Warm Glowing Warming Glow

Dude, Where's Your Other Hand?

I think I liked just about 100% of last night's Heroes.  All week I was thinking, "Oh, Heroes.  Nothing's going to happen on you until the season finale."  Then yesterday afternoon, I thought, "Oh, maybe they'll set up a good cliffhanger to resolve on the finale . . ."  Which they did and actually, I'm almost afraid to talk about the series of plot twists and stunts, for fear of presenting as a gaping fan boy.  Eric Roberts -- dead! Ted -- dead!  Linderman -- dead!  D.L. -- dying?  Candice -- fat?  OK, I actually don't care about Candice's weight that much -- or Ted or D.L., for that matter.  D.L. dispatching Linderman was pretty cool -- it's been nagging at me, though.  Have we seen that move somewhere before?  Did Kitty Pryde ever do something like that? 

Should we talk about the political subtext of Heroes?  I've certainly detected certain messages in recent episodes.  "Five Years Gone," seemed, in part, to be about September 11.   In this episode, we had Micah using his powers to get Nathan into Congress.  I'm not sure what to say about that, except that we really have to consider the dangers of super-powered children tampering with electronic voting machines.

Any thoughts on what's coming next week?  Boom? -- Peter

First Impressions

Grace a NBC's on-going relationship with the youtubes, we have access to one-minute clips of NBC's new shows for next fall.  I've watched them and I'm not sure what I think.  This is my favorite:

I probably won't watch Life, but it's a good clip, don't you think? Damian Lewis has always been an exciting actor and I forgot how good Sarah Shahi was on Alias.

CBS: Kind Of Gay?

I just sort of skimmed Variety's report on CBS's new shows, but it reads kind of gay to me: musicals, vampires, viva something, Hugh Jackman?  Am I wrong? 

ABC: American Berlanti Company

Our man Greg Berlanti (though I'm still on the fence about Brothers & Sisters) gets two new shows picked up at ABC: Eli Stone, starring Jonny Lee Miller and Dirty Sexy Money, with Peter Krause, Jill Clayburgh and Glenn Fitzgerald. 

I'm curious about Pushing Daisies, the new show from Bryan Fuller (Dead Like Me, Wonderfalls, Heroes).

Here's the whole new slate.

NBC: Friday Night Lights, Literally

I can't believe it's already upfronts week.  (Is that right?)  Here's a link to NBC's press release, announcing its fall schedule.  I didn't have that much invested in NBC this year, so I don't care that much, but it looks like all good news: Friday Night Lights is back (albeit in a crap timeslot), 30 Rock is back, plus a huge order for The Office.

P.S. Holy crap!  Josh Schwartz is one of the producers of Chuck, which sounds like Jake 3.0.  I think the WC is likely to pick up his other show, Gossip Girl, but this is the first I knew he had something for NBC, too. 

Veronica Mars Death Watch IV

According to Michael Ausiello, there's still a pretty good chance that Veronica Mars will be back in the fall. 

My Life Before My Liberty

One of the pleasures of Heroes is trying to predict which book or movie the writers will shamelessly rip off next.  I'm trying to remember if they've pulled out The Manchurian Candidate before, and I don't think they have to the extent they did in last night's episode ("The Hard Part").  This was a nice episode for Cristine Rose -- sometimes she's a little too much for me, but scenes like the ones she had with Claire ("Now let's talk about gloves.") and Nathan (almost a complete paraphrase of the famous scene from The Manchurian Candidate) really highlighted her strengths.  I'm kind of slow, though -- I guess I thought that she and Linderman represented rival conspiracies and that she was a force for good.  Now it's clear that Claire escaping from Eric Roberts was really just slipping from the frying pan into the fire. 

Elsewhere . . . no real forward momentum with Hiro and Ando.  At this point, it's hard to feel a great deal of suspense because we know that nearly all of the characters have to be around for the big season finale conflagration/showdown, not just because it makes sense dramatically, but because we learned they would be in last week's episode, when Hiro and Ando traveled to the future.  Any deviation from that version of the future would steal from the inevitability we're supposed to feel about the apocalypse. So, no, didn't really expect Hiro to be able to kill Sylar.  Did enjoy seeing Ellen Greene (Sylar's Mom) again, however.   

Where the Hell did that gun come from, though?  Peter just found it in the sideboard, wrapped in a napkin, right?  The Hell?  Don't kids live in that house? 

The Perfume Called Stars Hollow

Kind of a funny Lauren Graham interview here -- I wouldn't put too much stock in it, because I think she's too smart to say anything really revealing about the network or Scott Patterson or the various executive producers, but it's a nice read regardless. 

"Down-to-Earth and Fun"

I got really worried when I saw this headline.  I thought Bravo was considering tinkering with the Tim Gunn end of Project Runway, but no, they're reportedly trying to fun up Tim Gunn's Guide to Style.  I'm not sure if I care.  On the one hand, "down-to-earth and fun" is code for "vapid and whorish," which is, in turn, code for Nancy O'Dell (OK -- I don't know she's whorish, but . . . she's the one who sent Wendy Pepper to Fashion Week, so I think I'm allowed); on the other hand, is Tim Gunn's Guide to Style even a good idea in the first place?  Tim is already over-exposed.  Seeing him on a Queer Eye knock-off might really ruin him for all of us. 

The Morning Line

I feel like Nikki Finke didn't do that great a job last year of predicting which pilots would get picked up, so I wouldn't put too much stock in this page, but it's still kind of interesting.  It's hard to believe it's almost time for upfronts again.