Toob Talk

If you like TV and haven’t checked out Hulu.com yet, do it now. The site has a wealth of classic and current shows. A lot more clips than full episodes, but the things they have full episodes (and some full seasons of) is pretty impressive.

The video quality is OK. I noticed a bunch of artifacting and some distortion during scenes with a lot of movement in them. It was even more noticeable when watching an older show at full screen size. Still, better than having to get them from a torrent (especially now that writers actually get paid for us viewing them).

Speaking of places to watch shows, while your over there, check out the new Fox series, The Return of Jezebel James. As with mots sitcoms, the basic plot premise is a little contrived and the first couple of episodes are more than a little rough around the edges (particularly jarring in the first two episodes of this series is the massive change in living arrangement for the main character).

The show has a lot of potential. Most of that potential comes from the two leads in it: Parker Posey (from a whole lot of things) and Lauren Ambrose (best known from Six Feet Under). Another dash of potential comes form the show’s creator: Amy Sherman-Palladino (who gave us Gilmore Girls among other things).

Hopefully in the next couple of episodes, after all blatant exposition is done with and the characters established and settled into, this will be one of those half-hour gems that I look forward to every week.

Speaking of half-hour gems, two of my personal favorites are back and all new this Monday. Be sure to pop on over to CBS and check out the new episodes of The Big Bang Theory and How I Met Your Mother. Big Bang was kind of a surprise as I hated the first episode, but every one after that has been beautiful. How I Met Your Mother was spot on fantastic from the start. If you haven’t been watching these shows, you’ve been missing prime examples of what modern sitcoms should be like (hint: they’re a lot like classic sitcoms–funny and not insulting).

If you haven’t been watching Lost this season, you’ve been seriously missing out.

Last season, the run started off a little rough. This time around, there was none of that.

That’s probably a good thing, with the long lull between last season and this season. Any faltering would have lost them a lot of viewers.

Tonights episode was one of the subtle ones… (more behind the cut)

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I’ve put off talking about New Amsterdam for a couple of episodes. Mainly because I wanted to see if it could keep up the wonderful attitude it had in the first episode.

The show really did surprise me. Right from the first few minutes, it set a good tone. We quickly got into the head of NY detective John Amsterdam, a man who’s called the area home for about 400 years or so. Unlike really old west coast vampire Mick St. John (who’s more than three centuries younger) over on CBS’s Moonlight, Amsterdam has more or less gotten over himself. In fact, he’s doing a lot better than just about any vampire that’s ever had a show.

I’m sure some of that has to do with the fact that he’s a) not a vampire and b) doesn’t have to chop off the heads of other immortals in order to finally grow old and die. No, all he has to do is find his true love.

And I think we can all relate to just how tricky that can be.

Well, he’s been at it for centuries, ever since he saved the life of a local Lenape back when New York was New Amsterdam (why they changed it, I can’t say… people just liked it better that way… everyone, sing along!) and was “rewarded” with near eternal life. He just can’t die. Not for long, at least.

New Amsterdam refers as much to the Big Apples original name as it does to the idea of the main character reinventing himself. Needless to say, he’s been there and done that before–and unlike most other Methuselan characters we’ve seen on the toob, he’s not all that shy about talking about it. Most people just think he’s joking. It must be the wonderfully dripping cynicism he usually wraps it in.

The show is enjoyable on a number of levels. With a decent bit of police procedural thrown into a mix of relationship issues (romantic, platonic and familial) and topped off with Highlander-like flashbacks to the long ago (but not so far away) events of Amsterdam’s past, there’s something here for almost everyone. Some of the interactions can be downright funny.

If you haven’t seen the show yet, pop on over to Fox’s website and catch up. I doubt it’ll be around past what episodes there already are based on the track record of the other time-traveling/sci-fi-ish shows that were (not quite) all the rage during the first half of the season.