Cowboys & Indians

There was, after three long weeks of mind-numbing nonsense, at least one good moment in tonight's Prison Break episode. That was the cliffhanger dilemma in which the General has Sara, while Christina has Lincoln -- each threatening Michael with their leverage. Not that Prison Break is even a shadow of what it once was, but this sort of puzzle, requiring Michael to figure out how to achieve both goals, is as close to some of the classic problems of season one as we've seen in a long, long time.

But really, that was the only good thing going tonight. The rest was just noisy boredom. Blah, blah, blah, extended chase sequence, blah, blah, evil mustache twirling, blah, blah, more evil mustache twirling, blah, blah, uninteresting action sequence, blah, blah, blah.

I figure at this point I might actually understand how fans of the TV series Heroes must feel, to see a show they liked so much in its first year become so bad you could scarcely find ways to make it worse. The show is an obligation now, and I'm afraid if next week's finale can't deliver more than the "one good idea" of this week's, it will have slipped so far as to tarnish the thought of the show ever having been good. Even when Alias dipped after season two, and flatlined in season four, I never remember feeling as down on the show as I feel now about Prison Break.

Since its return three weeks ago, it has saddled the struggling Dollhouse with a worse lead-in than even Terminator was providing, resulting in the worst ratings yet. This after Dollhouse finally managed to transform from the show that you hoped would get better to the show you'd actually miss if it were gone. The final insult in the blighting of Prison Break is that it may have driven the last nail in the coffin and taken another Joss Whedon show with it.

One last obligation to fulfill next week, and then I can wash my hands of it.