57 Channels and Only This Is On: 8/25/13

Ray Donovan: This show is moving just too slow. Ray hires James Woods last episode and he just leaves Boston at the end of this episode. The show seems to somehow stretch three episodes of plot across eight episodes so far. And it may even move slower next week which is entitled “Road Trip” so Woods may not even making it to Los Angeles until the end of that episode. Doesn’t Ray have access to a private jet? They really could have done without the lesbian punching because I could care less for that character, she maybe has shown up for a combines five minutes so far this season, so when she gets mad at her faux lesbian love, it is hard to care at all.

Switched at Birth: I have always asserted that Daphne’s bomb was bigger than Cota’s, but I was surprised she actually launched hers in a preemptive strike. I would eb easy to say this will ruin Coto’s career, but Republicans have an uncanny resilience when it comes to sex scandals, Mark Sanford recently got elected after stepping down as governor after being revealed he had a Brazilian mistress. And not only did friend of the family David Vitter not step down after he got caught up in a prostitution ring, he got reelected and is still a Congressmen. Just as shock was that Toby and Nikki called off their wedding after having sex only to get married down at the courthouse without anyone knowing. Did not see that swerve coming.
You can stream recent episodes on Hulu. You can also download Switched At Birth on iTunes.

Under the Dome: Hopefully Winona Hawkins livens thing up inside of the dome because the last couple episodes have been becoming increasingly boring.
You can stream Under The Dome exclusively on Amazon Instant Video, free for Prime members.

Siberia: I live in Ohio so I am used to some weird weather occurrences, but two feet of snow as the first snowfall of the year would not even happen here. And where exactly did the people in the helicopter go? I was waiting for the faux lesbian and the pilot to show up at some point.
You can stream recent episodes on Hulu. You can also download Siberia on iTunes.

Pretty Little Liars: Come on, they had Red Coat in the back of the hayride and still were unable to catch her? Something better happen on the summer finale.
You can stream recent episodes on Hulu. You can also download Pretty Little Liars on iTunes.

Perception: So is Kate going to be the crazy one in the duo next season with Pierce playing the straight guy? It does seem like Kate entered crazy town this week obsession over the Senator’s son. I do not see how she gets away with killing a dude even if he turns out to be a rapist. I guess Pierce could diagnos her with temporary insanity.
You can download Perception on iTunes.

The Bridge: Initially I was with Sonya in thinking this may not be the guy, but not because he seems to crazy to pull this off but because we are only half way through the season and how do they fill the rest of the season when they have the culprit already in custody? But then again, earlier this year, on this very network I wondered what they would possibly do after we found out who Drew Thompson was a couple episodes before the finale but still turned out its best episodes after that. Plus this always felt like a multiple man job so they could have caught the person making the calls but there are other co-conspirators out there wrecking havoc.
You can stream recent episodes on Hulu. You can also download The Bridge on iTunes.

The Challenge: Rivals II: God bless TJ for holding that dog for the whole challenge for no apparent reason. It made an otherwise boring episode watchable. At least it looks like Mount Camilla will finally erupt for the first time this season next week if the promo monkeys are to be believed.
You can download The Challenge: Rivals II on iTunes.

57 Channels and Only This Is On: 8/18/13

Ray Donovan: That fake movie, Black Mass, was one of the funniest fake movies I have seen in a while. Someone needs to rush it into production. Get Robert Rodriguez on the phone. It is nice that Ray named his daughter after his dead sister, but it can get distracting on a shown when he starts talking about his sister and I spend a couple weird moments wondering why he is talking about his daughter like that.

Switched at Birth: I feel cheated that we did not get to witness Travis and MaryBeth’s first (or second or third) date. That had to be highly entertaining. Certainly more entertaining than Toby’s bachelor party at the free clinic.
You can stream recent episodes on Hulu. You can also download Switched at Birth on iTunes.

Siberia: It is nice that they tried to explain why the cameramen would not just put the cameras down and start helping out. Of course if I were the cameraman tasked with following the group to the tower, I would have passed, or at the very least asked them to take turns filming stuff. Of course if this really was real, the battery would have died a long time ago without the ability to recharge at the base camp. I also had to laugh at how everyone was complaining about how hard it would reach the tower ten miles away. Colin Ferrell starred in a movie not too long ago about a group of prisoners who escaped a Siberian prison camp, in the dead of winter at that, and managed to walk all the way to Tibet and that was based on a real story. Okay, I think half the people ended up dying, but ten miles should not be that bad in the fall. Unless of course you come across ground zero of what may very well be nuclear testing.
You can stream recent episodes on Hulu. You can also download Siberia on iTunes.

Pretty Little Liars: Just last week I rejoiced that Ezra’s baby mama was moving to Washington because there would be no way Ezra would not follow the child he just found out about. Fast forward to this week and Erza’s kid is not actually his kid. What!?! Which means he will probably go back to having sex with his student. Chris Hansen really needs to pay the writers room a visit.
You can stream recent episodes on Hulu. You can also download Pretty Little Liars on iTunes.

The Bridge: A lot of back-story this week, we learned that Sonya’s sister’s murder was handed by her now boss (and she does not know… yet) and she still visits her sister’s murderer in prison even his diminutive mental state. While we also learned that Marco’s father had ties to Fasto’s father who started Fasto’s current business. So did Marco go into law enforcement to rebel against his father or to be a mole for the family business? And it did cross my mind that the two back stories could have intertwined somehow and maybe Sonya’s sister’s killer may have worked for Marco’s father and this whole mystery has been about Sonya and Marco this whole time.
You can stream recent episodes on Hulu. You can also download The Bridge on iTunes.

The Challenge: Rivals II: I have been watching the show live the last couple of weeks and the frequency of the commercial breaks is really distracting. It seemed like the girls half of the challenge had three breaks itself. It just ruins the flow to have an ad every four to five minutes. I really need to go back to watchjing the show OnDemand where I can fast forward through the commercials even if MTV does not offer HD on their OnDemand channel and I am stuck watching in standard definition.
You can download The Challenge: Rivals II on iTunes.

57 Channels and Only This Is On: 8/11/13

Falling Skies: Did they not just kill Karen two episodes ago? Being a sci-fi show I would not be at all surprised if we see her again. Maybe the Karen we saw die was not the real Karen and she was just some sort of real life robot the aliens were able to produce just to mess with the humans. I do not remember if it was ever explained why she still worked with the aliens without the harness on. And I wonder if there will be any resentment from Hal that Maggie killed Karen. Hall did seem shocked by the action even though that was the humane thing to do and really if Hal should be mad at anyone over Karen’s death it should be at his father.

And as creepy as baby Lexi was, school-girl Lexi is even creepier. I thought it was callous of Tom to shot Karen without trying to barter a way to get the bugs out of her, but I turned out Tom has his own creepy witch doctor in the family. I wonder if she will be a gull teenager by the start of next season. It may only make it even more creepy.
You can download Falling Skies on iTunes.

Ray Donovan: One of my longstanding pet peeves on television are dream sequences and drug trips are a corollary to that, but really, even I cannot hate a drug trip that features a monkey. But I was a bid disappointed that the cop that pulled him over did not morph into The Terminator as he was talking to the agent. And I did complain at the start of the show that I feared it would devolve into cheesy fake celebrity problems that Ray would have to solve every week (which thankfully for the most part it has not) that NBA lottery plan was disturbingly brilliant.

Under the Dome: So at the center of the town (which for some reason is a secluded wooded area, not downtown like normal cities) is a mini dome which encases an egg. Alrighty.
You can stream Under The Dome exclusively on Amazon Instant Video, free for Prime members.

Siberia: It is a little bothersome that the show does not notice the little things. There was an actual scene where the one chick is hunting for deer with the cameraman walking right in front of her. Seriously. No cameraman on a real reality show would walk directly in front of someone with a bow cocked back. At least the show moved the plot forward with the disappearance of everyone on the crew, aside from the cameramen on duty. But then that begs the question, what happened to the faux lesbian who “left” earlier in the day. Did she really make it out just before everything went down, or was she just wondering around for the day? Granted it is highly suspicious that we did not get to see her leave, so I have a feeling she may have been captured by the creepy kids lurking around.
You can stream recent episodes on Hulu. You can also download Siberia on iTunes.

Pretty Little Liars: It looks like I was right, that Mona would essentially plea insanity and find herself back at the mental institution. I wonder if they will heighten security this stay after she admitting to sneaking out multiple times during her last stint.
You can stream recent episodes on Hulu. You can also download Pretty Little Liars on iTunes.

The Bridge: Wow, that discussion on serial killers was profound. Too bad I had to read it. And as much as I find that Sonia lives somewhere on the autism spectrum, that meal with the family was actually entertaining in its uncomfortableness. Poor Marco, you really cannot come up with a good example as to why your wallet falls out of your pants innocently. The best thing I could come up with would be to cut a hole in your back pocket and hope she buys it just happened to bust while at the home of another woman to have her sign documents.
You can stream recent episodes on Hulu. You can also download The Bridge on iTunes.

The Challenge: Rivals II: The biggest problem with shows like this is that voting is extremely predictable (Survivor tried to shake things up with the addition of the Hidden Immunity Idol, but it really has only affected the outcome of a Tribal Council three or four times; I am pretty sure more people have gone home with an Idol in their pocket then have been saved by one) so it is always entertaining when a vote goes disastrously bad like when Teresa “threw away” her vote on her hook up LeRoy only for half the people after her following her lead and also voting for LeRoy, sending him into The Jungle. Not that it ended up mattering because LeRoy was saved by an even more rare occurrence with a disqualification in an elimination round (the only other time I remember this happening was to CT who crushed someone as he usually does, only to be sent home on a technicality).
You can download The Challenge: Rivals II on iTunes.

57 Channels and Only This Is On: 8/4/13

Falling Skies: So Tom was able to figure out who the mole is because someone said something similar to what he remember Lourdes said hours before but did not realize it did not make sense to him when she first said it? I hate when writers continually put these kinds of revelations into scripts. Way too cute, just have someone walk in on Lourdes trying to kill Cochise. The reveal would have been more satisfying and less absurd.
You can download Falling Skies on iTunes.

Ray Donovan: I wonder what exactly Ray’s wife thinks he does for a living. Is she just a she no evil her no evil, blind to the fact who just does not ask as long as there is food on the table. Or the kind that does know deep down, but will not say anything because she has grown accustomed to her lifestyle. Or does she really know, does not care, and is just mad that he may be cheating on her and that is the preverbal line.

Switched at Birth: ASL karaoke: who knew? And I am not sure if I should have laughed at all the cheesy ASL pick up lines that Travis was trying. It should be interesting to watch his date with MaryBeth which I have a feeling may devolve into the episode of The Big Bang Theory where Raj went on a date with the chick who plays Daphne with Howard as the interpreter.
You can stream recent episodes on Hulu. You can also download Switched at Birth on iTunes.

Siberia: When the show first appeared I theorized that it would turn out to be a rip off of The Cabin In The Woods, and if that is the case, the Powers that Be sure pumped in the pheromones this episode because there were people hooking up all over the place. I also had to think of another horror movie, Evil Dead, when the Serbian dude found the book. I was screaming at the dude, you do open up creepy books that are hidden. But at least he did not try reading from it. Yet.
You can stream recent episodes on Hulu. You can also download Siberia on iTunes.

Pretty Little Liars: Oh Mona, you sneaky devil. But did she fall on the sword to make it up to Hanna for all the A stuff, or does she have a devious master plan that she is not letting on. Either way, she probably could get off, she worked out the self defense claim with Hanna, and worse case scenario, she could just e declared insane again and go back to Bradley, which may very well be her masterplan.
You can stream recent episodes on Hulu. You can also download Pretty Little Liars on iTunes.

The Bridge: So not only is the creepy trailer dude not a murderer, he is actually coyote for Mexican prostitutes trying to get up from under the thumb from an evil sex trafficking drug lord(who can easily get a million dollars to Marco to pay for his other stolen property). Oh yeah, and he is so compassionate, he will even help snakes across the street. Alrighty. And it took me about half the episode to realize that was a clean shaven and fully functioning Johnny Crowder as the FBI agent. Considering what happened to him, it may have been better had I not recognized him.
You can stream recent episodes on Hulu. You can also download The Bridge on iTunes.

The Challenge: Rivals II: When I saw the title of this episode was Mortuusequusphobia‬, I got excited because I assumed it would be another spelling challenge this week. Silly me, they would never use a word longer than five letters in the spelling challenge. I guess it is safe to assume that mortuusequusphobia‬ is the fear of ketchup or condiments in general. But as great as the Jemmye mental breakdown was, the Jungle was as equally disappointing. C’mon promo monkeys, you do not hype the most dangerious elimination round ever only not to have one.
You can download The Challenge: Rivals II on iTunes.

The Hero: Patty?!? Seriously America? Apparently the only people who watched (and or voted) besides me bored housewives who thought they were Patty. And Patty winning is probably the best reason why there will not be a second season. If only the casted the inaugural season better.
You can download The Hero on iTunes.

57 Channels and Only This Is On: 7/28/13

Falling Skies: When Tom shot Karen my first thought was oh my God, they killed Karen! My second thought was, wait, she did not say that line they repeated over and over again in the promos, they must have Inceptioned Tom putting him in a dream inside a dream. Stupid promo monkeys spoiling the episode. But I wonder how many people spotted Cochise in Tom’s dream. If you missed it, that was Doug Jones without his Chochise costume talking to Gloria Rubin in the teacher’s lounge.
You can download Falling Skies on iTunes.

Ray Donavan: There are very few things I need to see less than Jon Voight dancing to Now That We Found Love in a gay bar.

Under the Dome: An interesting question of what would be on your playlist if you only have a half an hour before being nuked by your own government. The DJ went with the soothing tones of Mozart. I think I would embrace the impending doom and put on It's the End of the World As We Know It (And I Feel Fine) or maybe War Pigs. And all it took for the dude to care about his sister was a MOAB. Though odd it took Big Jim a whole day to decide he should release her. But will Junior just drag her back down next episode after he realizes the bomb failed? At least the preacher finally died. It was pretty obvious after the pacemaker took out the sheriff that the preacher’s hearing aid would do him in.
You can stream Under The Dome exclusively on Amazon Instant Video, free for Prime members.

Pretty Little Liars: So we got our first confirmation that Red Coat is Cece, assuming that hanger dude was not told to give that name by the real Red Coat if pressed. I am thinking that is the case because that is kind of an underwhelming reveal and shows like this love big reveals. I am still betting Allison is actually alive and pulling the strings.
You can stream recent episodes on Hulu. You can also download Pretty Little Liars on iTunes.

The Bridge: My biggest complaint about the Pilot was that I do not really like when there are random characters that seem to have no connects but undoubtedly will end up intercepting by the end of the season. Thankfully we only had to wait three episodes before the three random storylines started to intercut as the police had to inform Charlotte of the ransom and Steven became the chief suspect of the investigation. Now I just wonder how long they stay in each other’s path or how long before we get a connection between Charlotte and Steven.
You can stream recent episodes on Hulu. You can also download The Bridge on iTunes.

The Challenge: Rivals II: That was one solid episode even if both challenges were kind of lame (remember the good old days when they had to melt blocks of ice with only body heat?). You had Marlon open up the episode by hooking up with a dude and closed it out with hooking up with a chick (this season needs more Nanny who along with Frank was the breakout star last season). He even got in a shouting match with Knight after a game of charades got out of hand (which may be the first time ever anywhere; Hollywood Game Night certainly would be more watchable if a brawl broke out after a game of charades). And that was not even the best fight of the night which went to Anessa and Trashelle which featured Trashelle hitting Anessa’s elbow with her face which was enough to make Trashelle quit which, of course, pissed off T.J (and inadvertently sent Sarah packing for the second time simply because of the partner she was paired with). And an annoyed T.J. is an entertaining T.J. This gave me the idea of an entire season made up exclusively of people who have quit in the past. It would be awesome to see T.J. tear down these contestants week after week.
You can download The Challenge: Rivals II on iTunes.

The Hero: Of course the two people I was thinking of voting for ended up going home in the last episode. Really, all the talk of what it means to be a hero got extremely annoying this season. Seriously, you not a hero for electing to go home yourself, you are a moron. Even worse, Charles probably had the best chance of the final six to win. I hope for Charles’ sake, whoever win thinks it is heroic enough to throw him some dollars for his stupid selfish act.
You can download The Hero on iTunes.

57 Channels and Only This Is On: 7/21/13

Falling Skies: I never thought Hal was the mole, just too obvious. But do you know who was not at all obvious: Lourdes. Certainly did not see that coming. And that face worm scene was extremely creepy. But how exactly did she know all the strategic planning? Not really something a doctor would be privy two. As for the Masons, all the counter attacks really started to border on absurdity. There had to be about six in one episode lone.
You can download Falling Skies on iTunes.

Ray Donovan: The first two episodes were good, but the show was just missing something to get me invested in it. That may have finally came when the dude who got Papa Donovan out of prison showed up and we ended the episode in his dark basement with Ray and all his friends posted on his wall. This scene really should have been the final scene of the premiere.

Switched at Birth: Bay and Daphne’s talk about sex may have been the most uncomfortable thing I have seen on television in a long time.
You can stream recent episodes on Hulu. You can also download Switched at Birth on iTunes.

Under the Dome: So the brother finally asked someone about his sister. That only took three days. Not that he cared all that much because it look like he is already renting out her room. But just what is Big Jim going to do with her? If he lets her go, he will have to send his son, who just did not disappoint him for the very first time in his life, to jail. Since it is flooded, he really cannot keep her in the bunker. So it is either lock her up in the house or kill her.
You can stream Under The Dome exclusively on Amazon Instant Video, free for Prime members.

Siberia: It is annoying on competition reality show when contestants talk about “playing the game” and it is even more annoying on this show because there really is no “game” to play. There are no competitions, not elimination, the only thing they have to do is not die, that really is not a game.
You can stream recent episodes on Hulu. You can also download Siberia on iTunes.

Pretty Little Liars: When Spencer drove into that town I thought she drove into a different show. It turns out I was right. For the unaware, Ravenswood is an upcoming Pretty Little Liars spin-off show (do not get too attached to the Hanna / Caleb relationship because is joining that cast). If the show is as creepy as these segments would suggest, it may be worth watching.
You can stream recent episodes on Hulu. You can also download Pretty Little Liars on iTunes.

The Bridge: I do not know what I would do if a woman who looked like Diane Kruger walked up to me in a bar and propositioned me for sex right off the bat. I do not know what I would do if any woman walked up to me in a bar and propositioned me for sex right off the bat. I would probably be too paranoid that I was on a hidden camera show or that she is just luring me back to her place to harvest my organs that I would end up passing up the opportunity. It may not be a good thing that this was my big take away from the episode why my biggest question would be is a hostess really an upgrade over a waitress?
You can stream recent episodes on Hulu. You can also download The Bridge on iTunes.

The Challenge: Rivals II: Seriously producers, if all you can get on short notice was Cara Maria, just send Cooke home. No one wants to see her ever again (including the contestants). It is not even a hate to love thing, it is a wants to turn the channel thing. And a note to any newbies to the Challenge, watch previous seasons. I had to shake my head when Anastasia got mad at CT for using her as her own personal plaything. Had she watched the show before, she would have known that is his M.O. with the exception of Diem. Not watching the previous seasons would be as dumb as training by smoking cigarettes and not eating (God bless TJ).
You can download The Challenge: Rivals II on iTunes.

The Hero: I was really hoping they were going to vote Patti into the Hero’s Challenge, I could have done without her for the final episode. And again it is annoying they are going make us wait a week to find out who gets voted off, really unnecessary. I really doubt there are many people out there that were thinking of not watching next week but will turn in just to see who will be voted off.
You can download The Hero on iTunes.

57 Channels and Only This Is On: 7/14/13

Falling Skies: So Hal was the mole? I still do not buy it (and the promo monkeys would seem to agree with me). I still find Gloria Rubin the most likely culprit although the bigger question to me is does the mole have a bug in their ear or are they doing this under their un volition?
You can download Falling Skies on iTunes.

Switched at Birth: It was only a matter of time before the show did an alternative timeline episode but I am a little surprised this was the route the writers took with the new timeline starting if Regina told the Kennish’s about the switch as soon as she figured it out. I assumed we would get a what if the girls were never switched to begin with timeline. Instead we get a Jon fever dream of a worse case scenario where everyone is much worse off had the switch happened earlier (what does it say about Jon that he killed off Regina). I kind of laughed when the end of the dream, Jon ended up dying because Regina was not there to give him CPR and is now glad that she is around all of the sudden. It is a little absurd.
You can stream recent episodes on Hulu. You can also download Switched at Birth on iTunes.

Defiance: Since it premiered during the end of the spring season, I was behind on the show from the start and finally got caught up in time for the finale. Kind of a middling season at best. It is weird they killed off the main antagonist a couple episodes before the finale and never really replaced her (unless the white dude is supposed to be the main villain but I always found him more of an annoyance that scary). I am also not a fan of shows that leaves everyone in the cast in peril at the end of the season (Smallville was always the worst at this), and the only way they can make it worse is if everything is back to normal by the second episode (which was always the case on Smallville). I will not be surprised if the hooker turns up alive next season or the white people end up not being exiled. Hopefully the video game is better. Not that I will be playing it.
You can stream recent episodes on Hulu. You can also download Defiance on iTunes.

Under the Dome: So the one kid is telling everyone he is living alone? Um, is he ever going to notice that his sister is missing? By my count she has not been home for two days, it is about time he starts noticing her absence.
You can stream Under the Dome exclusively on Amazon Instant Video, free for Prime members.

Siberia: I was going to complain at how stupid some of these characters are like the computer nerd going into the forest to see how that one dude died violently or trying to hide bullets under your mattress. But this is supposed to be a reality show, and there are plenty of stupid people who populate these type of shows to the extent that I made a list of the 25 Dumbest Survivor Contestants Ever and that list is not even five years old and I could easily already expand it to 50.
You can stream recent episodes on Hulu. You can also download Siberia on iTunes.

Pretty Little Liars: Oh Hanna, you really need to leave the thinking up to someone else because you are no criminal mastermind. You really should have just stayed home and had more Melrose Place flashbacks (sure it was a different character but I am sure that is what they were going for). And should I have recognized who the den mother in the picture from the end of the episode was?
You can stream recent episodes on Hulu. You can also download Pretty Little Liars on iTunes.

Perception: Apparently I am not the only person watching Brain Games because that unintentional blindness as the basis of an episode earlier this year (where they managed to have a cheerleader strip in front of me without me even noticing). But the ended was such a stretched I could not help think of the South Park episode where the one dude had sex with chickens as a way to get people to read.
You can download Perception on iTunes.

The Bridge: The show is as good as I expect coming from FX, but much like the last show they launched, The Americans, it is just missing something to make it great. Most notably being that I am completely worn out on television characters that fall somewhere on the autism spectrum. I had to roll my eyes when Diane Kruger had her first moment of social awkwardness. I also do not like it when it has random characters that are seemingly unrelated storylines that end up intersecting much later in the show. After one episode, I already do not care about Annabeth Gish or the creepy kidnapper. Hopefully the show finds its footing and soon.
You can stream recent episodes on Hulu. You can also download The Bridge on iTunes.

The Challenge: Rivals II: I thought the inception of Redemption Island to bring back Boston rob and Russell Hantz was the dumbest way to pair off any two reality contestants, but Johnny and Frank’s Twitter war just beat that. If the show really wanted to bring back those two, they should have paired CT with his backpack Johnny (which was the greatest moment ever in The Challenge history) and had Frank team up with the gay porn star from last season (and as a bonus, that would have meant no Wes this season). And there are a lot of boring people on this season, they could have eliminated both teams in The Jungle and I would not have mind. Really all the rookies are worthless up to this point. They really need to step their game up. And I have absolutely no clue who Zach’s partner is and I watched that season. Hopefully things get more interesting from here. Otherwise it might be time for another Fresh Meat season.
You can download The Challenge: Rivals II on iTunes.

The Hero: Wow, those eliminations were really lame. C’mon, you got to add some pomp and circumstance to them. Have them in the war room with The Rock there to ask questions before the decision. Just having a dude come back, say "Shawn", and be done with it is a little lame. I was really hoping Patty would have been eliminated second because you have to take the money. It is not being a hero to pass up $30,000 and get tear gassed for it, that is stupid plain and simple.
You can download The Hero on iTunes.

Hollywood Game Night: Darn you Kristen Bell, making me turn into this crap. Alright, it turned out not to be completely horrible. It reminded me of all those cheesy game shows I grew up on. The different being those were only a half hour and this would benefit from chopping it in half. If they did that, this show could be a good fill in whenever their new sitcoms inevitably fail this fall.
You can stream recent episodes on Hulu.

Best of the Week: 7/6/13

Quote of the Week: And find out what it is about those four pretty girls that attracts so many corpses. (Lieutenant Tanner, Pretty Little Liars)

Song of the Week: Waiting On the World to Change – John Mayer and the Roots (Philly’s 4th of July Jam)

Big News of the Week: MTV and VH1 Actually Played Music Videos for a Full Day: No seriously, this actually happened when you were too busy being outside eating hot dogs and looking at fireworks, the two former music television networks took time out of airing unwatchable reality shows and laughably bad scripted series to celebrate the nation’s birthday with a little music with new music of today (VH1 aired a bunch of indie artist premieres like The Lone Bellow), and summer jam classics like Born In the U.S.A. (natch) and No Diggity (one of the greatest songs ever put to wax). Though in the age of YouTube, it because clear why television music channel would be irrelevant when they played songs like Pumped Up Kicks and noticeably edited out the word “bullet”, or when they edited out the saxophone bong from Diane Young (although I think the scene missing title was a nod to Closer by Nine Inch Nails) and of course the fully clothed version of Blurred Lines is also not nearly as entertaining. Of course by Friday, VH1 went back to being the all WAG’s network while MTV was back to showing YouTube videos of dudes getting hit in the junk with various objects.

"The Pickett Line" Falling Skies Sunday at 10:00 on TNT

Free Download of the Week: Funny Heartbeat - Kisses (Amazon MP3)

Deal of the Week: 100 Albums for $5: This month’s cheap albums include Prince, Beastie Boys, John Mayer, and Simon and Garfunkel.


New Album Release of the Week: Don't Look Down - Skylar Grey

New DVD Release of the Week: Spring Breakers

Video of the Week: Kevin Hart was all ready to explode almost a decade ago, and then he was the star of Soul Plane, one of the worst movies ever made and sank back into obscurity. Ever since he has been digging himself up and is set to explode again with his biggest movie yet playing opposite to Ice Cube (who played the straight man that launched the career of Chris Tucker). And though the buddy cop genre has been way overdone, there are plenty of laughs in the trailer for Ride Along.


Next Week Pick of the Week: The Bridge, Wednesday at 10:00 on FX: FX regained its title as the next network on television launching The Americans and stellar seasons of its older show. Though it is about to enter a year of uncertainty as it splits in to two separate networks. Granted all its best stuff like its dramas as staying on FX Prime while all their not very funny comedies are being shipped off to FXX. Just before the switch, FX has one more show to launch The Bridge. The show follows two detectives investigating a murder who’s body falls on their border. Hopefully it is better than the last Norwegian murder investigation import: The Killing.