Are We Winning?

As most of you know, I read a good amount of books.  Mainly fiction, but every once in awhile I will read something nonfiction.  Rarely do I read sports books.  Which I think is weird, since I love sports.  Some of you also know that I am a huge fan of Deadspin, especially the Will Leitch days.  Well, he has a new book out, called Are We Winning?  Fathers and Sons in the New Golden Age of Baseball.  I decided to pick it up last week and pretty much could not put it down once I started it.

The book is about a trip to the Cardinals/Cubs game in '08 when the Cubs clinched the division.  Leitch attends the game with his father and a friend (a hated Cubs fan).  Actually this is just the backdrop of the book.  Leitch is writing the book to his nonexistent son.  It is broken up into chapters by inning.  He explains modern baseball and how it is doing just fine, but also his own relationship with his father.

My favorite part of the book can be read here.  He discusses Steve Bartman and how that could have been any diehard baseball fan.  Anyone could have reached for that foul ball and ended up being blamed for ruining a season.  Utterly ridiculous the way Bartman was treated.

The book also made me think of the relationship with my own father.  In fact, so much of Leitch's description of his dad, reminded me of my dad.  Playing catch and my dad being able to launch flyballs into the stratosphere, or being able to throw the length of our field without much effort always amazed me.

If you are a fan of baseball or just want to read about father/son relationships, this is definitely a book you should check out. 

Hey, TV Shows are Back!

Now that the holidays are over and our lives are finally back to normal, television shows can resume (or premiere...or start a new season, whatever).  I will now tell you about everything I watched this week.

Alcatraz
It has Hurley and Sam Neill.  Obviously I am going to check it out.  After the premiere, I can only say that I will need a few more episodes before I decide if I like it or not.  I mean, the story is pretty interesting, but will it take forever to receive answers?

Basically, all the inmates from Alcatraz disappeared (it was all covered up) and now they are starting to return.  Neill's character (Hauser) is now hunting the convicts as they return, along with a hot cop and Hurley.  It seems that Hauser's assistant was a doctor back then who did experiments on the prisoners and has not aged since...hmm.  Very weird.

There are some silly things though.  I mean, Rebecca Madsen (played by Sarah Jones, who was Polly Zobelle on Sons of Anarchy and the pregnant fugitive on Justified and is smoking hot) dresses in super-tight pants (I am not complaining), but would a cop really want to wear pants like that while working?  Especially when she constantly ends up chasing people? 

Second, Hurley (I will not even bother looking up his character's name) has a PhD in criminal justice and is some kind of expert on Alcatraz.  For some reason he is perfect to work as Madsen's partner.  Even though Hauser seems to have spent his entire life studying and preparing for the moment these guys start returning.

Being Human
Seriously, why do I watch this show?  I might have to stop.  What happened?  Who honestly cares.  Hell, that show that came on after it was actually better (Lost Girl).

Justified
Now this is an awesome show.  Everything was pretty much perfect.  Without going into too much detail, let me tell you about the awesome stuff:
-Raylan pulling the table cloth on Fletcher Nix (who is an awesome villain and better be back at some point).  I knew Raylan would come up with something, but I did not imagine it would be that simple and then still shoot him in the arm. 
-Boyd fighting Raylan in the U.S. Marshalls office, which seemed a little odd at first, but then you realize that Boyd is now locked up with Dicky Bennett.  I love when Boyd has a plan (he always has a plan).
-Ava hitting a dude with a frying pan.  Seriously, the funniest thing I have seen in like a month.

White Collar
Neil and Peter save Elizabeth and catch the bad guy.  The big thing that happened though was that Neil had to decide whether he wanted to stay in NYC or run away with the treasure.  Obviously, he chose staying in the city and continuing his job with Peter.

The thing that interested me though, was where did Neil learn to shoot like that?  Is there anything he is actually bad at?

Royal Pains
This is one that Lindsey and I enjoy watching together.  It is basically like House, but a tad more upbeat.  The season picks up where we ended last time, with Hank's patient accidentally receiving the wrong medication from Divya (who was also working at the hospital without telling Hank).

Evan finally receives the General's permission to marry his daughter, but then has it taken away when Evan stands up to him.  Naturally by the end things were pretty much resolved.  Also, Divya tells Hank that she gave the patient the wrong meds, which will probably cause Hank to not trust her. 

Also, I am tired of the whole Jill/Hank story.  Get her to Uruguay already.  I think Hank should just go on a rampage banging his patients.  It seems like all of them end up being attractive women, who flirt with him.

Person of Interest
I expected a little more from this show.  I hope next season they shift gears a little bit and focus more on the machine.  I am more interested in watching Reese investigate Harold than each week's victim (which ends up being about the same as an episode of Human Target).

Archer
Burt Reynolds and Archer together, yeah it was pretty much as awesome as expected.  There were so many funny parts, but my absolute favorite was the elevator joke.  A super-slow elevator and then a discussion about putting in a bat-pole.  

Community Season 2

As some of you know (those of you that read this post), I am a fan of Community, but I am about a year behind.  I missed season one, so I got it for Christmas and well, you get the point.  Anyways, I finished season two the other day and I must say that it was also pretty damn awesome.  Fortunately, I was smart enough to DVR season three, so I can start watching ASAP.

The great thing about the show, I said this before, but I will say it again:  it can be many things all at once.  It can be hilarious, with traditional jokes, slapstick style humor, or insane situations.  It can also be pretty emotional when it wants to.  Here are some of my favorite moments:

-Abed delivering a baby in the background and then referencing it during Shirley's delivery.
-The two-part paintball episode.  So much awesome stuff in that one.  Especially since Sawyer showed up as a badass paintball mercenary.
-The zombie plague and how it ended up with Chang sleeping with Shirley.
-The trampoline.  That was such a silly thing, yet it really helped cement the idea of Pierce as the villain for the rest of the season.  It seemed to me that this was the moment that we saw being excluded truly bothered him.
-The number of moments where we thought maybe Jeff and Annie might get together, but then it gets made fun of during the fake flashback episode.
-Troy's 21st birthday, which ended up with Britta and Jeff realizing that they both were talking about the same bar.  Troy never orders a drink and ends up driving everyone home.
-Abed and Annie kissing, while Abed is in his Han Solo role.
-The Christmas special, which was kind of sad and yet very funny.
-The Valentine's Day episode was pretty awesome.  Starting with the fight about the Barenaked Ladies, Troy and Abed going for the same girl (but instead of doing the typical sitcom thing, they do not compete over her), Britta trying to teach Annie about being homophobic (although, the lesbian turned out to be straight, who thought Britta was a lesbian), Pierce's drug addiction, and Jeff eventually sending the group a very sweet text.  Pretty awesome.

There were more moments, but I cannot think of anything else.  I bet we can all agree though that Alison Brie is still hot...

Sherlock Holmes: A Game of Shadows

Lindsey and I went to see this the other night (she only fell asleep for like a minute, so proud of her!) and I must say that I was quite pleased with it.  All the good things about the first one were in this one. 

I love the deduction process he uses during fight scenes.  I especially loved it at the end when he fought Professor Moriarty, when both characters are laying out the way the fight will go.

I feel like this plot (Professor Moriarty trying to start a massive world war) was the plot for League of Extraordinary Gentleman.  Any Holmes fans out there know if that was something Moriarty planned to do in the book?  From what I can tell that was never really what he was up to.

Also, I have one complaint:  the scene where Holmes tosses Mary out of the train.  I am pretty sure someone would be severely hurt if they got thrown out of a train into a body of water.  I guess that is not too bad though if that is my only complaint.

I recommend going to see it if you have not already done so. 

Inheritance Review

Christopher Paolini's Inheritance Cycle series came to it's conclusion with the fourth book:  Inheritance.  Where does he go from here?  Something tells me that he is not done with this world.  I imagine he will write a few short stories about other things, but his next novel will return to this land.

Anyways, on to the book.  It was decent.  That is really about all I can say.  It had a few great moments, a few terrible moments, but the majority of it was pretty bland.  At least he tied up the majority of the earlier loose ends, but most of them seemed pretty weak.

The major one was the Vault of Souls.  I honestly expected whatever weapon be there to be something completely different, but instead it was just a bunch of the Eldunari that were hidden away from the world after Galbatorix went crazy.  My question is that if the dragons are that powerful that they could make everyone forget about these Elunari, how come they could not do more against Galbatorix? 

Also, the more I think about it, I feel like the Eldunari and Paolini's magic system come like a video game.  You can gain and absorb power, I almost expect to see a health bar near Eragon's head during battles.  "You have discovered the Vault of Souls!  Unlimited magic power!"

Second thing that bothered me was the way he portrayed Galbatorix.  At first, he seems to be very much not insane.  He has grand plans for the use of magic throughout the land.  He wants to make it fair and pretty much put everyone on equal footing.  Remember how Murtaugh said that Galbatorix had grand designs for the world?  Well, it seemed like he was not lying.

I just wish that Paolini had continued with this idea.  In fact, he should have taken it to an extreme.  Make Galbatorix the good guy, who represents change in the world.  Eragon and the rest are fighting to keep things the way they are.  This would have been an interesting idea, something to help ponder.  But, in the end, it turns out that Galbatorix is just batshit crazy and wants to rule the world.  Lame.

Although, I did enjoy that the secret to Galbatorix ended up being that he discovered the name of the ancient language.  Unfortunately, I did not like that the way he is defeated.  Murtaugh falls in love with Nasuada and this causes his true name to change, meaning all of the binding spells by Galbatorix are null and void.  He reveals this by stripping Galbatorix's wards with the new magic word.  Eragon then uses a spell without words to make Galbatorix feel pain or something.  Galbatorix then pulls an Emperor (or Sauron) and explodes, almost killing everyone.

Speaking of love...ugh.  Murtaugh and the Nasuada love story was pretty much the most predictable thing ever.  If someone could not see it coming, then they must have been mildly retarded.  Another thing I could do without:  the stupid contemplations about murder during war that Roran and Eragon both go through.  If I wanted to read about soldiers thoughts on the horrors of war, I would read biographies from actual soldiers...the reason Tolkien could write about these things is that he actually fought in World War I.

Wow, so it probably seems like I did not like anything at all.  Which is not true, allow me to mention the things I enjoyed:

-Angela.  I would love to see a short story, or maybe even a featured novel about her history/adventures.  Also, I loved the Monty Python reference.  She tells a story to the Urgals about a killer bunny and it ends with "and there was much rejoicing."

-Roran.  Again, if there was another book about his adventures in securing Carvahall or something.  I would be most pleased. 

-I actually enjoyed the ending with Eragon going away and not ending up with Arya.  Especially now that she has her own dragon.  I was a little upset that we never really saw anything from Vanir until the end.  I thought for sure he would lead an elf battalion or something.  Or at least become friends with Roran...oh well.  I also liked the way Eragon handled the Urgal situation.  He created the Olympics AND allowed an Urgal (and dwarf) to be a Rider.

-Minus the love story, I did enjoy the fact that Murtaugh decided to leave.  Maybe that is what his next book should be:  Murtaugh's adventure outside of Alagaesia.  Then he can return and explain to Nasuada that her becoming High Queen is idiotic.  He could bring democracy to the land...

Like I said, it was an okay book, but nothing amazing.

Boardwalk Empire: Sutter Take Note...This is How You End a Season

Last week was a pretty awesome episode, but I failed to write about it since I watched it on Tuesday and wanted to focus on Sons of Anarchy.  We see through a series of flashbacks, how Jimmy ended up with Angela and what caused him to leave Princeton.

Basically his mom got drunk while visiting him at school and when he tried to put her in his bed, she started kissing him.  They had sex.  Seriously.  That one thing that we all suspected, but never wanted to discuss because well, most shows do not do that to a main character.

Needless to say, after banging his mom, he left Princeton and joined the Army and went over to Europe to fight za Germans.  And before I any further, I have to say that James Darmody is a real motherfucker.

Anyways, on to the awesomeness of the finale:

-Richard and Jimmy forcing the turncoat to write a confession saying he set Nucky up and that it was all Eli.  Then killing him and making it look like a suicide.  That is when those two are at their best, being completely badass.

-I was pretty excited to see Nucky reconcile with Jimmy and then with Eli.  Jimmy tied everything up nicely for Nucky.  Fixing the Chalky White/KKK problem was pretty badass as well. 

-The ending was probably the most shocking thing I have seen in awhile.  Jimmy goes to meet Nucky because he has Manny for him.  Unfortunately, Jimmy walks into a trap.  Apparently, Nucky believed Eli over Jimmy about who tried to kill him.

Jimmy gives Nucky a little lecture about what it is like to kill that first man.  Then Nucky shoots him in the head and tells him that he is not seeking forgiveness.  Most people seem to believe that this is the first person Nucky has ever killed, but I do not think so.  The way he said "you do not know me James."  Leads me to think that maybe in his younger days he did kill some people for the Commodore, and tried to rise above that...

It was seriously a shocking moment though.  I cannot believe they would kill off Jimmy.  It was a great move because it was hard to imagine how they could all coexist.  I actually thought Nucky was going to shoot Eli and allow Jimmy to kill Manny, but I think I like this ending better.

-Also, how pissed is Nucky going to be when he finds out that Margeret signed the deed of land over to the church?  She needs a bullet.

SOA: CIA Ex Machina

The episode started off pretty cool.  I had no clue how Sutter was going to get the club out of the RICO mess, but then he reveals that the CIA is working with the cartel.  No more RICO case.  Nice and easy.

Then, Romeo informs Jax of all this.  He says that if the club does not help the cartel get the guns from the Irish, then they will allow the Feds to take SAMCRO down.  The Irish only want to deal with Clay, so therefore, Jax has to allow him to live.

Jax does visit with Clay and gives him the lowdown on what will happen.  He will step down as president and he will make sure the Irish are happy.

After that, the episode goes downhill.  There is a good amount of talking and tidying up of small plot lines.  The season ends with Jax sitting at the head of the table,  Chibbs as his Sgt. at Arms, and Opie not showing up.  Tara shows up to lend her support and Gemma sees them together and thinks of herself and JT.

The best part aside from the way Jax threatens Clay, was learning that the girl that Tig ran over, was the daughter of some major player.  I am guessing this guy must be the big boss of the Niners.  He will be an O.G.  I am guessing that will be a major story for next season.

I look forward to next season.  Or at least for the start of Justified...

SOA: The Truth About J.T.

The episode was pretty good.  I feel like this has been spread out over too many episodes though.  They could have honestly cut this down a little bit.  Allow me to explain in a bit.  First, what I liked.

The Good
-When Unser is there with Clay, I thought for sure that he was going to kill him somehow.  Maybe smother him, or just put another bullet in him.

-Tig.  He turned his back on Clay and now blames himself for being shot.  His running down LaRoy's girl was pretty badass.  I loved the chase scene and then the joining of Jax and the others.  I just have on question:  when Jax is shooting at them, did no one else call the police and report a biker gang shooting at SUVs?

-Also, Tig at the hospital was pretty cool.  I felt bad for him.  I wonder how much he knows about JT?

-Gemma finally comes clean with what happened to JT.  Needless to say, Jax is not too happy.  Tara makes herself useful and provides Jax with a method to kill Clay.

-I also loved Opie's disbelief in Jax's promise to do something once he knows the whole truth.  Apparently, Opie is a little tired of these promises.

The Bad
-Gemma's overall plan.  What the hell is she doing?  At first she does not want Clay killed, then she does, then she wants Jax to know.  I get that she had to find the letters and remove the elements that blamed her, but she could have went about everything in a simpler way.

-Tara.  Her whole "tell me you love me" thing was pretty damn weird.  I will have no problem if she takes a bullet.  Also, just like Gemma, what is her plan?  Did she hide the letters that implicate Gemma?  I was confused during that whole exchange.

-Jax's reaction after shooting Opie.  He wants Unser to say it was some black guys.  He then gets pissed at Tig for going after LaRoy.  What the hell did he think would happen?

Predictions
-Lincoln Potter is not kidding when he told Juice that he does not want the club.  He will get the Irish and the cartel, but leave SAMCRO out of it.  Maybe he has some connection to the club...

-Jax will take over the club, and with the IRA/Cartel out of the way, I think he will decide to stay and help push the club back towards what his father envisioned.  Either that, or Tara will die at the end of the season and force Jax to want revenge.

-There will be a war with the Niners.  Will that be the big thing for next season?

Boardwalk Empire: Wife Murdering 101

Allow me to explain something:  if you owe a Jewish butcher $5000, you should probably just pay him.  Jimmy just learned this the hard way.  Manny shows up at Jimmy's house and grabs Angela.  He is holding her hostage while he waits for Jimmy to come out of the bathroom.  As soon as the door opens, Manny shoots, but it is not Jimmy.  It is Angela's girlfriend.  She begs, but Manny still shoots her.

It will be all out war with Philadelphia, but the real question is this:  what will Nucky do when he finds out?  Will he help Jimmy, or will he just stay out of it and not care.  Maybe this could be the thing that helps reconcile their relationship.  Maybe not.

Other awesome things:

-I love the numerous references you can catch if you pay attention.  Like Sacco and Vanzetti in this episode. 
-It was great how Angela and Jimmy had that great moment before she died.  Maybe things were going to get better between them.  Probably not now.
-I wish I had a desk drawer full of Ty Cobb autographed baseballs. 
-I guess sending in the guys with billy-clubs was probably a dumb move on Eli's part.  Also, he is becoming a bit of psychopath.  Nucky should probably have killed him awhile ago.

SOA: Opie's Revenge or Clay's Downfall

Honestly, the majority of the episode was pretty weak.  I think it was pretty silly for them to bring back
Wendy at this point.  Does Jax really need something else to worry about?  Also, Gemma keeps acting like she has a plan, but what the hell could it be?

The Otto stuff was cool, well played by Sutter, but again, it just felt like filler until we got back to the Opie story.  Finally though, we got what we all wanted:  Opie's revenge.

Opie confronts Jax to find out if he knew anything about Piney's death.  He then shoots out Jax's tire and rides off to confront Clay.  Jax believes it should be brought to the table.  Oh do not worry Jax, Opie is bringing it to the table...

Jax steals a hearse and then some guy's crotch-rocket.  Opie gets to the clubhouse and Clay is waiting for him.  I honestly thought Clay was going to shoot him, but Opie is too smart (or just too pissed).  He smashes through the door and forces Clay to sit down and does not listen to the lies coming from Clay.

Jax shows up and tells Opie that he does not want to have to shoot him.  At this point, I thought that Opie might listen.  Then he shoots Clay twice.  And judging by the previews for next week, Clay dies.

The club is not in a good place right now.  Will Gemma tell Jax the truth about Clay?  Probably not.

SOA: Kozik Exploded

I enjoyed last night's Sons of Anarchy, but it did not need to be a ninety minute episode.  From all the previews I saw and read about the episode, I thought more would have happened.  Unfortunately, stuff happened, but not what we expected.

-Gemma changes her mind the next day and tells Unser that the club has to worry about the cartel and Clay needs to be around for that.

-The showdown between Clay and Jax almost happened anyway.  Jax confronts him about his mom's face and Clay tries to pull the "it's my old lady, mind your own business."  That worked on Tig, but not so much with Jax.

-Then they go hunting for Mexicans.  I figured at some point someone would have to die, hell maybe like a major character.  Sadly, it ended up being Kozik.  I am guessing Sutter hates Kenny Johnson, since he kills him in his shows via explosion.  In The Shield, it was with a grenade, and in last night's episode, he stepped on a landmine.

-Speaking of Kozik exploding:  his arm lands on Juice.  That dude is not having a great season.  As he leaves the minefield, he goes on a suicide mission just trudging his way out.  Needless to say, Chibbs confronts him.   Later Juice finally tells Chibbs why he is suicidal.  Well he leaves out the whole Assistant US Attorney thing, but he tells Chibbs that his dad is black and that the sheriff is threatening to tell the club.  Chibbs laughs at him and asks what his birth certificate says.  Then Juice answers his phone and checks in with Link's people. 

-Otto is going to rat out the club.  Unfortunately, his whole reason is because of Bobby lying about Georgie being dead.  Well...Bobby, Tig, and Opie kill Georgie and get him to confess to being responsible for Otto's wife's death.

-The best part of the episode was a continuation of the ending last week.  And it came at the end of the episode.  Tig sees Gemma, turns in his Sgt at Arms patch to Clay.  Opie goes to the cabin and finds his dad dead.  Wayne shows up to tell Opie that Clay killed his father.

Next week seems like it should be pretty good.  Will the club have to stop Opie from killing Clay?  I really hope that Clay is able to kill Tara.  I know that is mean, but she is such a useless character.  I think it would take Jax down an interesting road.

Boardwalk Empire/The Walking Dead: Balcony Toss and Ear Necklace

Boardwalk Empire

-Anytime it appears that Nucky has no options left, he shocks us all with something crazy.  Instead of fighting Jimmy and the gang, he just steps down.  Tells them some crap about wanting to be a family man.  HAHAHA, yeah right.  Then he visits Chalky and informs him to have his people strike.  He will cause the entire city to shut down and everyone will want Nucky back.

-Also, during the party Jimmy decides he has enough of Mickey's annoying laugh and decides to toss him over the balcony.  Actually, it was more like a way to piss off the Jewish guy.  Pretty awesome either way.

-Oh, and I thought of something interesting:  Nucky is going to Ireland soon and I bet he will try to make a deal with the Cause.  He is going to deal those guns the Armory has lying around, this will help the fledgling IRA become a serious power and then eventually they can sell guns to the Sons of Anarchy.  How crazy is it that two unrelated shows have a connection...

Hell on Wheels
I have no clue if I actually like this show or not.  I have not seen anything that leads me to believe that there will be any sweet gun fights, yet it does feature a fascinating point in our history.  The rapid development of our nation is absolutely amazing to me.

Anyways, I do enjoy our hero becoming the new boss and his whole reasoning why he would be great at helping to build a railroad, since he was so good at destroying them.  Most people like to mention how that dude played in a Britney Spears movie or something, but whatever.  He looks the part.

I guess all I can say is that I will just give it some more time...

The Walking Dead
Daryl has become one of my favorite characters.  Talk about having a rough day.  First he gets thrown off his horse and falls down a hill.  Not too bad, right?  Well one of his arrows went into his back.  He starts hallucinating about his brother, but it turns out to be a zombie.  He kills them and starts to go a little crazy.  He makes a zombie ear necklace...

His hallucination brother pushes him to climb up the hill/cliff and by the time Daryl makes it home he is pretty much limping and looks like a walker.  Andrea shoots him.  I nearly had a heart attack.  Fortunately she grazed him and he was just knocked out.

Then the big revelation:  Herschel has been keeping all the zombies in the barn.  I am guessing he is hoping for a cure or something.  Glenn is pretty freaked out. 

A Crown of Swords

I just finished book seven in The Wheel of Time series by Robert Jordan.  This one was pretty damn good (everyone keeps telling me that they start to become boring, but I am not sure when that will be...)  Let me recap some of things I really liked.

-Rand fighting Padar Fain.  I was glad that they finally confronted each other.  The dagger almost killed Rand, luckily one of the Asha'man was able to use healing to save him.  Then they head to Illian to confront Sammael.  Unfortunately, the battle with Sammael ends up being pretty lackluster.  Rand chases to Sammael to Shadar Logoth, where they battle a bit, but Sammael ends up being killed by the Mashadar.

-Dashiva is one of the Foresaken.  I would guess that he is Aginor (or his new body as Osan'gar).  There is just something about him.  He seems to know things and he quickly rose within the Asha'man.  As Lews would say "KILL HIM!!!"

-Who was the guy who helped Rand in Shadar Logoth?  I am guessing that it was whoever the weird guy is that holds Moghedien prisoner.  Moridin.  My thought on that one is that Rand saw him channel, but did not see the weaves or saidin.  Moridin channels from the Dark One.  The other question is who is Moridin.  I have no real guesses on that one, maybe one of the other ones Rand killed.

-Elayne and Nynaeve (reluctantly) apologize to Mat for the way they treat him.  Aviendha was shocked that they never thanked him for saving them in Tear.  Also, Mat and Birgitte have some fun conversations:  he recognizes her and when they are drinking, I think he explains that he has a bunch of dead soldiers in his head.  They become friends.

-They finally find the Bowl of Winds, and they discover another major treasure:  women who can channel, but either did not pass their tests as Aes Sedai, or were wilders.  They also learn that the one woman is over 400 years old.

-Lan finally comes back and reunites with Nynaeve.  They get married and the good schtupping that Lan gives her causes her to break her block (or maybe that block comes down when she almost dies, whatever). 

-Mat's battle with the gholam was pretty awesome.  That thing just sounds like an amazing thing to see.  Then to see Mat's medallion hurt it.  As always, Mat is so damn awesome.

-And then, out of nowhere the Seanchan arrive in Ebou Dar.  As our merry little group tries to escape, Mat cannot find Olver and decides to go look for him.  I have a feeling that Mat will end up getting captured by the Seanchan and he will finally meet the Daughter of the Nine Moons.  That is just a guess.

I might take a break from the series in order to read Inheritance by Christopher Paolini...

Boardwalk Empire and Walking Dead: Hanging Murders

Maggie is played by Lauren Cohen, the girl who played Bela  on Supernatural.

Walking Dead
The episode started off pretty weak, but then it got pretty good.  I will not lie, the whole debate between Rick and Lori about allowing Carl to live or die was pretty lame.  I almost fell asleep.  Also, the religious discussion between Glenn and Maggie was weak, although I did enjoy the blossoming romance between the two.

Anyways, Shane makes it back with the stuff and he tells everyone that Otis did not makes, that he sacrificed himself for Shane to get away.  Unfortunately, as he shaves his head, he remembers what happened and it was nothing like what he said.

As the two men made their escape and were running out of bullets, Shane shoots Otis in the leg and then takes the pack from him.  Otis tries to fight back and that is why Shane is shaving his head.  Hmm, this is a nice change from the comics.  Otis stuck around for a good bit and died a bit later from something else.  I have a feeling this is their idea of demonizing Shane more, that way things will be justifiable later...

I did like the zombie hanging from the tree.  I also loved that Daryl was not going to kill it since he figured it was a waste of an arrow.  Such an awesome character already.

Boardwalk Empire
Just when things seemed to be going the right way for Nucky, a small wrench gets tossed into the gears.  Turns out that Senator Edge will get his revenge after all.  He decided to listen to the Commodore and Jimmy, and told the Attorney General that he wants him to prosecute Nucky.



Then Jimmy finds out that Herman was working with Nucky.  The big Jewish butcher does not like this very much.  He invites Jimmy over and wants him to kill Herman.  They learn about Nucky's deal with Philadelphia and intercept.  Turns out the muscle is Lucky Luciano and Meyer Lansky.  They cut a deal to work together to bring Nucky and Rothstein down.  Oh man, that shit gets me pretty excited.

Unfortunately, the Lucy storyline was shitty.  She had the baby, but Rose found out and now she is pissed at Nelson.  Ugh, I liked it better when he was murdering his partner.  Go back to that...

SOA: Piney is Dead

Well it looks like I was right about last week, Juice did not die.  In fact when he tried again, Chibbs found him and stopped him.  Hopefully they can resolve this, maybe Juice will come clean with him and they go murder the sheriff together.

The rival cartel killed a bunch of Mayans and members of SAMTAZ.  Bobby's vote for president was delayed by gunfire.  Chucky hid a head in the chili, which the cops then ate.  Yeah, pretty much your standard SOA episode.

Actually, Clay gave a great speech at the fundraiser for the Charming Gardens.  He and Oswalt donated the $75,000 needed and he actually sounded like a pretty good guy.  After that he paid a visit to Piney, who would not back down about getting the club out of the drug muling business.  Piney was ready for him and forced Clay to remove both of his guns.  Unfortunately when Clay left, as Piney locked the door, Clay smashed his way back in and grabbed Piney's gun, shooting him in the chest.  He then used Piney's blood to write LS on the picture of the original nine.

RIP Piney!  The club's tequila usage drops 59.3% without ya!

This is the point of no return for Clay.  He could have sent Tig to kill Piney, but he did not.  He did it himself.  I have a feeling that Gemma will suspect that something was a little off.  Also, it is now only a matter of time before Tara tells Jax about the letters and about how Piney confronted Clay (if she knows that).  Tara will make Jax see that it is not a coincidence that she received a death threat and then Piney dies...

The real question is will Jax kill Clay when it comes down to it?  I think there will eventually be a scene where Jax has Clay in a position to kill him and he will say something "I am not going to kill you, because I'm not like you."  As he walks away, Opie will then come in and kill Clay and say something like "this is for my wife and for my father."  See, writing a TV show is easy.  Now I have no clue how they will get out of this cartel mess.

Boardwalk Empire Scalping

There were so many awesome moments during last night's episode of Boardwalk Empire.  The best part though, is Nucky getting his power back.  Pretty scary for Jimmy and his pals.  Here are some of the great things that happened:

-Eli and Nucky get into a fight.  Eli begs for Nucky's help.  I felt so bad once he started crying, and I thought for sure that Nucky would accept him back into the fold.  Then Nucky pretty much tells him to go screw himself.  They get into a fist-fight and Eli tries to grab his gun, but then Margaret shows up with a shotgun and tells Eli to leave.  Nucky yells at her and says that the next time she points a gun at a person to make sure it is loaded.

-Jimmy pays a visit to his investors and when he mocks the really old, rich guy's chipped beef, the old bastard whacks him in the head with his cane, leaving Jimmy with a nasty cut on his forehead.  These rich guys are not too happy that the Commodore is out of commission and they really do not like the idea of Jimmy running things.

-Richard takes a little side trip out to the forest, where he plans to kill himself.  Then a dog comes and takes his mouth.  He chases after the dog and runs into a few hunters.  He joins their camp, eats some squirrel and gets a lesson on life.  The one guy informs him that this forest is for hunting, for living, not for other things.  He seemed to know what Richard planned.

-Then George shows up at Eli's house (Eli might be a little bit drunk) and decides to berate Eli about the Commodore.  Eli becomes frustrated and grabs a giant wrench and hits George in the throat.  George collapses and Eli then crushes his skull with the wrench.  His deputy shows up and they get rid of the body.  I am not going to lie, when he hit George with the wrench, it was pretty unexpected.

-Richard goes to see Jimmy, to basically ask him a question:  would Jimmy go to war for him.  Jimmy responds that he would be by his side down to the last bullet.  Richard agrees to help Jimmy out.  They pay a visit to the old bastard who hit Jimmy.  The guy brags about being in the Army when they defeated the Sioux and seeing 20 men take down 2000 screaming savages.  Jimmy and Richard grab him and Richard proceeds to scalp the prick.  Jesus...it was pretty gruesome and detailed.

The Walking Dead Season 2 Premiere

Last night's premiere of The Walking Dead was pretty damn awesome.  The beauty of having the show be different from the comic book is that I at least have no clue what will happen next.  Yes, at some points there are things that I almost identical, but other times they go completely away from the original material.

How tense was the entire herd scene?  Everyone hiding under cars as thousands of zombies shuffle past.  I will not lie, my pulse was racing.  The funny thing is we did not even learn about herds until much later in the comics.  As Rick described early on, there seemed to be two kinds:  roamers and the ones who just stand around.  We learn later that the roamers have tendency to form packs, and as the packs collide, they form herds...which can be pretty damn scary when you think about it.

Most people were probably pretty shocked by the ending, where Carl takes a bullet during a hunting trip.  I vaguely remembered that from the comics, but I was expecting something else to happen during this scene.  Actually, does anyone remember Sophia ever going missing in the comics?

Honestly, Carl and Sophia are two of my favorite characters in the comics.  Mostly because of how Kirkman shows them adapting and coping to the situations they are constantly put in.  Carl is probably turning into a sociopath and Sophia, well she just seems to repress everything about her past.  Her and Carl will probably survive everything and end up ruling the world.

Another cool thing about the show is Merle.  I realize he is a hillbilly, racist prick, but he seems to be the only capable of making smart decisions.  He and Rick gutting the zombie to see what it ate last was pretty nasty.

I could do without the whole Andrea being suicidal thing.  I realize they had to condense a few characters and they are now combining her story with some of another characters, but it just makes her less interesting.

I am guessing we will be seeing the group make it's way to Hershel's farm.  I was just looking at the comics and it blows my mind how quickly they found the secret place they go after the farm (if you have read the comics, you know what I mean).  Will they reach that point this season or will they wait until next season?  Or will the season finale end with Rick stumbling upon the view of what he thinks will be paradise....

Breaking Bad: Face-Off

This is how a season finale should be.  Tension the entire time and then something crazy happens.  And then after the craziness, a complete bomb is dropped.  This finale almost made me have a heart-attack. 

Quick recap of what happens:  Walt hatches a plan to kill Gus.  He uses ol' Tio (the bell-ringer in the wheelchair), he gets Tio to go to the DEA and basically mess with them.  This causes Gus to pay Tio a visit (to murder him) and Walt plants the bomb on Tio's chair and the bell is the detonator.  The look on Tio's face when he hit's the button is pretty awesome.

They show the outside of the room and Gus comes walking out.  At this point, I was irritated that he somehow survived the blast.  As much of an awesome villain as he is, I cannot imagine a way out for Walt and Jesse other than his death (or Walt going to Hank and "admitting" everything).  Then, Gus turns and half his face hi blown up.  He drops dead.  Or you can just watch this GIF over and over.

The police have been holding Jesse because of his ricin comment and then they release him because the poison turned out not to be ricin at all, but instead it was Lily of the Valley, a common New Mexico plant that has poisonous berries that children sometimes eat.

As Jesse leaves, he is grabbed by Gus' men and we see him working at the lab under gunpoint.  Then the lab opens up and it is the other guy, but he is dead and Walt appears from behind and shoots the guy.  Walt and Jesse get to work destroying the lab.

Jesse explains to Walter what the doctors told him about Brock.  Jesse seems conflicted about killing Gus, but he is trying to convince himself.  Then they show Walt's chair by the pool and there is a zoom in of a plant, and you see the tag and it says "Lily of the Valley."  So Walt really did poison Brock.  He crossed a line and has completely went to a new place. 

So where does that leave us for next season?  Well, obviously Hank will not give up on Heisenberg.  I think that he will eventually suspect Walter.  What would Walt do to protect his secret?  Would he murder Hank? 

Where and who will they cook for?  Obviously now that Walter has a taste for the money, he will want to continue cooking meth.  Actually it is not about the money, Walter likes the power, it reminds him of what he gave up as a great chemist.

I only see this ending one way actually:  Walter dying, most likely from cancer. 

Breaking Bad: End Times

There are plenty of decent shows on television, unfortunately none of them really come close to the level of excellence that Breaking Bad reaches each and every week.  If you have not seen the latest episode then you should stop reading now.

When Jesse finds out that Brock is sick, I immediately said to Lindsey that he must have taken the poison capsule from Jesse's cigarette.  I honestly thought that it was a mistake, that Brock just got it out of his pack or something. 

It was not until Jesse goes to Walter's house, that I realized the brilliance of Gus.  He poisoned Brock to make Jesse believe it was Walter.  What did he say to Jesse over the phone when discussing what to do with Walter?  This is the perfect way for Gus to get rid of Walter, have Jesse kill him.  There was nothing better than seeing Jesse realize that Walt would never hurt a child and that Gus is more than willing use anyone.  Great to see Jesse and Walter working together again.

I was seriously nervous the entire time that Walter was waiting for Gus to get into the car.  I kept expecting someone like Mike to show up and beat the crap out of him.  Instead, Gus just realizes something is wrong and decides to leave on foot. 

I half-expected Steve to find something that would prove there was a meth-lab there.  I also wondered how they were handling Jesse getting to work.  Obviously if Hank saw Jesse there, he would have some major questions.  Am I the only person out there who wants Hank to finally catch Gus Fring?

I also thought that Marie was going to take a bullet.  When she kept saying about how much danger they were in and how Walter needed to get his butt over there, I thought that would be a great moment to have a sniper kill her. 

I cannot wait until next week's finale.  I have no clue what will happen, although it looks like Jesse might go to the DEA, but maybe that is just how they want it to seem.

So Many TV Shows...

A pretty busy week of television, I will just get started...

Boardwalk Empire
I thought the premiere was pretty slow.  Enjoyable, but slow.  The big thing that we see happening is Eli and Jimmy working with the Commodore to bring down Nucky.  They pretended to be some KKK guys and shot a bunch of Chalky's people.  This has the entire city close to a state of war.  Now it is on Nucky to fix the problem.

Also, I think that Jimmy is starting to regret his decision to try and bring Nucky down.  He looked at Nucky as a father and now the Commodore wants to be that father.  I see things getting very interesting, very fast.

Breaking Bad
Now this was not a slow show.  Where do I even start with this one?  Jesse and Gus head back to the States.  Gus decides to point out the he believes Jesse is ready to run the lab on his own.  Jesse does not like this and informs Gus that he cannot kill Mr. White.  Gus does not really like to be told what to do.

Back at the lab, Walt is being treated like complete shit since Hank is watching the laundry.  Walt realizes that his time is up since someone has been cooking at the lab when he is not there.  He deduces that it must be Jesse.  He confronts Jesse at home, but he is told to get away from him.  Tyrus comes and tases Walt.  At this point, I started to have doubts as to whether or not Walt would survive.  I know, the main character, but still.  It would be insane.

They take Walt to the desert and Gus finally comes out to see him.  Walt is informed that he is fired (what Jesse asked for) and that Hank will be killed.  If Walt tries to warn him, his entire family will be murdered.  Gus is one scary-ass motherf*cker.   

Walt then rushes to Saul and wants the guy who can make him disappear.  Unfortunately, when Walt goes home to get the money, Skylar informs him of the Ted thing.  Way to go Skylar, now your family is going to be murdered.  Oh, and now Marie calls Skylar to say that the DEA is there guarding them because they are in danger (apparently Saul made that call for Walt).  The episode ends with Walt lying in his crawlspace, laughing hysterically.  His only option is to go to the DEA, right?

Sons of Anarchy
We are finally starting to see what happened to JT.  It looks like he was about to go back to Ireland to cancel the gunrunning deal with the IRA, unfortunately, he did died before that trip.  Obviously Clay killed him.

Down in Arizona, we meet SAMTAZ (Sons of Anarchy Tuscon Arizona) and they are dealing meth.  It turns out they killed a member and got one to patch out so they could vote it in.  Clay does not like this and confronts the club about it.  They get the two dicks out, but SAMTAZ still votes for dealing meth.  As Bobby points out (very angrily):  dealing and supplying are pretty much the same thing.

We are seeing a precedence, if it is discovered that Clay decided to mule coke before putting it to a vote, then he could be relieved as President and a new vote taken (I mean, how does Clay not feel like a complete hypocrite?).  Also, what will the rest of the club think when Piney drops the bomb that Clay and Gemma murdered JT...hell, how will Jax react?

Person of Interest
I was pretty iffy about this one going in, I mean it sounded too good to be true:  Jesus, Ben Linus, creator of Lost and one of the The Dark Knight writers.  This just seemed like one of those shows that ends up being terrible.

Then all of sudden Jim Caviezel is dressed like a bum and beating the crap out of people on a subway.  Also, Michael Emerson is a billionaire who created a program that helps track crime before it happens.  Unfortunately, it worked too well and it was picking up all sorts of small crimes.  The government made him filter it to just pick out terrorist activity.  The other list is destroyed.  He built a back door and that is the list he has, but he just has a social security number.

Luckily, Caviezel plays a former CIA super-spy.  He pretty much has all sorts of tricks up his sleeve.  I knew from the beginning that the first person they were trying to save (the hot Natalie Zea) would end up being the bad guy.  I am sure there will be plenty of those kind of things each week.

I guess what I am trying to say is, I liked it, but I can see it becoming pretty silly after awhile.  There has to be an overall story that has not been revealed yet.  Maybe someone is monitoring these two...

Supernatural
What a disappointing premiere...Castiel was God for about 32 minutes.  Then he is convinced to give up the power before he explodes.  He gives up all the souls and all should be good.  Unfortunately, the Leviathan's stuck around inside and have now taken control.  Yep, Castiel is still a bad guy, but only now he is some kind of weirdo.

The only cool part was Dean, Sam, and Bobby binding Death the way that Lucifer bound him all those years ago.  Needless to say, Death was not very pleased.  The dude that plays him is absolutely awesome.  Castiel broke the binding and then Death tells them to clean up their own damn mess.

Pan Am
I decided to give this one a shot as well.  I figured that this and The Playboy Club would just be blatant ripoffs of Mad Men, well TPC seems to be (that is all that I have heard about it).  PA was pretty good, I had no clue what it was about, but it seems like there will be spies involved as well.  Also there are hot girls.  Always a plus.

Terra Nova
Time-travel and dinosaurs!  What else could a person ask for...although, when they started showing the crazy rock drawings, I pretty much thought they were going to hint at aliens.  Luckily by the end we know that it is just Taylor's son who is out there being crazy.  Also, there is some sinister plot about the real reason Terra Nova was created. 

I must say that I enjoyed Jason O'Mara in Life on Mars (the American version, I know that is such a horrible thing to say).  Anyways, I am glad that he has a big role.