American Idol winner - wtf?

This is what I wrote that night.

American Idol winner - wtf? possibly the most depressing thing I've seen on TV in a long time. So horribly wrong. Looking forward to seeing what the judges think. I noticed Simon didn't stand up at the end along with the other judges. Trust Americans to pick the safe, bland middle of the road choice. At least Adam won't have to sing that horrible single.

Weird: Cyndi Lauper playing the dulcimer on Time After Time; Steve Martin playing the banjo; bikini girl.

Painful: Having to sit through 2 freakin' hours of crap for a few seconds of revealing the winner.

Evocative: Brian May of Queen playing with Adam Lambert, reincarnation of Freddie Mercury.

On the other hand, maybe America should be scared of  a man who will wear this outfit - (round bling thingy on his thigh certainly reminiscent of handcuffs):

American Idol finale performance show

Catching up here on all the Idol doings this week.

The highlight may have been Adam's outfits. Haha. So...picspam below. Each finalist sang 3 songs. They each picked their favorite performance of the season and repeated it. That was disappointing, as I would have preferred to hear fresh material. Adam sang Mad World, which is definitely my favorite. While his outfit completely rocked, the studio version is much better than his live performance last night. He didn't hit the notes squarely at times, or as the judges would say, at times it was "pitchy". Although none of them said so last night. But the outfit...OMG, I loved it SO MUCH.

Kris chose Ain't No Sunshine, which is a song I really liked, and it was his best performance of the night. I liked the piano on it. Very nice.

Then they performed songs chosen by the show's creator, Simon Fuller. Adam did Change is Gonna Come, a Sam Cooke song and this was his best performance of the night. Absolutely fantastic. As soon as he finished, I wanted to watch him do it again. Amazing. Plus another great outfit, a silvery suit with a turquoise tie and, I think, silver boots!

Kris's song was....can't remember and didn't write it down. It was fine, but boring. Simon said it was like a bunch of guys strumming guitars at home. LOL

The last song of the night was the first single from the season, co-written by judge Kara DioGuardi. I didn't like the song at all. Not even Adam could sell it to me. I preferred his performance of it, not surprisingly. Kris' performance of it was off on some notes.

Last pic below is Adam kissing Kris on the head. Awwww. They're pretty cute together.

The L Word Finale: Reaction

The finale of The L Word should have had me crying, but instead I felt totally apathetic. I wanted to know who killed Jenny, but when it became clear that they weren't going to tell us, I was surprisingly disengaged. All in all, none of the open plot lines were resolved, which was very frustrating. This last season was a complete failure, in my opinion, even worse than the previous one.


Who Killed Jenny: Both Tina and Bette had opportunity. I don't think anyone else did, but correct me if I'm wrong. Of the two, I don't think Tina could kill. Bette possibly could, but the threat from Jenny didn't seem adequate to make her kill. It would have been more convincing if they'd built up the threat more gradually instead of inserting it last episode. I tend to think Jenny tripped and fell.

In any case, the "Who Killed Jenny?" tagline for the entire 6th season was somewhat of a red herring, poorly planned and poorly executed. If you're going to frame a TV show as a mystery, you should provide the goods. Yes, they carefully provided each character a reason to kill Jenny. But it was pro forma. It was as if their heart wasn't in it. It wasn't really believable. They've spent 5 seasons trying to get us to empathize with these characters, and now we're supposed to believe one of them was capable of killing Jenny? This was half a mystery. We didn't see Jenny die, we didn't even hear her fall or scream, there weren't any real clues as to what happened, other than both Bette and Tina were alone with her right before it happened. And there's an awful lot of irony in having a show that was supposed to celebrate lesbian's lives end in death.

I assumed Bette and Tina were going to adopt Max's baby, but they didn't even resolve that. And, by the way, they never explained why they decided to adopt rather than have one of them carry the baby themselves. Unless I missed it. They already did that, so why not again? Apparently just to provide a mini-plot about a potential birth mother.

Dylan and Helena: WTF??? An awful lot of the episode was taken up with strange interactions between these two and I found I just didn't care. I felt like there must have been a missing episode that would have explained what was happening, LOL. Suddenly Dylan's grabbing a knife and into d/s? Why would Dylan have been mad about the "test" if Jenny already told her about it? It didn't really make sense. And why did they make Helena basically an alcoholic so late in the game? What was the point? And when did she acquire this fancy-schmancy seaside home? I thought she lost everything when she went to jail.

Alice/Tasha: It was very awkward when Tasha suddenly appeared at the end. I guess it was supposed to mean she rejected Jamie in favor of Alice, but it was so rushed, it wasn't clear.

Shane/Molly: I loved seeing Molly again. There didn't seem to be any point to her letter to Shane other than convincing Shane that Jenny really was evil. I wish they had let Shane stay with Molly. (And, guh, Carmen in the tribute video. I forgot how hot she was.)

I laughed when Jenny said her tribute video was 3 hours long.

And what was up with the smiling strutting in the final credits? That was just weird. We segue from the friends mourning Jenny, all sad-faced and anguished, to smiling, well-groomed, shiny, happy people sauntering in slo-mo towards the camera, for no apparent reason.

Minor quibble: I also laughed when Jenny was frantically trying to buy editing software mere hours before the video was supposed to be finished, and sent Shane out to the Mac store to buy Final Cut. I have that software, and you'd have to be a genius to learn it in a couple of hours. This little exchange pushed my buttons because Final Cut has been nagging my soul for a few months and I quake in my boots every time I start trying to make a video with it. I keep wimping out and using iMovie instead (way simpler). Possibly Jenny was familiar with the software already, but why was she just buying it? They showed her with the video on her computer before she talked about having to buy the software.

Thoughts on sequel with Alice: Alice in prison? darker tone? give me a break. What's great about Alice is her wry humor. She doesn't seem suited to a prison story. And do we really need another show about lesbians in prison? Did Chaiken not get this out of her system with Helena's ridiculous jail story? I can't imagine this is going to be any good. Although I hear Laurie Metcalf is going to be in it, and I've always liked her. (She played Rosanne's sister on the Roseanne show back in the day, and in fact, I always thought she'd make a good lesbian, or at least her character in that show should have come out, haha.)

Americans' Tender Sensibilities

I just read this article in the New York Times about "Ashes to Ashes," which I watched on BBCAmerica last night. Apparently Americans just can't take the actual dialogue of DCI Gene Hunt and BBCAmerica decided to edit it. Crap! "[Hunt's face can be seen on] coffee mugs, T-shirts and bottle openers emblazoned with one of Gene Hunt’s most famous run-on slurs, “You Great, Soft, Cissy, Girly, Nancy, French Bender, Man United Supporting Poof.” (BBC America has chosen to clean up his juicily phrased, almost poetically off-color outbursts.)" That's really too bad because that sounds like it would be really entertaining. I never watched "Life on Mars" (this is a sequel to that show), but I'd really like to, especially as it stars John Simm (I loved him as the Master in Dr. Who), but apparently it's not available on DVD in the US, so I'll have to resort to other methods, whenever I get around to it.

I was intrigued by the premiere episode, but I couldn't help wondering why Alex Drake, the lead female character, (Keeley Hawes from MI-5, another show I loved) kept her over-the-top 80's makeup and costume after the first day of her arrival in the 80's, since her contemporary dress and look was very restrained. Sadly, I'm old enough that the 1981 setting has quite a bit of nostalgia for me. It's funny to hear the old songs and see all the old technology (wow, a Sony Walkman!, VCRs!, rotary phones! desktop computers that can only play Pong) and remember when that was all we had.



NYTimes Review of "Ashes to Ashes"

I'll be watching The L Word finale tonight, which I'm sure will be just as ridiculous as the rest of the show. There's no way they can resolve all the open-ended plot points in one hour. So disappointed in Ilene Chaiken. This show could have been so much better.

New TV fav: Mistresses

My newest TV favorite: "Mistresses" on BBCAmerica. Mistresses homepage; Mistresses on imdb.com. I love this show! The title's cheesy, but the show is packed with intriguing and sophisticated female characters who are full-fledged adults with all the accompanying baggage, anxieties and subtleties. The show features four female friends in varying sorts of relationships, from married to widowed to devotedly single and adulterous, who each get involved with someone during the course of the series. There are six episodes in Series 1 and a second series in now airing in the UK. I've seen two episodes and I was immediately drawn into the lives of these characters. After the first one, I couldn't wait to see the second. I think this is partly due to the quality of the acting, which is fantastic. There are several actors that have appeared in other recent British shows shown in the US, including Sharon Small (The Inspector Lynley Mysteries, aired on PBS) and Raza Jaffrey (MI-5, aired on BBCAmerica). My two favorite characters so far are Katy Ronan and Siobhan Dillon, played by Sarah Parish and Orla Brady, respectively. Katy is a doctor who had a long-term affair with a patient who recently died. Her lover's adult son is now hot on the trail of his father's lover, but also has the hots for Katy, who is also his doctor. Siobhan is a married lawyer who is trying to get pregnant and getting involved with a co-worker. The difficulties Siobhan and her husband are facing are played with quiet poignancy. (Katy on right, Siobhan on left)

Other highlights are Anna Torv playing a lesbian about to get married, but attracted to main character, single and loving it Jessica Fraser, played by the beautiful Shelley Conn. Torv stars in American series "Fringe" (another of my favorites) as FBI agent Olivia. She's very believable here as a lesbian. (Is it getting hotter in here or is it my imagination?)

While this might sound like a rip-off of Sex and the City, Brit-style, the show feels completely different, perhaps because it's an hour long and goes at a slower pace. And, of course, because it's British. There is less overt discussion of men and sex, and more scenes that simply show the women's friendship and the development of the various sexual relationships. The show is airing on BBCAmerica on Friday nights at 9pm EST.

Review of "24 Redemption"

I mentioned "24 Redemption" as something I was looking forward to watching in November. I finally got around to watching it last night. Wow. It was fantastic. Riveting from the first shot. Completely absorbing. At first, I was a bit taken aback by the scenes of children being brutally forced to become soldiers in a fictional African country. But this is the reality in some places, and it made for some gripping scenes. You soon find out that Jack Bauer, the hero of "24", is hiding out at a boy's school being run by an old spy friend of his. I won't give away the plot, but you come to empathize with the boys and Jack's need to protect them. The U.S. Congress has issued a subpoena for Jack to testify about mistreatment of prisoners and Jack is trying to avoid the subpoena. (Jack? mistreat prisoners? no way. LOL) I was quickly reminded of what I love about "24," which is watching Jack get out of one ridiculous situation after another. It's nothing for Jack to single-handedly get rid of 10-15 heavily armed men. At one point, some bad guys are torturing Jack to get information. Clearly, they don't know Jack, because that is impossible.

The story shifts between Africa, where Jack, his friend, and the boys struggle for safety, and the U.S., where a new president is about to be sworn in. The American scenes are wonderfully intriguing, with lots of mysterious shenanigans by behind-the-scenes schemers. There's a great scene between the president-elect (played by Cherry Jones) and the current president (played by Powers Booth), in which Booth sort of awkwardly hands over the reins of power to Jones. Booth has a great voice (he was great in this role, which he played in last season) and Jones is perfect as the new president. She conveys wisdom, power and naivete all at the same time. Great stuff.

There are interesting contrasts between the inauguration scene and Africans trying to get into the American embassy to escape a civil war. The Americans are definitely not always the good guys in this prequel.

This 2 hour prequel did the job for me. I absolutely can't wait for the new season to begin in January.

Watch "24 Redemption" here. It looks way better on the website than it did on my crappy old TV.

Here's the trailer for Season 7: