what i've been up to - may television edition

so wow. may's over. what did i watch?

- House, Law & Order: SVU, and Law & Order were back for several episodes, and now they're gone again. each show was pretty good in its own right - especially House - even SVU, which has been pretty lackluster the past few seasons.

- now we've entered a pretty bleak summer in terms of television. i'm currently watching mostly reality stuff - Hell's Kitchen, Last Comic Standing... even So You Think You Can Dance during commercials - and of course i'm still watching Battlestar season 4 and the Spectacular Spider-Man cartoon. the reality stuff is just filler stuff to watch, but Battlestar and Spider-Man are my bread and butter. but Battlestar... oh man it's letting me down this season. but not Spidey! Spider-Man continues to be GREAT. i urge everyone to track it down. the sad news? Battlestar and Spider-Man are on hiatus starting next week! and after that, Hell's Kitchen will be over at the end of the month! not really much to look forward to either except for Burn Notice and Mad Men, which both return July/August sometime. oh well. no television means i can focus on catching up on series of the past and/or video games.

- finished watching Freaks and Geeks at the start of May. had they been able to have a four-year production plan in place and been able to pace things out better, the show could have been one of the best. ever. as it was, the show was a little rushed and muddled, yet somehow it started to get repetitive in the final few episodes (of only 18). it sort of had an ending, so at least there's that. it's a great show that could have been even greater.

- watched the first season of the BBC show Ashes to Ashes. it's a spin-off of one of my favorite shows of all time, Life on Mars (which, funny enough, is itself being adapted for American television this fall on ABC - might be worth checking out). Ashes didn't hold a candle to Life at the start of the series, but by the end of the eighth and final episode of the season, it certainly came into its own. it had 2-3 plot twists in the final episode that i did NOT see coming - in a good way. great writing. now if only the rest of the season had been as good. oh well. the best part is just seeing the gang back in action, even if it's in the 80s instead of the 70s. supposedly there's 2 more seasons planned, so here's hoping for some more Ashes goodness next year.

- well, in my last post i said i was going to move on to Deadwood after Ashes. well, i didn't. what happened? Indiana Jones fever struck. with the movie coming out, i devoted a weekend to watching the original trilogy. then i saw the new movie. and it wasn't enough. then i remembered that there was a television show that revolved around Indy as a young lad. The Young Indiana Jones Chronicles. so i downloaded it and i've been slowly making my way through it. why slowly you ask? ...well, it's not very good. ok, the series might pick up when Indy is older, but right now i'm watching the episodes where he's a little kid (like 10-12) and he's sort of annoying! that, and the thin plots are stretched to their breaking point at 45 minutes length. that said, the show does have a certain innocent charm to it, and it's neat seeing all of Europe and Africa (each episode it seems they're filming in a new exotic location - how many shows have the budget for that?) - oh, and it's cool how he meets all these famous people along the way, like Picasso, Tolstoy, Freud, Teddy Roosevelt, etc. so i'm making my way through the show, but it's taking longer than i'd like.

and that's what i've been watching. i suspect June will see me abandoning broadcast television altogether (until Burn Notice and Mad Men start up) and maybe, just maybe i'll make my way through The Young Indiana Jones Chronicles.

-k