TELEVISION UPDATE

HI! I have not written here in a while, because of life and because I'm terrible and stuff. So, since we're about halfway through November sweeps and coming close to the halfway point of the TV season (!!!), I thought I'd give a few updates on where a few shows are standing with me right now.

Let's start with Bob's Burgers. Bob's has only had 4 episodes so far this year, thanks to FOX's stupid dedication to SPORTS (gross!), but they've all ranged from decent ("A River Runs Through Bob") to fantastic ("Fort Night", which is, in my opinion, is already Bob's Burgers' Halloween classic). Bob's Burgers is one of those shows that's in such a great groove right now that it's hard to imagine it doing much of anything wrong. Other shows may be more ambitious, sure, but I still look forward to my half-hour with the Belchers every week more than anything else on television. Other than "Fort Night", nothing this season has quite hit the dizzying heights of episodes like "Mother Daughter Laser Razor" or "Topsy", but since the first half of this season will all be episodes made under the Season 3 production schedule (thanks to scheduling weirdness, now a staple of Fox's animation block), I'm fairly certain there's more classics waiting for us in the bunch. The thing that continues to impress me the most about Bob's Burgers is the way it just accepts everyone's flaws and quirks and does so in a way that is lovingly hilarious. It's such a refreshing tone, and it's certainly been present in all of the episodes this year. I really can't say enough good things about this show. It's a strong contender for my favorite show on television right now.

Let's get onto Brooklyn Nine-Nine, easily the seasons' best new comedy and probably the best freshman comedy since Community back in 2009. It's amazed me just how quickly this show found its comic tone - by the second or third episode, I was already consistently laughing out loud when I watched it, which is pretty rare for a comedy that young. The show has also done a great job crafting strong, relatable comic characters, from Captian Holt to Terry to Amy. And of course, it features the hilarious Chelsea Peretti, who was absent in this weeks' episode but is always there to bring her special touch of enderaring weirdness to everything she touches. My biggest issue with the show has been the way its lead character, Jake Peralta, can delve into douchebag territory far too quickly and never quite get the moments of redemption a character like that needs to in order for us to root for them. But the show actually remedied that a bit this week, with a stellar plot where Jake puts himself on the line after someone insults Captain Holt's sexuality. He's still not a perfect lead character, but I can see now that the show is working to make him better, and given Mike Schur & Dan Goor's track record with that subject on Parks & Recreation, I'm confident they'll be able to do so. One thing I find interesting about Brooklyn Nine-Nine is how old-school it feels - not so much in its humor, which feels very much like modern comedy, but in its relatively simplistic plotting and subtle character development. It's an interesting vibe that I'm wondering if the show will keep. I think it could stand to push its characters just a bit more, but other than that, I'm enjoying the bit of a throwback vibe its giving off, and I'm certainly enjoying the misfit ensemble they're crafting through solid writing and mostly pretty fantastic performances.

Then there's New Girl, which got off to a bit of a slow start this year but has really picked up its game in the last few episodes. I loved this weeks' episode, "Menus" - it was my favorite of the season so far, and probably one of my favorite episodes of the show of all-time. It wasn't anything particularly fancy, but the way it took the characters' seperate insecurities and blended them into one meaningful and thematically strong storyline was some really excellent writing. I think the show is also being aided a lot by the re-addition of Coach, who has already freshened up the dynamic a lot in the two episodes he's been around. I am hoping that Coach's return will spark something in Winston, rather than having him pushed to the sidelines even more. Winston's been having a great season comedically, constantly providing the show with some of its funniest moments, but I do think it's about time we got a real, full-fledged Winston arc (and not just a half-assed romance one like the one he had with Brenda Song). I know some people are frustrated with the show this season, but I really don't understand why, other than the usual third season backlash narrative. New Girl has never been a perfect show, but that's sort of what I like about it. It doesn't settle into a groove and continue to coast. It's constantly pushing and re-inventing itself to get to the emotional truth of its characters. That makes for a show that isn't always consistent but, when it hits, it really hits, and it's still hitting enough of the time that I continue to find it one of the best shows on TV.

That seems like a good way to segway us into Parks and Recreation, which has spent much of the last several years in "coasting" territory. Parks & Rec has an incredibly strong core, so when it coasts, it's still pretty damn great a lot of the time - but it can still get kind of same-y and boring after a while, as it did for much of Season 5 and portions of this season so far. Luckily, the show came back roaring this week in its return from its random hiatus/not hiatus, and it did so by doing what it used to do well in its earlier seasons but hasn't done in a while (arguably since Leslie got Ben back in Season 4) - it let Leslie Knope lose. I know, tragic. Just tragic. It was! The scene where it was announced that Leslie was recalled was a gut punch, and millions of Leslie Knope fans on Tumblr all cried out in sorrow at the same time. But that's a good thing! These things make us feel more connected to the characters. What was missing with Parks over the past few years was that it didn't let Leslie fail anymore. It gave her everything she wanted, mostly without even trying. All she had to do was defeat a bumbling moron for City Council or go through ridiculous, cartoonish townspeople to get what she wanted. So I'm really happy to see the show actually testing her again. It's sad! But this is Parks, so you know something good is coming for her soon, and that something is going to be even more powerful now that she's been through a bit of a struggle. This season has been inconsistent so far, but I'm enjoying it more than the last because it feels like its slowly poking out of the narrative rut it was in for all of last year and even a lot of Season 4. Let's hope it keeps pushing itself as the season progresses.

And finally, The Michael J. Fox Show, which I have nothing to say about. Because I dropped it. Because that shit is boring. I love you, MJF, but please, get a better show.

So, there's the basics. There are other shows that I'm consistently entertained by - like The Middle, which is the best family sitcom in ages - and other shows that I've been consistently let down by - like South Park, which is showing more cracks than ever this season, but those are the shows that have been consuming my mind the most lately. And Doctor Who. Oh, do I need to make a post about Doctor Who. But that's for another time.