Monday Night’s Polar Opposites

Monday television seems to bring out both some of the best good shows and worst good shows around (and a pox on you, NBC, for pulling The Black Donnellys earlier than initially announced — you keep doing stuff like that and we’re going to have words). But, on with the show(s).  

I’ve said it before and I’m going to say it again, I’m sorry, but it’s true: How I Met Your Mother is one of the funniest (if not the funniest) show on television. It’s true, it’s a fact, deal with it.

That Barney guy. Every week he seems to come up with some new form of wonderfulness. This week we got to see what a Barney Bachelor Party is like (and who doesn’t appreciate the notion of well past their prime strippers?). I’m telling you, his antics are legendary, or at least they will be in a few years. And, not only does the man bring the funny, but having him be the guy that convinced Lily to move back to New York so that she could reunite with Marshall is really smart. There has to be a reason that the rest of the HIMYM gang hang out with him, and it’s now clear that it’s because they know while he likes to have fun and has some insane ideas about the world and how it operates, or should operate, he’s a nice guy. Barney is, in fact, a good human being (even if he’s loathe to admit it).

In other news, and I’m going to try to not rant too much about this, but what are the producers at 24 thinking? Did they realize the season wasn’t going so well and just decide to punt the last quarter of it? My God, what would these people have done if The Nine hadn’t been canceled so quickly and they hadn’t been able to rope Kim Raver into reprising her role as Audrey Raines? Now just stop, I’m not giving away any spoilers if you haven’t seen the episode yet, there’s no way you didn’t know that Audrey Raines was alive. They just happened to show us a picture of her dead body where you couldn’t see her head, in fact pretty much the only identifiable thing about her was the white raincoat? It’s just not that surprising, so pick your jaw up off the floor.

Next, you’re going to tell me that you were surprised that the whole attack on Jack and the Silver Spoons kid while they were transporting Fayed was a setup surprised you as well. It didn’t. You weren’t surprised. I know you weren’t surprised, don’t pretend like you were. 

The question here really is why 24 has just been so lackluster this season. All it’s done is rehash old plots, create nonsensical tie-ins, and try and make it look like it was all new and different this time around. I’m not sure how the show can resurrect those great cliffhangers and plot twists that we saw in the first two seasons (and then again in seasons four and five), but it just isn’t working anymore. 

And, anticipating the show, let me ask you this: if Audrey went to China to try and rescue Jack, and the Chinese captured her and faked her death, what on God’s green earth could have possessed them to smuggle her back into the United States where she’s going to be a whole lot easier for Jack to free? It is only hypothetical at this point that she’s back in the U.S. after having gone to China, but it’s the only sort of thing that makes even the smallest amount of sense. True, we don’t know that she was captured in China, but based upon all available information, this seems the most likely course of events (odds are that she was in fact in China when captured). As to why I believe she’s back in the U.S. now, that’s easier, it’s because the last few hours of this season would be even more boring than the whole thing has been to this point if Jack hops on a plane to go to China to rescue her.

I actually hope I’m completely wrong. I hope that the U.S. Government is working with the Chinese with the Audrey Raines stuff, and that the two governments conspired to fake Audrey’s death. That might be the only way the show can resuscitate this season. I don’t think it’s the case, but, fingers crossed…

I can’t wait till Heroes comes back.