My Favorites - Part 1

Since December --and therefore 2004-- is coming to a close, I thought I'd join the bandwagon and start making some lists of my favorites. So, the first list is my favorite TV shows. Why? 'Cuz during my multi-tasking on the computer I have 1/4 of the screen playing a TV show or movie, 1/4 of the screen open to a file window, and the other half is usually dedicated to FrontPage and Mozilla Firefox.

Oh yeah --not really a Top 10 list... And these have to be current shows (or MASH would probably still be listed!)

Best Comedy: Scrubs. Boy, with Frasier and Friends over there really is a comedic void right now. Curb Your Enthusiasm would be second, but I don't get to watch it regularly (note to self: start downloading them already!!). At least with Scrubs, I'm pretty much guaranteed an enjoyable 30 minutes each episode.

Best New Comedy: Is there another new comedy besides Joey? I'm not too fond of Joey, but I tried to give it a chance...

Best Crime Drama: CSI. No, not 'CSI:Miami' or 'CSI:NY.' The original is still the best and although I was a late starter watching any of the CSI shows, I've now seen almost every episode of all the series. Second to CSI is Cold Case, followed closely by Without A Trace. And, yes, anyone who noticed that Jerry Bruckheimer is the Executive Producer behind all these shows.

Best New Crime Drama: CSI:NY. Like I said, it seems to be a Bruckheimer thing for crime dramas and there aren't any others I watch.

Best Drama: Huff. The only other dramas I watch right now is 'House' and 'Nip/Tuck.' While Huff has continued to impress 5 episodes in, I was ready to give up on House by the 3rd episode. I love Hugh Laurie's acting and always have, but the first couple of episodes all dealt with a mutated virus infecting the brain and causing the 'mystery illness of the week.' Fortunately, the latest episode went in a different direction. Huff, meanwhile, was not what I expected at all. I thought with Hank Azaria starring that it was going to be a comedy and it seemed to be going that direction until about 10 minutes in. Then it --for lack of a better term-- totally blew me away. Oh, and Paget Brewster plays Huff's wife and she's even hotter now than she was in Andy Richter Controls the Universe. I'd put her in my top 10 hot babes now... Nip/Tuck is already done for the season (although it's probably back in early 2005) but even my wife starting watching it. It's graphic, it's gory and it's totally disgusting, but the characterization went up a notch from the first seaosn and I ddin't think that was possible.

Best Science Fiction: Battlestar Galactica. I'd had a friend tape the mini-series, but the tape was bad and the screen kept flipping after 15 minutes. So much for the 4 hours. I've actually been able to download all the episodes (I don't get a channel that shows the series) and it's another one that gets better with every episode. If you know the original series and haven't watched the new one, the best way to describe it is that the Cylons are either complete robots or evolved humans. The human Cylons are copies of one another and some of them don't even know they're Cylon agents. There are, I think, about 6 different human Cylons and some have been discovered on ships in the fleet. They act like terrorists and may do acts of sabotage or just become a suicide bomber. In recent episodes, it seems that the Cylons are also religious zealots and one really acted out when it discovered that one of the humans was basically an atheist. Mary McDonnell (from 'Dances With Wolves' fame) plays the president, Edward James Olmos is Adama and Tricia Helfer plays Number 6, one of the Cylons and good Lord, is she on my top 10 list now!!

Best Action: Lost. Yet again, another series getting better by the episode. It's confusing as Hell if you haven't seen every episode, but it's also done in a way that you can pick it up quite quickly. When you put a bunch of people on a desert island, you're in a tough situation to build any type of characterization. This series, however, has made great use of flashbacks to help the viewer understand each character's methods and decisions. Questions abound on this series. What grabbed the pilot out of the cockpit in the jungle? Where did the polar come from and how did it get there? What experiment was the Frenchwoman's team working on when she killed them all? Who is Ethan and where did he come from? What did the psychic know about Claire's baby that convinced she should be on the plane? How did Locke get the use of his legs back? More questions than answers and there's at least one more asked every episode.

Geez, I watch too much TV.