TV review: The Fabulous Beekman Boys

How many of you knew that Discovery has a channel called Planet Green? I didn't. At least not until The Fabulous Beekman Boys appeared. (New episodes aired Wednesday nights at 9PM.) Yes, Discovery has dragged me back into reality television.

The show revolves around city boys, Josh Kilmer-Purcell and Brent Ridge, purchasing a farm in upstate New York called Beekman Farm. Their goal is to turn the farm into their main source of income. In order to do that, Brent (a doctor that previously worked for Martha Stewart) works and lives at the farm full-time while Josh (a former drag queen who is now an ad exec) works in New York City during the week then commutes up to the farm on weekends. Luckily, they have farmer John to help them tend the goat herd that gives them milk for their cheese and soap. Unfortunately, they don't have someone to help them through the strains of a long-distance relationship.

When I first saw the commercial for the show, I was delighted. It was touted to be a "City Boys Become Farmers" type show. (Yes, there are a lot of Green Acres comparisons.) The commercials claimed the boys knew nothing about being farmers and everything they knew, they learned from Google. In reality, the show is about the strains on their relationship. The pair have been together for 10 years and, for the first time, they aren't together all the time. Josh spends 5 days a week in New York City, which is 3 hours away by train, while Brent stays at the farm working on building the Beekman empire. A lot of the episodes revolve around Josh complaining that he never sees his boyfriend as Brent reminds him that they agreed to this "year of sacrifice" or Josh complaining that he's tired from working hard all week only to return to the farm so Brent can hand him a list of farm chores. Yet, underneath it all, you can see that Josh and Brent really do love each other and, if they can get the farm to a point where it can financially support them, things will be happy again.

So what is my opinion on the show? The 10-episode season ended last night. I purposely waited until the end to talk about it. The first few episodes were annoying. I wanted the "How do we milk a goat? Google it!" show and not the 'Gay guys whine/cry a lot' that we were given. However, by the end of the season, I was hooked. I really want to try their cheese and smell their soap. I want Josh to quit his city job and be a real farmer. I want Brent to relax a bit...though I know it won't happen. The show has been renewed for a second season. I'm hoping that there will be less whining this time around.

TV review: Modern Family

Somehow I have forgotten to talk about THE best show of the season - Modern Family. The show is a look into an extended family with a sort of reality show spin to it. There are three separate households that are related to each other. There's Jay's (Ed O'Neill) house where he lives with his second wife, Gloria (Sofia Vergara), and her son, Manny (Rico Rodriguez). Then there's Claire's (Julie Bowen), Jay's oldest child from his first marriage, house. She lives with her husband Phil (Ty Burrell) and her three children, Hayley (Sarah Hyland), Alex (Ariel Winter), and Luke (Nolan Gould). Finally, there's Mitchell's (Jesse Tyler Ferguson) house. He lives with his partner Cameron (Eric Stonestreet) and their adopted baby girl, Lily.

The three households interact, much like any family would, but each is punctuated with a dialogue directed at the camera/crew. This gives the show a better look into the family dynamics. Instead of just showing the tense relationship between Jay and his out-of-the-closet son, Mitchell, there will be a scene focusing on how the pair interacts, but then the camera will cut to a monologue with each character separately telling how they relate to either each other or the situation. While this sounds like it could be boring, it's often the funniest part of each episode.

This mockumentary way of telling a story isn't particularly new. Christopher Guest does it in all of his movies. However, it is new to a weekly television series. It can be rather difficult to get the storyline across to the audience without getting distracted by the various monologues. Yet it works here. Both the writing and the acting is absolutely brilliant. The show airs on Wednesday nights at 9PM on ABC. I'm not sure if it's available on Hulu, but ABC often reruns episodes. You definitely need to catch this one!

TV review: Demons

On Saturday, February 6, BBC America aired the final episode of the series Demons. At a mere six episodes, the show was extremely short. Especially considering the content.

Luke Rutherford (Christian Cook) is the last of the Van Helsing men. According to Rupert Galvin (Philip Glenister), it is now his job to hunt down demons known as "half lives" and smite them. With help from Galvin, Mina Harker (Zoe Tapper), and his best friend Ruby (Holliday Grainger), he faces vampires, harpies, demons, and more.

The show started off slow, which isn't promising considering how little time the writers have to get the story out and wrap it up. There were a few really good episodes in there. I think "Smitten" was my favorite. However, the writers spent a lot of time building up to something spectacular for Luke, only to end it without giving it to us. Instead, they give us a bit of a cliff-hanger. Unfortunately, it has been confirmed that there will not be a second season so we will never get the resolution to the climax. That would be why I can't really recommend it to anyone. It just doesn't go anywhere.

On the good side, both Christian Cook and Holliday Grainger gave some good performances. I hope to see more excellent work from them in the future.

Grammy Awards

The Grammy Awards aired last night on CBS. I normally don't watch award shows, but my husband is a Lady Gaga fan and he wanted to see if she would win anything. Luckily for me, Green Day performed so that made up for having to sit through the lengthiness of an award show. (Seriously - fewer commercial breaks and just shut the hell up.)

I found most of the performances to be rather dull. Mainly because, for some reason, whoever was in charge of mixing the songs decided that the lead vocals weren't nearly as important as the background vocals or the horn sections. I spent half of Beyonce's performance going "What is she singing? I can't hear a word she's saying!" The other half was "Huh. Is she singing an Alanis song?" Green Day's performance had the potential to be amazing, but, yet again, the mixer screwed everything up. Isn't this the reason they have rehearsals?

On the awards side, I was stunned that a country music band (Zac Brown Band) won Best New Artist. They were up against some tough competition. I guess this shows that this particular award was given out on merit instead of popularity. Otherwise one of the pop girls would have been a shoo-in. I was also a little surprised that "Single Ladies" won Song of the Year. It's not really a great song. Sure, it's catchy and it gets stuck in your head, but that doesn't make it great. Ah, well, award show...popularity contest and all that.

So, as usual, I was an unimpressed with the Grammy Awards as I have ever been. Will I watch next year? I don't know. I guess we'll see what rocks the music world this year. Maybe next year will be more interesting.

TV: Cougar Town

One of the new shows that I have been watching this season is Cougar Town. To be honest, I never heard about the show until my husband recorded it for me one night. The show had me laughing my butt off right from the beginning.

Here's the premise: Jules (Courtney Cox) is a recently divorced woman with a 17-year old son. With a bit of help from her best friends - Ellie (Christa Miller) and Laurie (Busy Phillips) - she tries to put a little excitement in her life and, maybe, find a good man along the way.

At first glance, it doesn't look like it would be anything spectacular. However, the writing and the cast are absolutely perfect. None of the characters are overbearing (or at least they aren't for very long) and you always feel like you are in on the joke. I know that some people are put-off by the title. Look past the words and let the laughter commence!

TV review: Alice

Wow. This review is extraordinarily late. Back in December, 2009, the SyFy channel aired Alice, a re-imagining of the Alice In Wonderland story. My husband and I enjoyed their version of Tin Man so we gave Alice a fair chance. (Unfortunately, we took so long to watch it because my daughter wanted to watch it with me and, well, she's a very busy girl.)

As usual, there were things I absolutely loved and hated about it. The Mad Hatter (Andrew Lee Potter) was brilliant. I think that watching the entire show was worth it JUST for him. Matt Frewer also gave a wonderful performance as the White Knight. I also liked the little touches that made Wonderland...Wonderland. On the down side, the flamingo aircycles were odd. They served a purpose but it seemed like they could have used something better. Also, the White Rabbit pretty much disappeared after the beginning of the show. I would have liked to have seen him just a bit more.

In comparison, I liked Tin Man much better than Alice. However, Alice wasn't a waste of my time. I didn't feel cheated or anything like that. Then again, I blame the Mad Hatter. He was just too awesome for words.

TV review: Torchwood: Children of Earth

Last week, BBC America aired the five-part Torchwood mini-series, Children of Earth. It begins a short while after season 2 ends. The team hasn't forgotten their fallen members, but they are moving on. As always, there is another alien force threatening the earth. This time around, it's the 456, an unknown alien race that appeared 44 years earlier and have returned, speaking through the children of the world.

The show is a lot grittier than what we are used to. Gwen loses hope. One of the team members dies. Jack is forced to do something pretty evil. Meanwhile, society around them is falling into ruin. I really did love the show, even though every episode feels like "how else can we screw over Jack..." and Jack doesn't come out of the ordeal unscathed. He comes out very broken. I would love to see another season of Torchwood, especially in light of everything they've gone through. However, it doesn't seem like it would be possible. Most of the team is dead and those that are left are scattered. Where can they go from here?

TV review: Being Human

I watched a lot of BBC America this past week. This includes the Sunday night season premiere of Being Human. The commercials had me interested from the get-go so I greedily tuned in.

The show itself is a little weird. Basically, a werewolf, a vampire and a ghost end up as roommates. The werewolf (George) and the vampire (Mitchell) had an established friendship before the show begins. Anna the ghost, however, already occupies the house they are going to rent. It is where she died. George and Mitchell also work together at the local hospital. The hospital had an isolation room where George could spend his "time of the month" and, well, we all know why vampires like hospitals. Though Mitchell is more of the 'I don't drink human blood' type of vampire so he tries to keep the blood-sucking type away from the patients.

While I think the show has a good premise and has potential, the first episode had a bit too much information shoved into it. Instead of taking the time to introduce our main characters and their quirks, they felt the need to introduce all of the side characters up-front. For example, Lauren (another vampire) could have waited an episode or two before coming into the fold. I understand why the writers wanted to shove as much information at us as possible. After all, you never really know how long your show will last. But too much information at once isn't good either. Let the story unfold on its own. If the show gets canceled before everything is revealed, then perhaps it wasn't a very good story to begin with. However, I think this IS a good story and could use the sprinkling of information well.

New Torchwood TONIGHT!

Don't forget, tonight is the beginning of the five-part Children of Earth mini-series for Torchwood on BBC America! It's also when BBC America officially becomes High Def!

TV review: Michael & Michael Have Issues

Last night was the debut of Michael & Michael Have Issues on Comedy Central. I am a huge fan of Michael Ian Black and I have been since he was on The State way back in 1993. So I was definitely looking forward to the new show.

There is no real plot to the show other than Michael Ian Black ("Black") and Michael Showalter ("Sho") butt heads at every opportunity they get. If Sho says something is awesome, Black has to say it sucks. This first episode had the Michaels fighting over an article in a high school newspaper that Greg the Intern was writing. Black didn't want to be interviewed but Sho did. Sho went behind Black's back and...let's just say it devolved into a bare-chested pseudo-fight on the front lawn of Black's house. Absolutely hysterical. I can't wait until next week's episode.