Lost, My Boys Returns, Silver/90210, Murtaugh List, Andy Hallett, & More - April 2, 2009

Top downloads was the performance theme for this week’s American Idol. Just kind of an all right performance week. Nothing really that spectacular. Some were good, some struggled, and some were in that middle ground. Megan Joy struggled the most as she just continued to not be able to find a performance and song that worked for her. The bottom three was her, Allison, and Anoop. Allison was sent back to safety (whew) and then it was down to Megan and Anoop. Megan went home and didn’t even get the chance to sing for her chance of the judges keeping her. She took a shot at them earlier in the night and Simon fired back on her. It was definitely a fun results show all around with the performances and the fun that the contestants were having. Last year’s winner, David Cook, also returned to the Idol stage to perform.

Lost really is the greatest written show on TV. Just incredible with all the details of the story. Great episode this week. Interesting twist with the time travel where the Oceanic crew is actually going to help save Ben’s life. Well, not all of them but Kate and Sawyer helped take him to the others so they could save him cause the Dharma group weren’t doing anything. That definitely shows how things will work out where Ben will join up with the others and come back to take out the Dharma Intiative. The time travel stuff was very interesting and Hurley talking about and making sense of it was hilarious. Big thumbs up for the Back To The Future references in those scenes by the way!!! So, Kate told Claire’s mom and also Sawyer’s ex about the island and what happened. I guess we now know where Aaron is and that is with his grandmother. Hey Ben, Locke lives!!! How about that to wake up to?

I was very sad to hear of the passing of Andy Hallett this week. If you are an Angel fan, you will know Andy’s work as Lorne. He has battled heart disease for several years and passed away due to heart failure. If I’m not mistaken, he was having health problems near the end of Angel’s run. Lorne was a big time favorite character of mine from the Whedonverse and Andy played the part so perfectly. Andy took the time to meet so many fans as he was a regular at fan conventions. People always had great things to say about their experiences of meeting him. Andy was 33 and I’m definitely saying prayers for him and his family and friends in this tough time.

My Boys returned with new episodes on Tuesday night. We were last left with the cliffhanger of Bobby going to PJ’s room to confess his feelings for her. She was in there with his brother however and Bobby was getting married the next day. After the wedding was called off in this episode, Bobby went on to the honeymoon by himself. Major payoff at the end where Bobby returned and PJ told her feelings to him. You could say his feelings were the same when he kissed her once she finished talking. Bobby said that he felt the same and had a twelve page letter typed up telling of his feelings. Fun premiere and great to have the show back.

Friday Night Lights keeps on going. NBC has renewed it for two more seasons. You may remember that NBC and DirecTV worked out a deal to bring the show back for this current season. The show would premiere new episodes on DirecTV and then those episodes would air later in the season on NBC. They also share the cost of the production of the show as well. Each new season will contain thirteen episodes each.

This week’s 90210 was the meltdown of Silver. I read a comparison in Entertainment Weekly and I definitely agree. They are turning Silver into the new Emily Valentine. I’m thinking that it isn’t a good thing either. Silver has been my favorite character on the show since the new series premiered. She was the perfect tie in between the original series and the new series. The character was very likable and fun. Now, her character has just completely went a different direction seemingly out of nowhere. Yeah, this has been brewing for a while based on her breakup with Dixon a few episodes ago but they gotten back together. She made a movie for her class and rented out a movie theatre for the debut. What Dixon didn’t know was that she had recorded their moment of intimacy in one of the rooms at school. She put it in the movie!! Then, her and Dixon had their fight over it and she burned the movie in his garbage can outside. Following that, she broke into Mr. Matthews apartment and blamed him for the other whole thing. Yeah, just too far out there for me. I just hope that they aren’t ruining Silver’s character which has been really good.

Survivor returned tonight after a two week absence. Yeah, I don’t count a recap episode as a new episode. We now have a fake immunity idol in play. After Timbira won the reward challenge, Joe was sent to exile island. He chose Erinn to go with him. She got the clues and she told Joe what the cluees were as she was hoping to strike up an alliance with him. Erinn said that she didn’t have any alliances in her tribe so she was going to try anything. The clues pointed back to tree mail. Taj knew that Joe would have all the clues that he needed so she made a fake immunity idol and hid it in tree mail. Joe did find it and grabbed it for his own. However, while Taj was doing that, JT found Taj’s real immunity idol. Stephen went into cover mode and eventually Taj had to just tell JT about the idol to cover her own tracks. So, now JT was brought into their alliance. That alliance was in danger of holding up though when they lost the immunity challenge. Joe and Sydney wanted to target Taj. TJ and Stephen tried to talk Joe into switching against Sydney but he wasn’t having it. Joe talked of giving his idol to Sydney to save her just for him to make a point. Yeah, it would have made a point all right. Stephen and JT did think about going against Taj especially considering that Stephen had the idol at that moment. However, it was Sydney who went home on a 3-2 vote. The previews show the big merge happening next week.

I’ve been watching season four of American Idol Rewind on TV Guide Channel. It’s been fun to watch it. They have new interviews recorded with various contestants looking back on their season including Carrie Underwood, Constantine Maroulis, Bo Bice, and more. The episodes are edited from their original form and have a completely different style to them. Check it out if you’re an Idol fan. I’ve seen the original episodes but am enjoying seeing the contestants looking back on it.

This week’s Big Bang Theory was a battle to be alpha female in the building. A new girl moved in grabbing the attention of all the guys. Well, except for Sheldon who was annoyed instead as he worried about the change of a new neighbor. Penny battled back to get their attention and it was really funny. The guys talked about how she appeared to be wounded. Fun episode which resulted in a fight between the girls at the end with Wolowitz holding Leonard back cause he knew he’d try and break it up.

The Murtaugh list was the focus of How I Met Your Mother this week. What is the Murtaugh list? Murtaugh is the character from Lethal Weapon and it was pointed out how he would say he was always too old for something that he was doing. So, Ted had a Murtaugh list of things that he was too old to do. Barney didn’t agree with this and accepted the challenge of things to do to prove he wasn’t too old. The counter was challenging Ted to do things that he was too young to do as he had talked about how he looked forward to growing old. Barney had Robin joining him as his manager. Barney’s challenges included getting his ear pierced (which became infected), putting off going to the doctor, leaving annoying two person answering machine messages, going to a rave, and more. Ted’s list of things to do was yelling at neighborhood kids, eating dinner at 4:00, taking forever to answer the phone, and more. The winner was Ted as Barney finally had all he could take. How funny was it to see how the show was hiding Alyson Hannigan's pregnancy? The opening scene had her coming out of the kitchen instead of being in the living room with the group. Then, she was walking around carrying food. Funny stuff and they did a good job with it. Speaking of Alyson, it was really funny watching Lily’s storyline of the episode where Marshall was the coach of a kindergarten basketball team. He wore them out and it was hilarious stuff.

A physically exhausting leg of the race on this week’s Amazing Race. So exhausting that Margie ended up collapsing upon arriving at the pit stop. Even Phil got into action quickly trying to help her. Thankfully, she was fine but gave everyone a scare. It seemed like water was her biggest need. First place was Mark and Michael. Well, it was until they got two thirty minute penalties for a couple of wrong doings. Tammy and Victor overcame their own mistake and took first place followed by Jaime and Cara. Mark and Michael then checked in back in third place. Eliminated on this leg of the race was Mel and Mike. They have been one of my favorite teams to watch this season. Here are the standings: 1. Tammy and Victor. 2. Jaime and Cara. 3. Mark and Michael. 4. Margie and Luke. 5. Jen and Kisha. 6. Mel and Mike (Eliminated).

Movie box office numbers for last weekend. 1. Monsters vs. Aliens - $59.3 million. 2. The Haunting In Connecticut - $23 million. 3. Knowing - $14.7 million. 4. I Love You, Man - $12.6 million. 5. Duplicity - $7.6 million. 6. Race to Witch Mountain - $5.8 million. 7. 12 Rounds - $5.3 million. 8. Watchmen - $2.7 million. 9. Taken - $2.6 million. 10. The Last House On The Left - $2.6 million.

The list has been announced of the Transformers that will be included in the movie sequel. On the autobot side: Optimus Prime, Ironhide, Ratchet, Bumblebee, Sideswipe, Arcee, Jetfire, Jolt, Skid & Mudflap. On the decepticon side: Starscream, Scorponok, The Fallen, Sideways, Soundwave, Wheelie, The Doctor, Ravage, Demolisher, and Devastator. Hmm, no Megatron. Think we’re going to get a surprise? I think we will. Starscream definitely needs to be leading the group in this movie. Hope things go better for him upon taking over leadership than it did in the original cartoon movie. Ha ha. Interesting that Wheelie’s name is a decepticon as he was an autobot in the original series. The movie opens on June 24 and I plan on being there opening day. I will go into this one feeling a lot better than I did on the last one. I went into the movies on that opening weekend really worried that I was going to hate it and walked out very happy with it. Also, there is news that season one of the original 1980’s cartoon will be getting a new DVD release in stores. The 25th Anniversary Edition will hit stores on June 16.

I got this news of a new show to pass along to all of you. It is called River Monsters and airs on Animal Planet. Here is the description for it: "The show tackles such legends as: Did a large catfish attack a teenager in a German lake? Did a school of piranha eat flesh down to the bone of a busload of passengers that crashed in an Amazonian river? Host, biologist and extreme angler Jeremy Wade travels worldwide to solve these freshwater mysteries, to debunk these myths and to track down these harrowing tales. Each Sunday, he’ll come face-to-face with fear and try to understand these mysterious predators with a taste for human flesh, putting his life on the line to find truly monster-sized fish while globetrotting through Germany, Australia, Brazil and even the state of Texas. River Monsters premieres Sunday, April 5 at 10 PM (ET/PT) on Animal Planet." For more information on the show, please visit: http://animal.discovery.com/tv/river-monsters

This was huge news this week for soap fans. Guiding Light will be ending its run after 72 years on the air. The last episode will air on September 18.

TV on DVD releases for Tuesday, April 7, 2009. Beverly Hills 90210 (Season Seven), Charlie Brown/Peanuts (Snoopy’s Reunion), Deadliest Catch (Season Four), Dynasty (Season Four.

TV Line Of The Week:
From The Big Bang Theory:
Sheldon: “Did you remember to ask for the chicken with the brocolli to be diced not shredded?”
Penny: "Yes”
Sheldon: “Even though the menu specifies shredded?”
Penny: “Yes”
Sheldon: “Brown rice not white?”
Penny: “Yes”
Sheldon: “Did you stop at the Korean grocery and get the hot mustard?”
Penny: “Yes”
Sheldon: “Did you pick up the lasodeum soy sauce from the market?”
Penny: “Yes”
Sheldon: “Good. Do you see how it’s done Leonard?”

From My Boys:
“You’re all I thought about on my honeymoon”. Bobby to PJ after he got back from his honeymoon trip that just involved himself.

You Tube Video Of The Week: Finding the sound of Chewbacca on the guitar.


Wishing all of you a great and safe weekend!! Take care and God bless!!