On With the Shows

"Premiere week" is here for most of the fall television shows, and it was a full slate tonight. I'm fresh from the TV screen and now at my computer screen, ready to spew my random thoughts about what I saw tonight.

First up was Prison Break. My love-nervousness relationship with this show continued this week.

On the love side, I'm still fascinated by the development of William Fichtner's character, Mahone. Every week, they paint him one more shade darker, and he becomes more interesting to watch. T-Bag remains the one of the most creepy, infuriating, and entertaining characters on television. As per usual, he got the best line of the night: "I'd have tattooed it to my body, but I didn't have the time." It was great to see so many of the escapees interacting once again, as they did back in season one. And suspense-wise, there were some good moments of tension with Tweener, C-Note, and Sucre all facing brushes with "almost caught."

On the nervousness side, they're careening towards this "loot in Utah" plot point at breakneck speed, and it's not entirely clear where the story has to go after it gets there. It's the same nervousness I've felt throughout this season, wondering if the show will be as good as it was in the first season. And so far, it's been pretty close, so you'd think the nervousness would have gone away by now. I guess that's just one more facet to the fun tension of watching Prison Break.

Second up was the return of How I Met Your Mother, the only watchable comedy on CBS. (It's actually quite a lot better than just "watchable," too.) I don't really have much to say here, because I recognize that as silly as it may be to spend so much time watching and talking about television, it's sillier still to talk about the ongoing plot of a sitcom. (Although you could with this sitcom.) Suffice to say, it's back, and still funny. Add to the weird stupidity of this year's Emmy nominations the fact that Neil Patrick Harris didn't get noticed for his role here.

Incidentally, I say that HIMYM is "only watchable comedy" on CBS, taking into account tonight's premiere of The Class before it. It's been available for sneak previewing on TiVo for a week, and, while not bad, there's nothing that great about it either. Its creative and directorial pedigree includes folks involved with Friends, Cheers, and more, but it doesn't really show any of that brilliance. Given how many great shows are on TV these days, there's no need to make room for one this mediocre.

And speaking of "great shows," the club got one larger tonight with the premiere of Studio 60 on the Sunset Strip. I tuned in, hoping for a proud continuation of Aaron Sorkin's brilliant work on Sports Night and The West Wing, and I was not disappointed. (In fact, they even stole the type face from The West Wing for their credits.) The writing was excellent; the dense discussions of censorship, politics, religion, and other such weighty matters was provocative; the acting was top notch. If any other new fall shows had to be this good for me to start watching them, I probably wouldn't be adding any to my rotation. (Which for me, might not be so bad.)

Anybody else out there have Monday night favorites (new or old) they want to share with the group?