Over the last few years, I’ve invested a lot of time in shows that, for one reason or another, just don’t work out. They get cancelled, they get so unimaginably stupid that even I stop watching, whatever.

But I haven’t read quite as good a takedown on both the mechanics of a bad show playing out the string and the mechanics of Internet Lovefest Guy commentary as the following magnificent paragraph from Todd VanDerWerff at The Onion AV Club, in his review of the penultimate episode of FlashForward:

FlashForward has been canceled. It is a dead show walking, playing out the string in hopes that it can pull enough of itself together that there will be that one guy in every comment thread on the Internet about great shows canceled too soon who will say, “HEY, YOU GUYS REMEMBER FLASHFORWARD? THAT WAS A GREAT SHOW, AND THE NETWORK TREATED IT SO BADLY, AND IT WOULD HAVE BEEN GREAT.” And, eventually, the number of people who are capable of successfully arguing with this guy that, no, FlashForward wasn’t all that great, and it received a gigantic marketing push from a network that gave it one of its best timeslots, and it debuted to an audience of some 12 million who mostly left because it WASN’T VERY GOOD, even with a mostly enjoyable pilot, will dwindle to nothing, but that ONE GUY, that ONE VOICE OF PASSION and LACK OF REASON, will be able to convince some poor souls that it IS worth checking out, and they’ll head on down to the Best Buy (or the post-apocalyptic variant thereof) and go all the way to the back of the TV on DVD section and find a DVD set on the bottom shelf of the last stand, covered in dust, and they’ll take it home, and they’ll pop it in the DVD player, and they’ll realize that guy was a fucking idiot.

Really, if you’re among the few people who’s been suffering along with me watching this stupidity, you should read VanDerWerff’s recap. FlashForward is a terrible show that could be criticized from a thousand angles, but it’s a rare treat to see someone take such a wide target and pinpoint with such surgical precision exactly what went wrong.

It takes a lot to make me stop watching a show. Evidence: I have watched every single episode of ER since its premiere. IN FUCKING 1994.

But I’m with Alan Sepinwall on this one: Heroes has lost me for good, and not because of anything in particular, but because of the sum total of its stupidity.

I was trying to explain why I still like Lost but am deleting my Heroes season pass to a friend, since both shows are often horrifically confusing and unnecessarily convoluted. It comes down to this: Motivation.

Characters on Lost have either had slowly evolving motivations or still are motivated by many of the same things that they were at the outset of the show. Most of the characters on Heroes seem to be motivated by whatever fits the plot that “chapter”, or even that week.

It becomes impossible to care who’s doing what or why when a character’s motivation can change so frequently and so capriciously, and you find yourself wondering why the hell you’re still watching this show in the first place.

It says a lot about how wrong you’ve gone when an unemployed person with nothing but time to kill decides that watching your show is not worth her time.

Credit to Sars of Tomato Nation for coining the phrase “DVR Break-Up“. Brilliant in its simplification of the process of deleting all recorded episodes of a show, then torpedoing the season pass. Amusing that she inaugurated it with Heroes six months ago, because she does not posess the patience (read: stupidity) that I do.

Spoilers for the last couple episodes of Grey’s Anatomy and The L Word, in the unlikely event that anyone who gives half a shit about either show hasn’t either seen the episodes or heard about them.

There are many shows that, for whatever reason, have their characters do things that are either entirely out of character, wholly implausible, or both. Usually this reason is that the writers have run out of ideas, but sometimes they’re just weird.

The question becomes: How do you address this within the show? Two shows I watch have pulled really odd and implausible plot twists out of their asses, and have gone with entirely different tacks in terms of how the other characters react to the weirdness.

Grey’s Anatomy has had Katherine Heigl’s character, Izzie, fucking the ghost of her dead ex-boyfriend. Like, having actual sex with a ghost. No other characters find out about it for a couple episodes, and when Izzie’s actual living, breathing, boyfriend, Alex, finds out about it, his reaction is roughly, “Whatever.”

The whole fucking-a-ghost thing is weird and implausible enough on its own, but for Alex to not really have a reaction to it made it that much stupider. As a doctor, he should at least be concerned about someone having massive hallucinations. As her boyfriend, he should really be concerned that she’s cheating on him with said hallucinations.

The whole thing’s just been handled atrociously, and what’s worse is that it’s STILL dragging out. There was some resolution in the last episode (apparently, Dead Boyfriend came back to tell Izzie that she’s sick, but he wasn’t an omniscient enough ghost to actually tell her what she has), but there’s still a lot of unraveling that arc has to do.

Meanwhile, The L Word, usually a show I still watch because it’s grown so cartoonishly bad it’s actually funny, actually handled an out-of-character moment for two of its characters really, really well.

Jenny is the resident flake/screenwriter, Shane is the resident seductress/slut. The characters have been good friends for several seasons, but apparently Jenny decided she was in love with Shane, and at the end of the episode two Sundays ago, declared said love.

Shane reacted to this by sleeping with her, eliciting a collective, “What the FUCK?!” from the lesbians and friends of lesbians who still watch this show, because such a pairing really makes no sense for either character. Even in a show infamous for lack of continuity and character inconsistency, this stood out as really bizarre.

But the payoff to the hookup that happens in the first few minutes of the next episode made me completely ignore its irrationality. Alice, a friend of both Jenny and Shane, comes over the morning after the ridiculous hookup, and has an awesome moment of revelation where she realizes Jenny and Shane had sex.

The camera pushes in on her face like in a Hitchcock movie where someone’s just realized they know who the killer is. Due credit to Leisha Hailey, who plays Alice: The way her facial expression morphs into a truly horrified grimace as the camera pushes in is absolutely hysterical.

Alice immediately excuses herself to use the restroom, and sends out a freaked-out mass text to all their mutual friends. The montage of reactions (one person falls off a treadmill, one person busts out laughing in the middle of a meeting, one person even gives an out loud, “What the fuck?”) is truly the best sequence they’ve done in years.

And why was this so funny? Because they took the bomb they just dropped on the audience and showed that even within the show, people were completely flummoxed and thrown by the development, just as much as the audience was. They effectively told the audience, “We know what we’re doing is insane. Stick with us on this one,” by making every other character in the show a proxy for the audience’s reaction.

Now I will grant the Grey’s folks one thing: They have to fill 22 episodes, where as the L Word writers only had to fill 8 episodes for their truncated final season. Part of the reason the L Word writers may have moved to address the issue so quickly was that they really didn’t have time not to.

Whatever the reason, it’s a fascinating contrast in how writers approach plotlines that take both the characters and the audience out of their comfort zones.

I finally gave up on a couple shows I’d watched every episode of earlier this year, Prison Break and Desperate Housewives.

While in DH’s case I hear I may have given up right before the show creatively resurrected itself, this spoilery item indicates I checked out of Prison Break at the right time.

Because seriously? That’s the most implausible plot twist they’ve come up with, and this is a show that’s pretty much a maze of implausible plot twists.

Shut up, Emo Peter Parker.

Although I’m at a bit of an unfair advantage: Working at the Fox Lot, we got a free screening tonight of Juno.

While I’m not nearly as eloquent a reviewer as Tim (and I actually look forward to his take on this movie), I’ll give the short version.

This is a movie with several major flaws, the most notable of which is a grating, failed attempt to capture the way teens talk to each other. It has its moments of hilarity, but the overall effect is distracting.

That said, if you want to see a LOT of outstanding acting, you should definitely see this movie.

Starting with Ellen Page (who does an outstanding job as the titular protagonist) and going down through every single supporting character, these actors do a really great job of selling material that often does not deserve it.

I’ll throw in a mention of Jennifer Garner, who I’ve always enjoyed but have never been terribly impressed with until now. She really sells the quiet desperation in a role that could have been made shrewishly hysterical by the wrong actress. Luckily, they cast Garner, and she’s great in a pivotal role.

There are a few very strong moments in the story, which I won’t spoil for those who wish to see it. But the bottom line is that while this movie has its issues, it’s certainly still worth being seen just for Page and Garner’s performances.

Also, I’d just like to note that I now have a huge crush on Ellen Page, which feels slightly less wrong after finding out she’s not quite as young as she looks and is actually 20, although still fairly wrong as she cannot legally drink.

I had not even been considering seeing wholly unnecessary sequel Elizabeth: The Golden Age until I read Tim’s magnificent review of it in all its glorious awfulness.

Now, I have to see it. This is why Tim should be writing reviews for a living. God bless Rotten Tomatoes for adding him to the Tomatometer, giving him at least some of the exposure he richly deserves.

Almost a month into the season, I can now declare an official winner: Pushing Daisies.

I’d absolutely loved the first two episodes, with their bizarre hyper-techincolor acid trip set design, extremely strong acting, and cute (but without crossing the fine line into too cute) stories.

I was worried, however, because both episodes were directed by Barry Sonnenfeld, who directed Men in Black and The Addams Family, and whose excellent, ebullient visual storytelling leaned heavily on what turned out to be an absolutely obscene budget.

You saw every penny of the lavish spending on the screen, but in the world of television, that kind of outlay over 22 weeks becomes simply unsustainable.

So unsustainable, in fact, that ABC actually took the draconian step of banning Sonnenfeld from directing future episodes and slashing the budget to the bone. I worried that without the wild, inspired world they were able to paint with all that money, the whole house of cards would fall down.

I’m pleased to report that the writing of this week’s episode was inspired enough that I barely noticed the more drab and dimly lit surroundings.

Trying to explain what actually happens in the show is a bit of a mess. The basic premise is moderately understandable (though is annoyingly reiterated in every episode thus far): The main character touches a dead person once, they are resurrected. If he touches them again, they die, and stay dead.

If he does not touch them again to re-kill them in a minute, however, someone or something nearby will die in their place. He uses this power to help solve murders, and collect rewards. Oh, and he also revives dead fruit to make delicious pies at his awesomely named pie restaurant, the Pie Hole.

But trying to capture the texture of this show in words is totally impossible, other than to say it’s the most wildly inventive show I’ve seen in some time, and it’s clear that both the writers and the production designers have found themselves some truly excellent hallucinogens.

If you’re willing to read some spoilers, professional TV critic Alan Sepinwall sums up why this ridiculousness works a lot better than I can. Even he can’t capture the true level of weirdness, so if you haven’t seen any of the episodes yet, you should try and get the ABC.com streaming to work for you, and watch whatever episodes they have up.

Pushing Daisies‘ weird, wild house of cards could still all collapse in on itself. I’ll certainly admit to some misgivings about how long they can sustain the delicate balance they’ve struck. But until it does collapse, missing it would be a real shame.

What a waste.

The pilot was way better than I’d heard it would be, particularly the excellent fight scenes, and I thought this could turn into a good show. But what false optimism it gave me has quickly been dissolved by the second and third episodes.

I’ve come to agree with the critics: Michelle Ryan is disastrously miscast as the lead. I was hoping the weaknesses she showed in the pilot would go away as she got more comfortable in the role, but they’re still there all the way through the third episode. She makes the character seem obnoxiously wishy-washy, and when you’re supposed to be a superhero, that’s the kiss of death.

Katee Sackhoff is by far the best part of the show as “The First Bionic Woman,” as she refers to herself in the pilot. The way Sackhoff is instantly and totally confident in her role no matter how ridiculous her character’s story becomes only makes Ryan’s miscasting all the more glaring.

I will say, the hysterically funny levels of LESBIAN SUBTEXT! (it’s about that subtle) between the two [Les]Bionic Women are aaaaalmost worth suffering through another episode.

Unfortunately, the show’s not nearly compelling enough to keep watching. I guess I’m just going to have to start getting Battlestar Galactica DVDs from Netflix. Mmmm…Starbuck…

Here’s another quick set of impressions of the stuff I watched this week. I’ll post scattered quickies of some of the late-premiering stuff, but this is the last big roundup.

This week’s bias alerts come from the fact that I work for these folks, so reviews for anything in our timeslot (9/8 central, Tuesdays) or in our medical genre you should view with a wary eye. That said:

Cane (Tuesdays at 10, CBS) – It’s nice to see non-white culture represented on network TV, but the level of arm-flailing “HEY! LOOK! CUBANS!” is pretty silly. They roast pigs! They have dance sequences! They smoke enough cigars to make a viewer cough from the thought of all the secondhand smoke! The oddest aspect of this is the occasional line or set of lines in (english-subtitled) Spanish, when the remainder of the scene is in English, with exceedingly clumsy transitions between the two.

However, despite some Dynasty-level plot twists, it’s not ridiculous enough to dismiss out of hand. There are a ton of absolutely outstanding actors in this, and the setting is novel enough that once the writers hit their stride, it could turn into a really interesting show. The only question is if enough viewers will stick around to keep this show on the air until then.

Dirty Sexy Money (Wednesdays at 10, ABC) – Another entry in the overstuffed “Rich People are Fucking Crazy” genre, but this one’s at least more entertaining than most. Peter Krause is great as the lawyer trying to get disentangled with a disgustingly rich family his father got entangled with years ago.

Donald Sutherland is a bit over the top as the patriarch of said family, but the excesses here are not nearly as obnoxious as those of Big Shots (see below). Total soap opera, but it reminds me of the first season of Desperate Housewives, back when that show was actually pretty damn good.

Reaper (Tuesdays at 9, CW) – This show is a direct competitor to my employers, so I can’t give it a full review. It’s similar to Chuck in a lot of ways, but different enough to not come off as a complete clone. Ray Wise, who plays the devil, is hysterical and blatant in his thievery of every scene he’s in. Let’s just say I wish this was in another timeslot.

Private Practice (Wednesdays at 9, ABC) – Disappointing. When you take her away from the increasingly annoying characters who populate Grey’s Anatomy (from which this show was spun off), Addison just becomes another annoying character. It’s an absolute waste of Kate Walsh’s talent.

A point I agreed with that was hammered home in review after review I read of this show was that these middle-aged people have gained no wisdom with age – They’re just as neurotic as the 20-somethings who populate Grey’s, but without the excuse of youth to forgive their ridiculously unnecessary drama. If you don’t like Grey’s, you’ll hate this, and even if you do, you still may not like it very much.

Big Shots (Thursdays at 10, ABC) – Breathtakingly smarmy, and damn near unwatchable. I don’t think I’ve ever wanted to punch every single main character in the face within the first five minutes of a pilot before.

Gets the uncoveted distinction of First Season Pass Deletion of the season, a feat achieved the second the pilot was over. Oh, and whoever thought this show would work well in the post-Grey’s timeslot needs to get canned, or at least drug tested, right quick.