30 Rock

By Media Maven Like its fellow NBC programs such as Heroes, 30 Rock, Chuck and My Name Is Earl, Friday Night Lights came to its premature, strike-induced ending for 2007.  Unless the strike wraps up soon, you aren’t going to be seeing any of these shows for a while, so I hope you took a moment say your goodbyes.  This week marked a fairly melodramatic, emotionally fluffy end to the FNL season’s first half, though we’ve been left with a few nice developments to explore once the show returns.  Take it to the breakdown:1. Matt/Smash — Ok, two cutesy scenes of Matt and Carlotta (ok, cute is more appropriate then cutesy.  I admit it, I smiled) plus one funny scene with Smash and Matt.  And that was pretty much it.  I know they need to rotate the focus to cover so many cha...   [read the full post]

By Media Maven 8:05 – The UCB announcer introduces each member of the 30 Rock cast, as the live music plays. Every major player is here except for Alec Baldwin’s assistant Jonathan (a.k.a. Sanjay from Weeds) and guest star Edie Falco, whose role is played by SNL scribe Paula Pell. Baldwin and Morgan get the most cheers by far. Grade: A Following the lead of Saturday Night Live’s live performance at the Upright Citizens Brigade Theater in New York last Saturday, the Emmy-winning cast of 30 Rock performed a live staged reading of an upcoming episode to a standing room only crowd at UCB tonight. And guess who was lucky enough to score a seat? [...]   [read the full post]

By Media Maven 30 Rock – Season 2, Episode 6  - “Somebody To Love”  …this show, which is going absolutely nowhere.  I’m seriously concerned for the fate of this program.  There are no serialized arcs so to speak of, so there’s absolutely nothing to follow or develop from episode to episode (aside from some hilarious Sheinhardt Wig Company appearance).  Fine, not the biggest deal in the world, but if you aren’t going to give us any sort of relationship, plot or character development, you better be putting our characters in some hilarious situations.  Liz mistakenly thinking Fred Armisen is a terrorist?  Not funny at all.  Obviously, Liz was going to turn out to be wrong, and an audition tape for The Amazing Race was the funniest explanation they could think...   [read the full post]

By Media Maven 2) The Ubiquitous Promos — (in Jerry Seinfeld voice) Have ya seen these promos?  What’s the deal here?  No one else can afford to buy ads on NBC airtime, so every other commercial in primetime is an “Inside Bee Movie” promo?   It wasn’t enough to have him name drop the film 6 billion times on the premiere of 30 Rock, which, by the way, was called “Seinfeld Vision” and featured Jerry Seinfeld as a guest star?  I’m lucky if I catch a few minutes of actual programming in between all the frickin Bee Movie spots!  It’s enough to make me wonder if someone allergic to bees would break out in hives just from watching NBC for 15 minutes.   [read the full post]

By Media Maven Anyways, this episode was, thank god, a return to the tried and true 30 Rock formula.  Yes, there was more stunt casting (are people really going to tune in because Carrie Fisher is on?  Really?), but it felt organic and unobtrusive.  There wasn’t as much Tracy Morgan hilarity as I like, nor was there (I can’t believe I’m actually about to type this) enough of Jack McBride’s Ken.  We’re getting an early Will and Grace type dilemma here, when everyone wanted to watch Sean Hayes and Megan Mullaly instead of Eric McCormick and Debra Messing so they reworked the dynamic of the show — we know 30 Rock is supposed to center around Tina Fey’s character, but she is BY FAR the least interesting person; its Jack, Tracy, Ken, Jonathon, Pete, and Cerie we want...   [read the full post]

By Media Maven 4. Where was Andy?  One little scene with Shane and Jack Donaghy’s assistant from 30 Rock?  That’s the best we’ve got for him?  Andy’s screentime this season has been wildly reduced from that of the previous two seasons.  What happened to Andy always wanting a cut of the business in a big way?  What happened to his entrepreneurial tendencies?   He just all of a sudden chilled out and doesn’t mind being a low level dealer on par with with 50% of the stars of New York Minute?  Of all the issues I have with this season of Weeds, this is the biggest. This wasn’t the best episode of all time, and in fact, wasn’t close to the true cream of the crop episodes.  But for a show we all like so much that has seemed so directionless lately, this episode was a great step i...   [read the full post]

By Media Maven Music: It’s a short list, but a fair one.  The Office has never been my favorite show, but despite the backlash at the month of hourlong episodes, I find myself liking this show more than ever before.  Say what you will, but I laugh more during The Office than any other program.  Last week’s bit about “whoever” vs. “whomever” was absolute genius.  Genius.  Also, they’ve cut back on Michael being over-the-top ridiculous (aside from the whole driving into a lake thing), as the centerpiece of every episode.  His behavior has been more reasonable (for Michael Scott, that is), and it’s helped me to like his character more.  Unfortunately, the show has been too hit or miss for me to really love it.  While certain moments are just hysterical, others are du...   [read the full post]