gilmore Girls to her new Parenthood character, Sarah Braverman. While I initially found that there are more differences than similarities between the two characters, after watching the preview below which NBC just put on its web site and seeing that Sarah's potentially interested in dating her 16-year-old daughter's teacher . . . well that scenario was played out in the first season of Gilmore Girls. (Remember Max Medina? You can refresh your memory with repeats of season one currently airing on ABC Family.) If Sarah starts dating her daughter Amber's high school English teacher, there's a distinct possibility that I may have to reassess my conclusion about just how much Sarah and Lorelai have in common.



What did you think about the Parenthood premiere?

Jimmy Fallon + Robert Pattinson = Team Funny

For a while now, Jimmy Fallon has having some fun at the expense of the insane popularity of Twilight hunk Robert Pattinson. (He plays Edward Cullen, the vampire, captain of Team Edward, for those of you not in the know.)

Fallon’s been doing spoof videos which he calls, “Bothered with Robert Pattison,” where Fallon dons uber-pale makeup and messes up his hair in order to look like Pattinson’s very serious character Edward. Occasionally, Fallon willl growl like Edward the vampire does after he's climbed into a tree in order to ponder things that “bother” Pattinson.

The Valentine’s Day installment of “Bothered” was hilarious:



On Monday, Pattinson himself appeared on Late Night with Jimmy Fallon in order to plug his new movie Remember Me (in which I’m interested in seeing, but want to read reviews first). Not only did Pattinson nervously field questions as fans went completely ape *bleep* over him -- that’s when he wasn’t touching his hair (that’s one heck of a nervous tick he’s got, wanted to scream, “Stop messin’ with your hair dude!” while watching the interview) -- but he was a very good sport by agreeing to appear in a “Bothered” video with Fallon.



Don't you think Pattinson's got some kind of weird hair issue going on here?

'Big Love's' Short Season Making Every Episode Feel Like a Finale

*Warning, spoilers ahead from the recent episode of Big Love.*

The recent episode of Big Love, "Next Ticket Out" had way too much of everything. The storylines leapt all over the place so that you couldn't really absorb what had just happened before something else monumental occurred. Everything seemed important because every storyline seemed to have heft: The new weirdness on the compound, the senate campaign, Barb's scuffle over Marilyn, Marilyn's crusade against Bill, Margene's marriage, Sarah moving to Portland, etc. And when everything's important, nothing's important. It was all just too much.

"Next Ticket Out," like the "Blood Atonement" episode which preceded it, are examples of how the quality of this once incisive and intriguing HBO drama has suffered because of the decision to reduce the number of episodes. Last season I could accept the fact that there were only 10 episodes because there had been a writers' strike. Big Love's first two seasons consisted of a dozen episodes a piece. However this season, there will only be nine, meaning that 12 episodes worth of drama has been crammed into a paltry nine, so much so that there's no room for any of the characters or storylines to breathe.

Big Love characters are racing all over the place that I wonder how they have time to do it all. They're going from Mexico (where rogue, violent polygamists detained some of the Henricksons in an ostrich cage and they escaped by slicing off one of the bad guy's arms), to Washington, D.C. (where Bill was lobbying a congressman for political support), to the family's new casino (they're always driving off there and always getting back home in time for dinner), to state political conventions, to TV interviews and debates, to the Juniper Creek compound and from one campaign scandal to another. There's no time to contemplate, no time to see the impact of the events on the characters.

Remember how long it took Margene to deal with her mother's death last season? There were several episodes of her being unusually quiet and withdrawn, followed by her private grief manifesting itself with her decision to dye her hair blonde. Soon after that, she started getting aggressive selling her jewelry and making something of her life. It was a natural, gradual progression.

But this season Margene kissed her teenaged stepson, who's had a crush on her, and admitted to Bill that she had romantic feelings toward Ben. Under normal circumstances, this would be a revelation of nuclear proportions and its effects would be long lasting. But instead, characters talked about it for roughly two episodes and then, poof, all that was over in a snap, forgotten and we've moved on to the fact that Margene married Bill's ex-lover's fiance to keep him from being deported. Sure, Ben was asked to leave the house by his father, but after Bill put his life on the line for Ben in Mexico, it's all water under the bridge.

And how about Nicki's betrayal of Henrickson family last season, where, under orders from her parents, she got a job working in the DA's office for the purpose of sabotaging her father's prosecution. Then she dated the DA when she was supposedly married to Bill. Such treachery should've had Nicki in the dog house a whole lot longer than she was this season. It didn't take long for her shocking behavior to be trumped by something else, like her dead father, or her mother being married off to her ex-husband or her saving her teenaged daughter from becoming the latest bride for a Juniper Creek geezer.

I could go on and on with the storylines that haven't gotten the treatment they deserved or seem to have been abandoned altogether:

-- The Church of Bill that, in the season premiere that Bill and Don were building. It's now just collecting dust? Bill has replaced religion with politics I guess.

-- The "firing" of Don Embrey as Bill handed his closest friend over to the media and publically outed him as a polygamist. What happened to him, to his family? And who's taking care of Home Plus while Bill's busy with a campaign, a casino, a baby mama, a kidnapping in Mexico, the state take-over of the polygamist compound's books and three wives?

-- Alby who fell in love with the Juniper Creek trustee, was the happiest he'd ever been. Now he's grief stricken in the aftermath of his lover's suicide. This storyline needs much more time than it's been given as Alby has been vacillating between being desperately sad and trapped to being evil, like assigning Adaleen to J.J. which has resulted in an Adaleen pregnancy and denouncing his sister as a whore.

-- Joey, who's gone nutty, killing Roman and then going after Hollis Greene and putting the lives of the rest of his family in danger. One minute he's smiling at his brother's campaign kick off event, the next he's holding a gun to Hollis Greene.

I get the feeling that next week's season finale will be so overloaded that it'll be anticlimatic. Every episode has felt so much like a finale, because something shocking has occurred in nearly every one, that there's no way that the ninth installment will feel special, unless of course the Henricksons go public about their polygamy.

As for the most notable storyline in the recent episode, "Next Ticket Out," that belongs to Barb who's being broken, bit by bit, by Bill's single-minded pigheaded narcissism. I blogged about "The Compromises of Barb" over on CliqueClack TV.

What did you think of "Next Ticket Out?" Do you think this fourth season has been too short, the episodes, too packed?

Ep. 42: Next Ticket Out - Recap