King of the Hill - Season 13 (Review)

And so one of the longest running animated sitcoms comes to an end, even though there’s still four episodes left unaired...I guess it doesn’t matter as long as the series finale was aired. King of the Hill had been facing impending cancellation since season 10 and with knowledge that the show wouldn’t have much time left, the creators spent the last few seasons wrapping things up and showing major changes in the lives of the Hills and their Arlen friends. Luanne got pregnant and married in season 11, while Hank’s father, Cotton, passed away in season 12. This final season was a nice send off for the show and Hank and Bobby’s characters in particular.

The series has always been relatively consistent in its quality over the years, although the last few seasons were somewhat weaker than what came before. This last batch of episodes are surprisingly and thankfully stronger and feature some pretty funny and engaging outings for the Hills, most notable being Luanne finally giving birth to her daugther and Hank performing the degrading tasks featured in his father’s will. Something else that was real treat was all the callbacks to previous episodes, The Order of the Straight and Arrow reappear, Luanne resurrected her Manger Babies act(my favorite episode), and we finally meet Buck Strickland’s son. The final episode is wonderfully heartwarming as it sees Hank finally discovering that he and Bobby have something in common: A love for good beef. The finale didn’t try too hard to tug on the heartstrings, it just kept the characters honest and true in their own unique ways and even though we won't be seeing these characters anymore, they'll continue to grow and live their lives like normal people. I generally liked what they did with everyone, and it seemed like a natural way to wrap up the show. King of the Hill has been a great series, and while it's declined in the last few years, I'm going to miss it now that it's gone.

Hung - Season 1 (Review)

I guess any show whose opening title sequence features someone stripping naked is worth a look. Hung is about Ray Drecker, a high-school teacher in a mid-life crisis. His wife left him for a another man, and his house caught on fire and his insurance policy just lapsed. With no other options, Ray takes the advice of Tanya, a woman he just slept with, to use his god given gift of a big penis to whore himself out with Tanya as his pimp. Hung feels like a combination of three fairly recent shows: Secret Dairies of a Call Girl mixed with Weeds and just a little pinch of Californication. Hung had a lot going for it before it premiered, mostly do to its casting. Thomas Jane is fine lead actor despite appearing in rather forgettable films like The Punisher, while Jane Adams in the role Tonya gives the standout performance and it took me a while to figure out that I recognized her from her brief stint as Niles' second wife on Fraiser. Sadly, while the casting and premise are solid, the execution is very lackluster.

The overall arc of this season basically sees Ray and Tanya adjusting to their new lives as prostitute and pimp. The story arc remains rather stagnate and repetitive for the whole season. Time is constantly wasted either reminding Ray and Tanya why they need to stick it out in their new line of work or watching Ray have sex with lots of pretty women. There's not much difference in plot between the first couple of episodes and the last few and the sole diversion we get during this time is a completely pointless love story between Ray and Jemma, his best client. Nothing is gained from the romance in terms of character development and the revelation of Jemma's intentions for Ray are unbelievably asinine.

Even worse is that a lot of the supporting characters have genuinely interesting stories to tell, like Ray's supposedly gay son Damon who has some complex and twisted emotions hiding beneath his surface. He gets an unresolved storyline at the end of the season that shows that he could be just a straight kid with pretensions of being gay. It would have been nice to see this aspect of his personality explored a bit more, but apparently the show was more interesting in watching Ray have sex, continually contemplate his situation and do other things we've seen him do multiple times throughout the season. There was so much opportunity for Hung to be more than it wound up becoming which was an an underwhelming debut season. The show was inexplicably renewed for a second season early in its run and I hope the show becomes a bit more engaging next year. Hung isn't a bad show, its just not what it was hyped up to be.

The Real World: Brooklyn (Review)

I started watching the Real World during their 11th year: the Chicago season. After that came Real World: Las Vegas, the infamous season where the show stopped being about 7 people learning from each other while dealing with personal issues and forever became a show about 7 spoiled brats getting a 3 month vacation to get drunk every night and bitch about nothing. I was about 14 or 15 when Las Vegas aired and even then I knew it was terrible and stopped regularly watching after the following year: the Paris season. Somehow the show has managed to survive for another 10 seasons bringing us to The Real World: Brooklyn, the 21st season. I must say it's the best season in over a decade.

This season was much more like the original 10 seasons, when it wasn't about drinking and partying, it was about the individual people and their stories. It didn't seem like there were as many drunken nights, it was a much more intellectual show than it has been in the past. People said their views sober, which was a refreshing change. The focus on the relationships and individuals' stories were really compelling. Seeing Ryan get called back into service, having Katelynn talk about her struggles as a recently transgendered woman, having Sarah receive a phone call from her abusive dad, those were all spectacular moments. The only thing that I really couldn't stand was the episode that was nothing more than promo for Mtv's Pedro movie.

My favorite 2 cast members were Ryan and Chet (The 2 guys on the far right in the above pic). Ryan seemed like alot of the people I hang out with: goofy, funny and he'll always defend you. I felt so bad for him when he got called back into service. You could tell he's really hurt and upset that he may be going back to Iraq, but without hesitation, Ryan stood up to the plate. and I love him for it. Chet was the closest to my personality (although a lot more metrosexual) and his goals in life were fairly close to my own. I personally don't think Chet is gay--but I do think that he loves Ryan. Not in just a friend way either. He seems to care a lot about him.

My least favorite was Katelynn, who bitched and moaned her way through the series. She started off as this strong willed person who had an engaging story to tell, but instead she acted like a 12 year teenager. Her gambling with the money Scott gave her to pay her bills really annoyed me. She just became a slag as each episode progressed and I'd like to know in her mind how she justifies some of her actions. Scott went from my least favorite person to becoming a really respectable man; giving Katelynn $1500 pretty much proved that. I mean at first he seemed like a your regular model, macho and brain dead, but he quickly showed that he had the most caring and selfless personality out of the whole cast.

Sarah and Devyn weren't that interesting for me to comment on, while J.D was exactly as I pegged him: a nice guy, but a real asshole sometimes. I did really feel for him in the last episode where the girls make him take the blame for a joke even when he started to cry. I was so glad the guys stood up for him. Finally there was Baya, the wannabe dancer that the show didn't give give a crap about. I guess the increase in cast members from 7 to 8 was too much for the producers to handle.

Overall I was truly surprised by the Real World Brooklyn. It managed to be the complete opposite of every horrible thing the show has stood for in the past 10 years. Sure, there were still a lot of those trivial pranks and fights but it wasn't even that mean-spirited and was actually really entertaining. A cast like Brooklyn that can have conflict but still have enough brains to respect each other can still be good television. I wish the producers would keep this kind of quality up, but the next season is set to take place in Cancun, so I don't have my hopes up. But at least The Real World: Brooklyn was a return to the classic.