Fall 2012 TV Review

My family and I don’t have regular TV in our house. We watch all of our TV online, through Netflix (DVDs or on-demand) or by purchasing the shows through iTunes. Surprisingly, that doesn’t keep us from missing out too much on what comes out each year. We have also found it cheaper to buy Season Passes than to have cable TV for more than a year now. What it does make us do is choose what we want to watch more carefully and not waste our time on crappy shows just because they are on. In this post, I will cover all of the shows we are watching and those that we have stopped.

Go On – This NBC comedy starring Matthew Perry as Ryan King is one of our favorite new shows and about the only comedy we are still watching besides the Big Bang Theory. I have watched a lot of failed Matthew Perry shows since Friends and this one finally seems to get it right. We get a sarcastic and self-centered character for Perry to play. We also get an ensemble cast of likeable weird people who are part of the grief support group that Ryan King joins when dealing with the loss of his wife. There is some out there quirkiness going on in the show, but it is consistently fun and funny. Four Mick Happies.

Elementary – The Sherlock Holmes in New York with a lady Watson show. This new procedural drama has the right mix of smart insight by Holmes (Jonny Lee Miller), banter with Dr. Watson (Lucy Liu) and everything is wrapped up in ~42 minutes. I am a big fan of the BBC Sherlock show and this is not it and is good all on its own. There is definitely room in my viewing world for both. Besides, Elementary’s Holmes seems way more edgy and at risk of drug relapse (and associated problems) than the BBC version Holmes. If you want to buy it like we do, iTunes has the Season Pass in SD for only $24.99 (about a dollar an episode). Also Four Mick Happies.

Malibu Country – Reba McEntire’s new comedy about a recently divorced woman making it on her own with her kids. We gave this one two episodes and stopped in the middle of the second. It isn’t as good and the cast isn’t as interesting as her former Reba show. Lily Tomlin is good as her mother, but that isn’t enough to carry any show or we wouldn’t be waiting for The New Normal to come out on DVD (Ellen Barkin ruled that show in the pilot). Malibu Country gets two Mick Happies.

Suburgatory – This little comedic look at up-scale suburban living us by surprise last year and we really enjoyed it. Unfortunately, the delay between seasons has left us feeling that the best was behind for this show. The jokes seem the same, the characters also seem the same, but it just wasn’t as funny this time around in the first two episodes we watched. Don’t think we will be giving Suburgatory a full season pick up in our house. Two to three Mick Happies.

Revolution – The post-apocalyptic show from Eric Kripke on NBC. The show is set in a future where all forms of electricity have stopped and looks at how things might be eleven years after that event. Some of this show really scratches my dystopian future genre itch and the writers are trying to have reason behind how it happened and (if) it can be fixed, but the stories and situations are pretty far fetched. I have been watching this online from NBC.com and will probably keep watching though I find I have to really work up to finding the 45 minutes to tune in. At best three Mick Happies.

Big Bang Theory – The king of all comedies right now. We have all of the seasons on DVD or in iTunes and have been watching this one as a family. It is too bad that this season seems to be going downhill for us. We are not as amused by the typical jokes. My wife and I discussed it and where the show is losing us is:

·      Leonard and Penny – these two need to break up.

·      Penny – she needs something other than drinking and back and forth relationship with Leonard.

·      Howard – needs to grow up a bit. C’mon, man, you’re married to Bernadette (one of the more interesting characters on the show).

One of the few bright points, besides Sheldon (as always), has been the budding “bromance” between Stuart and Raj. The other is Alex, Sheldon’s new assistant. More of that, less of the 3 bullets above please. We are still watching, but just less amused. Three Mick Happies.

Grimm – This is one of our favorite shows right now. It is based on the premise that all of the Fairy Tales creatures are real and hiding amongst us. The Grimm are people who are descended from the Brothers Grimm who can see the creatures for what the really are and have traditionally hunted them. Grimm is a procedural cop show with a supernatural element and season one was good and season two (this year) is as well. We are about eight episodes in (out of 12 aired to date) and liking it. The only nit to pick here is the storyline about Juliette’s memory – if you are watching you know how annoying it is. This show has supplanted Supernatural as our supernatural weekly fix – Four Mick Happies.

Other mentions of shows we liked but aren’t watching this year:

Supernatural – The wife has seen everything up to the end of last season and I have watched most of them as well. The end of last season was a let down with where the characters ended up. Felt too much like that time when Dean went to Hell and Sam was left on Earth. Maybe we will catch this season when it hits Netflix next fall. Certainly didn’t seem worth us paying to see the week they air – we can wait if we watch at all.

Raising Hope – We have been big fans of Raising Hope since it started, but gave up after last season when they killed the pig (the new version of Jump the Shark) and brought back Hope’s mom. Haven’t watched and probably won’t until a far future date when it is the only thing available on Netflix on demand.

10000000 Review

My name is Mick Happy and for the last few weeks I have had a problem. The problem is I spend most nights (right before bed) running down the battery on my iPod playing 10000000 by Eightyeight Games. It is easy to play and frustratingly difficult to win.

The game is about you being locked in a castle and trying to get out by running through a hallway filled with doors, chests and monsters. To get past the said obstacles, you try to match 3 or more items in a typical match 3 game played on the bottom part of the screen. You can match keys, wands, stone, wood, packs or swords. Match swords and wands to damage monsters, keys to open doors/chests, wood and stone for resources and packs for special items.

Sounds easy right. Sure it is. For every obstacle you overcome you get gold or score points. Get to 10000000 score and you get your freedom. As you match items in the matching game and beat monsters, you move a little farther to the right on the screen (safety) as you get hit by monsters or take too long to make a match, you move to the left (running out of time). When you go off the screen to the left your run ends. You can then either run again or go home. Once home, you can spend your gold, stone and wood to upgrade your castle and “level up” your skills (making your matches more effective.

Each run you have a few objectives you can try (get 800 wood, defeat X monsters, etc.), which if you achieve them you get a gold or experience bonus and achieve all of them on a level and you will level up your explorer status. (The higher explorer level the more score bonus you get). Whew…that’s a lot to remember, except you don’t have to remember it as all you have to do is start a run and then match tiles as quickly as you can by moving a column up or down or a row side to side. One unique feature of 10000000 is that the screen wraps so if you need something moved you move it as far as you need to up/down or side/side none of this just swap with the tile next to it stuff here.

As you maybe can tell, I like this game. At first it was a bit maddening and a little too frenetic for me, but once I got over trying to get 10000000 each run, it became fun trying to get the little goals each run or raising my score a bit more each time. Now I have nearly maxed out everything I can in my castle and I still only have a high score of 3800000…so much farther to go. But you can bet I will still be running to get there. 10000000 is a 4 Mick Happy game. I was able to pick it up on sale through iTunes for $0.99. It is currently listed at $1.99 and would have been worth it at that price. Here is a trailer from the developer to help you decide:

Midst Toil and Tribulation Review

Midst Toil and Tribulation is the sixth and latest book in the Safehold series by David Weber. Last year I reviewed How Firm a Foundation (book five) and noted how much I have enjoyed this series so far. The new book continues the struggles of the Empire of Charis against the forces of the Church of God Awaiting on the world of Safehold.

Unlike the previous books, this books deals with the war moving toward a ground conflict on the main continent of the world. The novel deals with the difficulties of logistics and the rapid spread of technology across the world and the devastating effects of that technology when applied to war. Interspersed are some touching moments of self-realization for some of the characters and a couple of twists (one very unexpected but enjoyable).

All of the Safehold books have been heavy on the military, religious and political conflicts of the world they are set in. This book is no different. However, the pace of the series seems to bog down in Midst Toil and Tribulation and that may be a parallel for how the conflicts are changing as well. Not everything is going the main character’s way, there is less forward movement toward the ultimate goal and the numbers of characters to remember continue to grow.

Midst Toil and Tribulation is a good book and well written. You will feel for the characters in no-win situations that do their best for king and country. However, the book covers much less ground and will feel like a much smaller step than previous books in the series toward the ultimate resolution of the conflict on Safehold. Happy I read the novel, but have to give it no more than 3 Mick Happies. If you haven’t started the Safehold series yet, you may want to take them all back to back after a couple more are completed – it will be easier to keep the characters straight in the long run.