Human Giant - Season One

Human Giant is an MTV sketch comedy show from a couple of years back.  It's not actually cancelled or ended, it's just on indefinite hiatus while Aziz Ansari is busy with Parks and Recreation.


Most sketch shows have more than three castmembers (although Little Britain has only two), but they make it work by using guest stars, writing sketches that don't have a lot of characters, or by playing multiple roles.  I like the sense of humour on this show because it's outside the mainstream: weird and wacky with unexpected punchlines (actually I did predict some of the sketch endings, but they still made me laugh).  They also break the sketch formula somewhat by not being too repetitive with their recurring characters.  Other sketch shows tend to just plug their popular characters into different scenarios but use the same jokes every time; Human Giant uses different jokes in different scenarios like a regular sitcom.  But most of their sketches are one-offs, so that you're not rolling your eyes going "This again?" every episode.  One thing I have to say is that the very first episode was probably the funniest and most brilliant of the season, and the rest didn't quite match it, but it's still a hilarious show with a lot of original material.


Best Sketches:
- "Attack Dogs", where the guys discover that they can get anything they want through sympathy by having a dog attack them on command
- "Mother and Son Moving Company", about a mother who puts furniture on top of her son so that she can use the adrenaline from a loved one being in danger to successfully move it by herself
- "Self-Defense", in which a mugger/sexual predator takes a self-defense class and complains that his victims will know how to thwart him
- "Swindle Tips", an instructional video series in which a sleazeball demonstrates how to get things for free and thinks he's exploiting the system when he isn't
- "Illusionators", two Criss Angel-like magicians who perform impossible and ridiculous illusions

This Week in Television - May 20-25, 2012

Glee
Two major reasons why this finale didn't do what it was trying to do: first, it hasn't solidly built up any of the friendships at all on this show due to, once again, too many characters and not enough screen time; and second, having everyone refer back to the pilot episode and how far they've come was like Glee congratulating itself for the deep character development it never actually practiced.  It felt like it was making up for these two shortcomings by trying to squeeze in a lot of meaningful glances and moments between characters to show how much they care for each other, but the number of times any of these relationships have been validated throughout the past three seasons can be counted on one hand.  If this had been the pilot episode of the show, it would have had the same exact effect as it had now: none.  Plus, Burt Hummel's appearance was a perverse opposite of what his character normally does: his speech to Kurt came off more offensive than awesome, and he somehow danced a choreographed Beyonce number in rhinestone gloves when all previous indication of the character points to him never doing that, for any reason, ever.  Apparently Glee is moving to Thursday nights next season, so I'm probably not going to be watching any more.  NBC's Thursday night line-up, even without Community (which is moving to Friday), is infinitely more enjoyable.  I mean there are other ways I could still watch it, but Glee isn't worth it, and this is as good an excuse as any to quit - I think I was having more fun tearing the show apart here on the blog than I was while watching it.  I'll miss Sue Sylvester, and literally nothing else.


Awake
Wow, this episode had some really riveting, powerful, puzzling, and wonderful moments.  It was exactly what a series finale should be - although, about that: according to an interview with creator Kyle Killen, the episode was not changed to compensate for the show's cancellation.  It was always meant to go into the second season with Mike having dreamed a third world in which both his wife and son lived.  But in spite of that, it perfectly tied up Mike's mission of vengeance while giving us a satisfying happy ending.  I really, really loved all of the trippy dream-like scenes (when Dr. Evans "paused" in mid-sentence, I thought my satellite had frozen for a moment, but when I realized it was intentional I just thought it was awesome), and the eerie silence that accented most of them.  It was also a great scene when Doctors Lee and Evans finally met (in Mike's imagination, anyway) and argued over their diagnoses.  Scenes like that, and the one where Green Mike visits Red Mike in jail, are the kinds of scenes that make you sit up and cling to every word.  You know, as disappointing as it was when I heard of Awake's termination, this finale was so fantastic and satisfying that I can now accept its demise.  They kept the series short and sweet, and it didn't end with a maddening unresolved cliffhanger.  Now I just have to hope for a blu-ray release.


This concludes the 2011-2012 TV season.  I'll have a season wrap-up post soon, as well as my picks for the top 10 movies of 2011, so keep checking back!

This Week in Television - May 13-18, 2012

Once Upon a Time
Goddamn, that was awesome.  Being a big fan of the Beauty and the Beast episode, I loved their reunion (been waiting half the season for it), and juxtaposed with Henry's "death" scene all of the actors played the hell out of those moments.  Plus we got a handgun being fired at a fire-breathing dragon!  I didn't know where the show was going to go if they were already lifting the curse at the end of season one, but then the purple cloud of magic rolled in.  That is a WILD direction to take it next season.  Several months ago I wasn't expecting to be saying this, but I'm super excited for season two now.  Well played, Once Upon a Time.


Survivor: One World (Sunday Finale)
Very relieved and proud of Kim for not only doing the right thing in voting out Alicia and Christina, but for winning the game.  At the final tribal council, I actually thought Chelsea's opening speech and responses were the best and that she might win because of it, but she turned out to be the one who got zero votes, and Kim deserved it most anyway.  It was also unusual that half the jury didn't even ask anything, instead taking the opportunity to just talk about themselves - the worst not surprisingly being Alicia, who did nothing but brag obnoxiously about how awesome she thinks she is.  Her tearful apology at the reunion was not sufficient.  I mean I do believe she was sorry about her offensive comment regarding special ed students, but that's not something you apologize for; instead, you just don't say it in the first place.  Kat's reel showing how crazy she is was misguided, because it was just footage of her doing weird dances and physical stuff like that, when it should have focused on the dumb things she's said.  They didn't even have the technical proficiency to give it background music, or any audio at all.  An interesting concept for next season, bringing back three people who left for medical reasons, but it's surprising because Survivor usually only likes to bring back popular and/or memorable players, and I don't know that anyone who was medi-vacced can be considered part of that category.


Glee
So Tina is one of the most ignored characters on the show, and their way of correcting this problem is to turn her into Rachel for a few minutes and then have her accept that she belongs in the background?  Way to do the character justice, Glee.  And you're going to refer to Lindsay Lohan as "America's sweetheart" and Perez Hilton as a "Hollywood gossip legend"?  Um, exaggerate much?  Speaking of exaggeration, I think it was overkill to fix EVERY single character's problems in these two episodes.  I thought this was the season finale but apparently that's next week.  How the hell are they going to squeeze out another episode with no conflict left whatsoever?  You don't tie up all of your storylines in the second last episode of a season.  You gotta leave something open.  Even if that had been the season finale, it would've been baffling, because it felt instead like a series finale, and Glee is not one of those shows that even needed to make a "just in case we're canceled" episode.


Community
I don't know if there was a specific video game they were referencing, but it was awesome either way.  Annie and Shirley murdering the shopkeeper's family was really funny, and weirdly it makes sense that Abed would fall in love with a digital woman with encyclopedic knowledge.  And I don't know why Troy kept trying to jump into Old Man Hawthorne's mouth, but it was funny.  I think it shows some character growth from Pierce, not only accepting a non-white half brother but allowing him to keep a large sum of money.


30 Rock
Hmm, even though Elizabeth Banks was never going to become a series regular, I still wasn't expecting a Jack/Avery divorce.  I liked the jokes about Kim Jong Il being the greatest waiter ever, bailing on Smash (I only made it about three episodes), and the little joke about Lorne Michaels as his name popped up at the end of the show.


Community
Heist movies are a genre I'm kind of sick of, but the parody was fun here.  The plans are always so complicated and ridiculous - especially when disguises are involved - that I think comedies should be the only place for crazy heists.  But it's nice to know the Dean loves the entire study group, not just Jeff.


Community
The finale was somewhat reflective of the show itself.  Community was in the darkest timeline, approaching possible cancellation, and like a few other series this year, this episode was produced to serve as a series finale if it had to be, because the show's future was uncertain.  You could say Evil Abed was representing network executives, coming from a place where conditions are grim (NBC) and trying to ruin the show by transforming it into something more similar to everything else on TV.  But it wasn't NBC that recently fired Dan Harmon from his own show, it was Sony.  So I have no clue what season four is going to be like, but there is now a chance that it won't be good, and that's even more depressing than cancellation, because if this season had been the last, at least it would have ended without deteriorating in quality.  Six seasons and a movie will probably never happen, but maybe we can get four seasons and a movie if Dan Harmon wants to end it properly in a theater.  P.S. the funniest thing about Star-Burns having faked his death is that he still has the star-burns, as if a wig will hide his one distinguishing feature.


Awake
Another cool episode, though I can't help worrying for Mike, because if he investigates his accident too deeply, he may ultimately find out which world is real and lose his wife or son.  It was interesting when the deaths of Bird and Hawkins mirrored each other between the two worlds, though.  Also nice to see the green therapist getting a bit of screen time this week, as the red guy has been getting more exposure than her.


Hero of the Week: Kim from Survivor, for winning the right way.  On a hilarious side note, she apparently gave the idol she never had to use to Troyzan after the show, and he told her it was more valuable knowing it had been in her crotch.


Douchebag of the Week: Whoever it was that removed Dan Harmon from Community, his own show, without even telling him, because the show was too awesomely creative to have a large audience.  Not cool, man.

This Week in Television - May 6-11, 2012

Once Upon a Time
This was fun.  I liked all of the fairy tale characters banding together to help Snow White; it gave purpose to some of those slightly more stand-alone episodes because we were able to know who they were and what they're capable of when it came time for them to assemble.  Also it might have been the first time I've seen an entire army of fairies.  With all of Regina's gloating, I thought it would give Mr. Gold time to warn Emma about the apple turnover, but then when Henry showed up at her door instead I knew he was going to eat it.  The preview for next week's finale looks epic.

Glee
See, because this show has way too many characters, it keeps trying to take these shortcuts by creating attempts at beautiful moments when we haven't spent enough time with most of the characters - or the relationships haven't existed long enough - to be properly invested in them.  I can tell this episode was trying so hard to be moving and likable, but it just wasn't.  It was just a lot of predictable sap.  I immediately identified Brittany's dinosaur song as a Ke$ha (or "Key Dollar Sign Ha", as Principal Figgins likes to say) song in spite of being mostly unfamiliar with her music, because one thing I do know is that Ke$ha songs tend to be written so that listening to them will cause your IQ to decrease by twenty points.  Seriously, listen to the lyrics of a Ke$ha song (and the way in which they're spoken) and tell me it didn't feel like it was murdering half your brain cells.  I got the sense that "Dinosaur" was trying really hard to be witty, but without having the intelligence to know what wit actually is, nor the creativity to express it in an effectively original way.

New Girl
I enjoyed the ending with everyone dancing to Nick's cheesy mix tape in their rooms.  Seemed like a good way to end the season, although it would have worked just as well if they'd let Nick move out and ended with that as a cliffhanger.  I also appreciated that Nick and Jess still didn't hook up, because I was thinking they might do the played out thing where they kiss in a moment of passion and then start acting awkward and wondering if it meant something but leave it open for next season.  Nice to see that it didn't go in that direction.  Also I found it funny how much Schmidt hated the cookies in the opening scene.

Survivor: One World
It was really funny when they mentioned at tribal council that Tarzan had been wearing Kat's panties on his head, and then they cut to Kat in the jury box wiping tears away.  It's creepy, Kat, yes, but not traumatic creepy.  Although that was probably just a reaction from something else that the editors stuck in.  But then again it's Kat, so maybe not.  Why does Alicia still think she's powerful?  Because she thinks she had Tarzan and Christina in her pocket?  Tarzan is smarter than she is and had his own strategy (didn't work, but he tried), and Christina will go along with literally any plan that is suggested to her.  Yeah, Alicia, that makes you a mastermind.  I don't want to have to listen to her unfounded boasting if she makes it to the finals on Sunday.

Community
Interesting.  Another clip show (sort of), only this time using clips of the characters acting crazy in an attempt to convince them that they're actually crazy, in a delusional way.  They have spent time in a mental institution, according to the previous clip show.  And Shirley is clearly insane if she thinks Brett Ratner is a master filmmaker.  Watching this episode, I thought it might be an interesting direction to take the show if Greendale really didn't exist after all, but a direction that only would have worked if the show was going to end this season (which it isn't - yay!), because an entire season without Greendale - and with most of what we've been seeing proving non-existent - would be a less fun blank slate.  But it was a really fun callback to early scenes when we saw the hallucinated, asylum versions of events from previous episodes, and a great montage of all the crazy, pointless classes that Greendale offers (almost as insignificant as the list of fake night courses last season).  And apparently this year's paintball tournament was film noir themed.  Might have been cool to see, but then maybe not.  Hard to top the last ones, and it might get old if they keep doing paintball episodes.  But I like that it was at least acknowledged.

30 Rock
I like that Leap Day William made a cameo at Jack and Avery's holiday party.  Also a great device that Avery playing to Jack's guilt over his indiscretion ended up strengthening their relationship by reminding him how much he loves playing mind games with her - something that, from what I could tell, her mother wouldn't necessarily do on a regular basis.  I Saw the contents of the "Criss Points" board online, and my favourite thing on there was that if Criss trades in 275 Criss Points, he is allowed to grow a "joke moustache."

The Office
This episode had some laughs, including the penis-flavoured energy drink for gays, Andy intentionally spilling soup on himself to look pathetic, and the senator once again hitting on Oscar, but there were also things that didn't work.  Oscar trying to make an "It Gets Better" video while his co-workers interfere could have been hilarious, and probably would have been had Michael been there to stick his face in, but it was disappointing, and I would think Oscar would be smart enough not to attempt that at work anyway.  I like Andy getting his job back, in spite of not really enjoying him as manager, because it means Nellie loses the position, but the moment had to be ruined by his keeping her on out of pity.  I'm also intrigued by the return of David Wallace and the Dwight/Angela hook-up (for the eight millionth time) because they are reminders of earlier, better seasons, but sadly I don't think that will magically make the show as funny as it was back then.

Parks and Recreation
I was ready to be okay with Leslie losing the election, if only because it would mean going back to more of the same and that's not a bad thing when this show has been consistently hilarious.  But I'm also a big fan of Leslie and friends, and seeing them happy makes me happy, so Leslie winning was a more satisfying ending to the season and takes things in a new direction for season five.  It's going to be funny when sober Ann realizes she agreed to move in with Tom.  Although she does love his pad, so it might be even funnier if she goes along with it just to live there and has to put up with him.

Awake
Here we go, this is exactly the kind of Awake episode I like to see. Too bad it was named after my least favourite movie quote of all time.  Even worse, NBC canceled the show this week.  ...No, no, the movie quote is worse.  I'm sick of writers overusing it in comedies and pretending it's a good joke.  Anyway, it's interesting that Mike's hallucinations not only come from something in his subconscious memory, but they seem to occur when he blacks out - or, in other words, when he's been forced from one side over to the other.  Cleverly, the argument still works for both sides: you could say that if Red is real, Mike was having difficulty getting back to his recurring dream; or if Green is real, he was simply having difficulty waking up because his bungee fall was a hard blow.  I'm still leaning toward the former, but with the show ending forever in a couple of episodes we might never know.  "Bohemian Rhapsody" ended up being the perfect song to use in the episode because parts of the lyrics were so appropriate, but I think they replayed the clip of Rex and Hannah singing it one too many times.

Fringe
Dead Rebecca Mader's eyes rolling around independently of each other was disturbing to watch, but I'm not sure if it was that by itself or because it was a special effect that wasn't 100% unnoticeable.  I could understand Bell's point of view about how human society has ruined itself (just look at MTV's A Shot at Love - or better yet, never look at it), because it's partly true, but I don't think you can just throw a pessimism blanket over two entire universes.  The amount of corruption would have to be massive to warrant destroying them and starting over, and I personally don't believe that it is. As a whole, I felt this episode to be a little anti-climactic, especially for a season finale.  It was obvious Olivia would have to die in order to stop Bell (but not permanently, because she still needed to pop out a baby, and because she's the lead actress with another season on the way); when Bell was thwarted he just kind of went "Okay. See ya," and faded away; and then we were left with a not entirely ominous warning from an Observer that failed to make for an exciting cliffhanger - although for that reason it would have been a less disappointing cut-off point had the show been canceled, and maybe that's why it was left open on a more generic level.  However, the scene where Walter thinks a nurse's tray of urine samples might be jello was hilarious.

Hero of the Week: Leslie Knope from Parks and Recreation, for making it happen.

Douchebag of the Week: I'm going with Alicia from Survivor again.  She might be a worse person than Colton.

The Wire - Season Two

It took me a while to get around to the second season because I had other things to watch - and, admittedly, I was procrastinating slightly because while I like The Wire, it is a dense show that requires concentration - but I finally finished it.


Because the previous season's case was such a headache for the department, everyone involved was split up and moved around, and because Rawls hates McNulty, he sent him to harbour patrol as punishment.  This leads to some fun scenes where McNulty gets revenge by proving some found sea corpses to be in his former department's jurisdiction, meaning Rawls' underlings now have to work those cases.  It also leads, later in the season, to a satisfying episode where season one's team inevitably reunites to work a shipping yard case that surfaced in the premiere when a myriad of dead women were found in a shipping container.


I'm not sure I enjoyed this season's case as much as last season - although Barksdale's drug ring was still a presence in spite of the police not really following them, and this seems like the greater arc that may last the entire series - but it did bring some interesting characters.  Ziggy Sobotka, who reminds me of a scrawny, dweeby Christian Bale, was a colourful character because he has a certain brashness and obnoxiousness that is surprising because he's also a screw-up, and I tend to think of screw-ups as being meek.  It was also cool to see Amy Ryan join the cast for the season; she seems to be one of those actresses who never gives a bad performance.  And I liked seeing Freamon - my favourite character from last season - get out of the basement and pound the pavement after finally escaping the pawn shop unit.  It was certainly a much busier season than the last due to a larger number of subplots simultaneously going on, which should have made it more fun, but I think I just wasn't totally into the shipping dock setting or something.  I loved the musical montage with which they closed out the season, though.  Overall I still liked the season, but from what I hear, seasons three and four are the best, so I'm very much looking forward to those.


Best Episode: "Backwash" had some amusing scenes with Herc and Carver involving a surveillance mic inside a tennis ball, and "Storm Warnings" gave Ziggy some powerful dramatic scenes, but I liked "Duck and Cover", in which McNulty gets back on the team and almost hooks up with Beadie, Herc and Carver invent a fake informant, Frank gets paranoid and catches on to the police surveillance, and Ziggy brings a duck into a bar (which sounds like the set-up to a joke).

This Week in Television - Apr. 29-May 4, 2012

Once Upon a Time
Thanks, Canadian television, for cutting off the ending.  It's not like I needed to see any more after Emma told Henry she needed to ask him something very important.  It's a good thing we have internet; for anyone else who missed it, she asked him if he wanted to get away from Regina and live with her, he of course said yes, and she decided they would leave Storybrooke. Anyway, seeing this episode puts last week's into an interesting perspective, because it was sort of the same father/son story with the same outcome, but with the roles reversed.  But I like the idea of a humanized Pinocchio slowly turning back into the puppet.  I can take or leave some of the twists they've put on the fairy tales, but I like that one.  Plus Miss Blanchard's speech to Regina was awesome.


Glee
It only proved what a pale and unnecessary imitation Coach Roz is when her character entered the episode spouting a whole string of unfunny insults, and all Sue Sylvester had to do at the top of the very next scene was call her "Black Sue" and I was laughing.  It's not just Roz's lame jokes; Jane Lynch has way better comedic delivery than anyone else in the cast.  I think they stunted themselves with the NYADA stuff, because while having Rachel and Kurt do nothing but talk about NYADA all season to show how important it is to them, it also made me sick of hearing about NYADA, and so I cared even less than usual when Rachel flubbed her big audition.  She and Kurt have been a little ignorant about it anyway; there's more than one way to make a showbiz career.  Not getting into some prestigious arts school doesn't mean your entire future is ruined, but apparently those two felt there was only one path and made no backup plans.  Mr. Schue would have done better to prepare them for that rather than force the dud students to have goals. And then there was the whole domestic abuse thing.  Apart from not handling issues seriously enough because Glee likes to cram them into an episode in small doses and then never mention them again (much like they do with some of the characters), the presentation of it didn't have me taking sides on the issue. I mean wife-beating is never okay, but giving that storyline to the manliest woman on the show and then downplaying it by telling us the reason was something small and the dude was drunk when he hit her, it took the gravity out of it.  If he only hits her when he's drunk, the solution is for him to never drink again.  If he can make that decision and actually stick with it, then I don't think it would be all that unfortunate for Bieste to go back to him; granted it's a big "if", but under those optimum circumstances I wouldn't consider it a step back for feminism.  And anyway, Bieste is literally as strong as Cooter is, if not stronger, and I'm not saying that makes it okay to hit her, but it does make her less of a sympathetic victim, and probably less relatable to domestic abuse victims because not a lot of women are built like she is.  I get that the message was that it can happen to anyone no matter how unlikely it seems, but what's the point of that message?  Fear-mongering?  Bieste may be an emotionally vulnerable person, but physically she is a tank and should be able to handle herself.  That's why this storyline is not helpful to the women who can't defend themselves.  It would have worked a lot better if they'd done this storyline in season one, with Ken Tanaka hitting Miss Pillsbury over his jealousy of her and Mr. Schue, who then would have cared a little more and brought the issue to the attention of all the students, not just the females, and thus it would have taken up more of the episode and gotten the air time it deserved.  This crap writes itself, Glee, where were you back there?


New Girl
It was cool to see Paul back, because it went well with the Nick/Caroline hookup.  Although it also seemed to push Jess closer to Nick, which I'm still not on board with.  Some good jokes about Winston's different earrings and the unusual things that give Schmidt boners (Asian Jess is an understandable one, though).  Bonus points to Jess for the Battlestar Galactica reference, and to the writers for remembering Coach with a little meta shout-out to Happy Endings.


Survivor: One World
Alicia thinks she's the most powerful player in the game?  What?  Kim has been controlling things since Colton left, and has an idol.  You're dumb, Alicia.  Kat's relationship with her cousin is disturbing, but her ridiculously low intelligence and misuse of the word "touche" will make for an amusing highlight reel at the reunion.


Community
I was struck by how many jokes they packed into the first few minutes of this episode.  I don't think Community's jokes per minute ratio is usually as high as that, and it was fun to see.  Was not expecting group expulsion to happen in the course of the series, although it may be a good excuse to prolong Community's time at Greendale if they get back in and have to repeat a year (and if the show is able to avoid cancellation).  I thought it was funny how nobody really cared about Star-Burns' death: Jeff mourned more for his summer than for the deceased, Pierce thought the comb Star-Burns stole from him might be inside his urn, Britta kept trying to put her Psych major to use, Shirley just wanted to sing "Ava Maria" at the funeral, etc.  Not that it's surprising, because they didn't care about him when he was alive, either.  The reference to "Remedial Chaos Theory" was very welcome because that episode is already a classic, and the Star-Burns tribute video was hilarious.  He probably has done all of those things...during acid trips.


30 Rock
On principle, I'm disappointed that 30 Rock re-did two of their concept episodes from last season (the live episode and the "Queen of Jordan" reality show - especially when laughtracks and reality shows are two of my least favourite forms of television), but on the other hand they managed to work because this season's live episode was funnier, and this season's "Queen of Jordan" still had more reality show tropes to make fun of.  Like Community's Law & Order episode, you can still get the jokes just by having a general sense of a very cookie-cutter genre, so I enjoyed them pulling out the sappy music when someone cried; referencing an unseen character and then explaining her lack of screentime by having her describe herself as someone who "pays her mortgage on time and handles conflict appropriately"; insulting audience memory by showing black & white flashbacks to something that happened only a few minutes ago; and exaggerating conflict wherever possible, like Kenneth vs. the cord he tripped on.  I think the story with Jack and his mother in-law's web of lies was a little dry, though, and I didn't like that it led to a Liz/Jack kiss.  Even if fake, it was too weird given the nature of their relationship and how unattracted to each other they are, and knowing that Tina Fey is opposed to those two ever hooking up.  Even Jack's nano-second kiss with D'Fwon was less weird.


The Office
While I didn't mind this episode, I didn't really like that they're retracing their steps in having Andy do something similar to the Michael Scott Paper Company.  They already gave him Michael's job and transformed his personality somewhat to be more Michael-like, now they're going to start giving him Michael's old plotlines, too?  I know it's not exactly the same, but it's close enough that they shouldn't have bothered to do it at all.  And, again, the Nellie scenes just felt like the writers trying to backtrack and say "Wait, wait, you should like her!", and while I found her less annoying this week, she's still not sympathetic.  But I did really like Jim and Dwight teaming up, because it's a rare thing and it's always fun when it happens.  Actually, Dwight teaming up with anyone tends to be interesting since he is more of a lone wolf who considers himself superior to everyone.


Parks and Recreation
I never get tired of Burt Macklin.  Andy's nicknames for everyone, and his treating the pie-throwing mystery like a puzzle when there wasn't really anything to piece together (and somehow solving it anyway) were awesome.  Also got a good laugh at the dancers coming out when Leslie learns of Nick Newport Sr.'s death, largely because I still find that "Get on Your Feet" song from earlier in the season to be really funny.


Awake
It was obvious that Hannah would turn out to have been right about Rex's girlfriend, but what this episode nicely set up was a reason for Mike not to move, resulting in the dramatic irony of him not knowing he's just endangered himself.  But I hope the conspiracy against him is more than just that his presence prevents some dudes from selling drugs.  That would be an inadequate reason for trying to kill his family.  P.S. Forgot to mention last week the joy of having a guest appearance by "Dr. Marvin Candle".


Fringe
Nice, another Lost castmember!  As cool as that episode in the future was, the problem with peeking into the future is that it sometimes ruins surprises when you go back to the past, like the reveal of Bell in this episode, Peter and Olivia contemplating a child, and Astrid getting shot (which actually was a little shocking, but we know she's not going to die because we saw her in the amber years later).  I'm wondering if it might have worked better to put that future episode after this one, and then we'd get that retroactive foreshadowing to set up the stakes for next week's season finale.  This Olivia's powers are way cooler than previous Olivia's.  However, she has apparently never seen Ghostbusters.  For shame!


Hero of the Week: Andy as Burt Macklin from Parks and Recreation, for solving the case, even if pie security failed.


Douchebag of the Week: Coach Roz from Glee.  Possibly the worst character on the show, and that's saying a LOT.