On Monday, January 26th, TNT expands its stable of original programming with the premiere of the Warner Horizon production, Trust Me. Starring TV vets Tom Cavanagh and Eric McCormack as best friends and creative partners at fictional Chicago ad agency Rothman Greene & Mohr, Trust Me is a light drama¹ about modern advertising.

Here’s the thing: I want to like this show and I’m going to give it four or five or even six episodes to grow on me. Creators Hunt Baldwin and John Coveny have a combined 20 years of experience in the Chicago ad world, and they and co-EPs Greer Shephard and Michael M. Robin have proven they know how to put together a tight drama on a cable budget with The Closer. But…

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1. I won’t call it a “crama”, no matter what DMc says. [↩]

Forty-four minutes is not enough.

When you bring the always delightful Sara Rue on as a guest star – freaked out to fly and the target of a Very Bad Man – you need to give her some room to breathe.¹ Where was the awkward flirting scene with Eliot? Where was the confused three-person conversation with Parker and Hardison where she can’t see or hear Hardison? I wanted more of Sara Rue. Otherwise, this was yet another solid, entertaining episode.

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1. Or hyperventilate. [↩]

I did a little scientific research with myself last night, and found that the absolute right way to end a weekend that started with a new and deeply disturbing episode of Battlestar Galactica is to sit down with a couple of screwballs on Flight of the Conchords. Actually let’s raise that “couple” to “three,” because without ol’ Ginger Balls, at least half the screws would be missing. In other news, Bret still looks like mama’s little lost bear cub and Jemaine, while sexy as all hell, still carries himself like Frankenstein. I’m sorry, but it’s true. And I’m sorry again, but all the riches of this show are in the details, so this ended up as more of a recap than a review. What can I say? Let’s not worry about semantics and also, life is hard.

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So. What were you expecting? Some peace? Sunshine and lollipops? Rainbows? Of course not. What we got is what we go for in the first place: to have Ronald D. Moore and his small, brilliant band of fiends pluck out our collective eyeballs and hand them to us like so many hard-boiled eggs (oops! Season 3 spoiler alert!). And then to snatch back those eggs and dice them up into little tiny pieces right before our one remaining eye(s). (I apologize; that analogy didn’t work at all.)

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So much joy in Mudville tonight. FNL returned. Pushing Daisies returned. I’ve only got one more day at my job. All in all, a pretty good day.

And you know what? My first day at my new/old job on Monday won’t be nearly as bad as Tami’s.

For those without DirecTV (and those who are out for the next week because some nimrod screwed up,) don’t read the rest. For those who got to see the episode legally or otherwise, more below the fold.

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I’ve spent a lot of time thinking about The United States of Tara. I’m struck by the show’s potential. The pilot is written by Juno screenwriter Diablo Cody, and directed by Craig Gillespie (Lars and the Real Girl). Did I mention it also has the hand of Stephen Spielberg on it? And with Toni Collette playing the lead, The United States of Tara could be a TV masterpiece.

Tara Gregson, played by Collette, suffers from Dissociative Identity Disorder (DID), otherwise known as multiple personality disorder. She also has two children, Kate and Marshall, and has been married to Max (John Corbett) for 17 years. While watching the movie, I was reminded of the first line of Anna Karenina.

“Happy families are all alike; every unhappy family is unhappy in its own way.”

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Oh hell, you give me Dan Lauria¹ and Nicole Sullivan as comedy standins for James Gandolfini and Edie Falco? Point Leverage. Add to that a script from Chris Downey loaded with subtle character humor and a slick turn behind the camera from Jonathan Frakes² and you’ve got another solid hour from the gang.

Considering this episode was the third one shot, I was pretty pleased with the smoothness that ended up on screen.

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1. Interesting – to me and no one else – sidenote: Dan Lauria went to college and played football with my high school coach. Coach was the class advisor for my girlfriend’s class and got Kevin Arnold’s dad as their graduation speaker. He gave a fantastic speech that managed to incorporate Bruce Willis and Ed O’Neill. Afterwards? The girlfriend told me Lauria was a hottie. That was weird. [↩]
2. Number 1 calls the shots on *this* enterprise, bub. [↩]

I love Ugly Betty. But last night’s show left me a bit – perturbed. Just slightly. In “Dress for Success”, Betty is scrambling to hold on to her position in the YETI program. Being a magazine editor is her dream, her passion. Her family should understand this and know (after three years) that the job requires long hours, sometimes at the last minute. They should know she is called away from family functions to run errands for Daniel. It’s her job. She signed on for this and it’s a typical rung in the ladder she hopes to climb.

But her family is giving her flack for doing her job instead of hanging out with the family or putting together gift bags for her sister’s salon opening. (We never saw Hilda thank Betty for those gift bags – or at least not in the profuse way Betty deserved). They hound Betty and lay guilt trips on her for showing up to work, for networking, for basically having any dream that isn’t tied to the family. Read the rest of this entry »

One of the complaints some critics have laid on Leverage is its reliance on common settings for a con/scam/mission show: bank robbery, horse track, etc. Personally, I not only find those locales comforting, but believe that specifically avoiding those settings would be unrealistic. These are thieves, after all. But tonight breaks the mold in a big way and goes somewhere I don’t believe any heist show has gone before.

My knowledge of the strife and suffering in the countries formerly composing Yugoslavia is sketchy, mostly consisting of what I’ve gleaned from features about the region’s basketball tradition. In fact, if not for tall men with names like Vlade and Drazen and Peja, I might not be able to remember the names of all the republics that split off from Yugoslavia. The fighting during the ’90s was intense and the toll is still being felt to this day. I don’t know how common the practice of using orphanages to front for gunrunners is, but there are certainly enough orphans in Belgrade to make it feasible. Read the rest of this entry »

I have to be honest. I remember watching advertisements of 10 Items or Less back in 2006. I was not interested. The commercials reminded me of Saved By The Bell – a show I was addicted to as a kid but hate as an adult. Now that I’m all grown up, the stupid, lame jokes of Saved By the Bell make me wish I could shoot myself instead of enduring another half hour of Zach and gang. So, to avoid being suicidal, I didn’t tune in for 10 Items. After watching “Turkey Bowling”, the 10 Items or Less season premiere, I realize how misleading marketing can be and regret not giving the show a chance 2 years ago.

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