Dream Emmy Ballot 2011: Supporting Actor in a Drama

Peter Dinklage - "Tyrion Lannister", Game of Thrones

Walton Goggins - "Boyd Crowder", Justified

Arliss Howard - "Kale Ingram", Rubicon

John Noble - "Walter Bishop", Fringe

Denis O'Hare - "Russell Edgington", True Blood

Michael Raymond-James - "Britt Pollack", Terriers

The category which, in my opinion, contains a significant share of the year's best work (A.K.A. the category of Liz's Endless Waffling, A.K.A. much of the reason why these posts are going down to the wire pre-nominations announcement). All six brought wit and a distinct spark to their respective shows. Dinklage did the best kind of adaptation work - the kind that makes you excited when you're reading to someday see the material embodied by the actor. Goggins let Boyd's struggle with his past flicker behind guarded eyes and never made his return to a life of crime feel like a foregone conclusion. Howard's cool made Kale Ingram TV's best espionage-affiliated gentleman since Jack Bristow. Much of Fringe's cast got to show great range in the dual roles dictated by the focus on the parallel universe, but Noble showed Walternate as a fierce villain, while keeping the original's distinctive loopiness. O'Hare pushed True Blood to its campy limits, devouring scenery with glee and making Russell a truly Big Bad. Raymond-James brought an easy charm, with hints of darkness, to Britt, ultimately making him - all apologies to Martin Freeman - the best detective sidekick of the year.

Honorable Mention: Scott Caan, Hawaii 5-O; Justin Chambers, Grey's Anatomy; Rockmond Dunbar, Terriers; Jared Harris, Mad Men; Joshua Jackson, Fringe; Michael B. Jordan, Friday Night Lights; Joel Kinnaman, The Killing; Taylor Kitsch, Friday Night Lights; Ryan Kwanten, True Blood; Matt Lauria, Friday Night Lights; Dallas Roberts, Rubicon; Nick Searcy, Justified; Brent Sexton, The Killing; Alexander Skarsgard, True Blood; John Slattery, Mad Men; TJ Thyne, Bones

Particular props to the ensembles of: Boardwalk Empire (Stephen Graham, Michael Pitt, Michael Shannon, Michael Stuhlbarg, Shea Whigham, Michael Kenneth Williams); Game of Thrones (Mark Addy, Nikolaj Coster-Waldau, Aiden Gillen, Kit Harington, Jason Momoa); Detroit 1-8-7 (Jon Michael Hill, Shaun Majumder, James McDonald); The Good Wife (Josh Charles, Alan Cumming, Matt Czuchry, Chris Noth); Sons of Anarchy (Mark Boone, Jr., Dayton Callie, Kim Coates, Tommy Flanagan, Ryan Hurst, William Lucking, Ron Perlman, Theo Rossi); Treme (Clarke Peters, Wendell Pierce, Steve Zahn)

Yes, this version of narrowing encompasses forty-five actors beyond the ballot limit.

I wouldn't be surprised to see: Andre Braugher, Men of a Certain Age; Billy Campbell, The Killing; Irrfan Kahn, In Treatment; Delroy Lindo, The Chicago Code

Dream Emmy Ballot 2011: Guest Actor in a Drama

Michael Cristofer - "Truxton Spangler", Rubicon

Jeremy Davies - "Dickie Bennett", Justified

Jack Huston - "Richard Harrow", Boardwalk Empire

Lennie James - "Morgan", The Walking Dead

David Morse - "Jerry Raines", Lights Out

Eamonn Walker - "Ed Romeo", Lights Out

Cristofer, besides delivering one of the year's best monologues in the Tie Speech, made for an alternately magnetic and fearsome conspiracy-mongerer. Davies regularly made my skin crawl with his depiction of a man-child unafraid to resort to violence when his ambitions outpaced his intelligence. The mask made Huston stand out initially, but his haunted, hollowed-out performance was striking even within Boardwalk Empire's attention-getting ensemble. In a season with a lot of great drama pilots (with varying degrees of shows then delivering on the promise of those pilots), James gave a fairly perfect pilot-only performance, capably handling the task of introducing viewers to the new zombie-dominated world. Though Lights Out was short-lived, I feel like Morse and Walker's performances will stick with me for a long time. Morse embodied the tragedy the show saw in the threat of pugilistic dementia, and Walker continues to stun me with his ability to grant great humanity, spirituality, and depth to characters who in other hands would come across as "magical Negro" stereotypes.

Honorable Mention: Greg Antonacci, Boardwalk Empire; Raymond J. Barry, Justified; Nicholas Brendon, Private Practice; Reg E. Cathey, Lights Out; Bruce Dern, Big Love; Noah Emmerich, The Walking Dead; Jay R. Ferguson, Mad Men; Scott Foley, Grey's Anatomy; Michael J. Fox, The Good Wife; James Frain, True Blood; Zach Gilford, Friday Night Lights; Tim Guinee, The Good Wife; Brad William Henke, Justified; Hal Holbrook, Sons of Anarchy; Bill Irwin, Lights Out; Joe Manganiello, True Blood; Robert Morse, Mad Men; Mark Moses, Mad Men; Denis O'Hare, The Good Wife; Dallas Roberts, The Good Wife; Christopher Stanley, Mad Men; Joseph Lyle Tayor, Justified; Titus Welliver, Sons of Anarchy

Can you tell this was a tough one to narrow down? Mark Moses almost made it - I love Duck Phillips' ongoing downward spiral so much.

I wouldn't be surprised to see: Beau Bridges, Brothers and Sisters; Richard Dreyfuss, Parenthood; Michael Emerson, Parenthood; Paul McCrane, Harry's Law; Jonny Lee Miller, Dexter; Scott Porter, The Good Wife

Week in TV: October 10-16

Boardwalk Empire

Best episode yet, and a great episode for fleshing out previously underserved characters in Margaret, Gillian and Chalky. In some reviews I've read, people have found the scenes highlighting Margaret and Chalky somewhat heavy-handed, but then I don't know what period television they're watching where such moments are "expected" or "obvious." Maybe it's just years spent in history classes where people feel compelled to excuse "the way things were back then," but I think it's important to showcase resistant voices in media like this. Thinking critically about the past helps us understand then and now, and if this is the kind of writing that BE's going to continue to employ, then I'm in for the long haul.

Rubicon

I'll be honest, I really didn't think they would ultimately have the terrorist act seen through to completion, but I think that doing so distinguishes Rubicon from every other show airing right now. The whole season has gradually ratcheted up the tension in a glorious slow burn; many shows are daring, but few do so without also being showy. I'm on pins and needles waiting to see what happens in the finale - now that that tension has culminated in an explosion, what do the characters do next?

Mad Men

- Unusually low-key penultimate episode, at least as far as this show goes, which makes me a little concerned that something crazy is going to happen tonight. Like, both Sterling and Cooper keeling over dead or something. A plot point like Don publicly rejecting tobacco work represents a dramatic shift in the show - Lucky Strike is the client that forms the backbone of the pilot - but I think it would be uncharacteristic of Weiner to have some new savior show up in the finale. Most of the storylines feel right now like their implications are designed to play out in the long-term rather than the short-term - an exciting feeling after a finale, but an unnerving one beforehand.

- I usually like the oblique collection of out-of-context quotes that fill the "Next Time on Mad Men" teasers, but I wish that if they'd only been pulling from past episodes that they'd used the prior season finales rather than selections from this season. Not because I haven't liked this season (I definitely have) but because the past three finales are among the show's best episodes. A teaser with, say, Don's carousel speech and Peggy in the hospital from "The Wheel," Peggy's confession and Don's righteous smackdown of Duck from "Meditations in an Emergency," and various company-heist hijinks from "Shut the Door. Have a Seat." would actually get me excited about next week. As it is, I have to say I'm more intrigued to see how Rubicon closes out their season.

- This is mostly unrelated, but I really hope that somewhere among the lead-up to the Broadway arrival of the How to Succeed in Business Without Really Trying revival we get a picture of Robert Morse and Daniel Radcliffe together. Just because I'm pretty sure it would be adorable.

Chuck

- I'm not dreaming, right? This season has been mad boring thus far? I'm sure a lot of outlets will blame it on Chuck and Sarah being together, but the problem is not their relationship as much as it's the fact that they never stop talking about their relationship. There's a rational level of insecurity involved in any new pairing, but I think we passed "rational" sometime in Season Three's back six and now we're veering off into "grating". All I know is when 8 on Monday rolls around, I increasingly want to watch 90210 live and time-shift Chuck instead of the other way around.

- I know I should probably be offended by the incidences of obvious product placement, but there's something so blatant about the way they mention Subway that it just makes me laugh.

Glee

- Now that's how you use a song from A Chorus Line.

- When the characters were reviewing their summer vacations in the premiere, did we somehow skip over Artie's lobotomy? Or are we supposed to believe that breaking up with Tina prompted some sort of dramatic break with rational thought? Where he seemed essentially smart, though occasionally misguided last season, now he just seems like he's taken leave of his senses. (The football thing stretches even the bounds of Glee's universe. Rules or not, there's no way that a school system lawyer wouldn't intervene in the interest of liability there. I'm pretty sure the apprehension of being sued transcends hyper-reality.) I just wish that he could've had a serious, low-key discussion with Brittany about the implications of losing his virginity instead of condemning her for manipulating him with her slatternly ways.

Sons of Anarchy

- I was struck in this episode by the difference between the ceremony involved in accepting or dismissing a member from the club and Jax's cursory break-up with Tara; I don't think SoA's ever before delineated quite so clearly the status of women in the club's milieu. I'm interested to see where Tara's path takes her now; I suspect that like Bill and Sookie on this past season of True Blood, she and Jax may be more interesting apart than they are together. It's not classy, but I'd love to see Tara totally lose her shit.

- Where's Wendy in all this kidnapping rigamarole? If I recall correctly, when last we saw her she was headed for a halfway house to become accustomed to sobriety. To some extent, it makes sense that they wouldn't tell her what's going on, in a variation of what kept them from sharing the news with Gemma for so long - don't alarm the recovering addict. But it would be nice if they'd mention her every once in a while, even if it's just to say that they're continuing to keep her in the dark.

Undercovers

Just what I was hoping for - oblique references to mysterious secrets! There may be hope for this show yet.

Hellcats

Perhaps the most pleasant surprise of the new crop of shows this fall, at least on the networks. The pilot was a little obnoxious, but Hellcats has actually turned out to not be terrible - its recent episodes have bestowed its main characters with decent development, and though it's depiction of both college cheerleading and the life of a pre-law student may not be 100% "accurate" in a real-world sense, the show does know its universe and communicate its ins-and-outs clearly. Special credit to Ashley Tisdale, who may be one of least broad actors to come out of the Disney/Nick machine in a while.

Terriers

Whenever I'm watching Sons of Anarchy and catch ads for Terriers, I'm struck by how mismarketed the show seems. The commercials highlight the goofy vibe and amiable banter between Donal Logue and Michael Raymond-James, and if I wasn't watching the show I think I'd think it was pretty lightweight. Since the third episode, though, the show's been tempering that goofiness with some serious doses of darkness that make the show unique, and very, very good. That last scene with Hank and Katie was heartbreaking, and the kind of scene that makes you realize that you've become totally invested in a show's characters.

30 Rock

- I can't believe this is the first time I've wondered this, but something about the use of the TGS sketches in the live show brought it to mind: Does SNL exist at 30 Rock's NBC?

- While I like Jon Hamm a lot, I've never really found Drew terribly funny, and I think his ad (in both versions of the show) was the most SNL-esque moment of the show just in distance from reality. Later in the evening I saw one of those Allstate "Mayhem" ads with Dean Winters, and thought how much funnier it could've been with an ad from Dennis instead.

Also Watched: How I Met Your Mother, 90210, Gossip Girl, Raising Hope, Detroit 1-8-7, Caprica, Modern Family, Cougar Town, Top Chef: Just Desserts, Law and Order: LA, Community, The Office, Grey's Anatomy, Private Practice, Degrassi, Gigantic, Law and Order: UK

Week in TV: October 3-9

Boardwalk Empire

For an American Studies scholar, this show is kind of a smorgasbord of references. (1920 is right in the sweet spot of an era that a lot of historians like to work in.) Allusions to Uncle Tom's Cabin and Horatio Alger in the same hour? Nice.

Rubicon

I love how quiet this show is. The writers really trust the actors to communicate the paranoia and foreboding that sell both the broader conspiracy and the terrorist plot, and it's made the show uniquely good.

Mad Men

- It remains to be seen how the departure of Lucky Strike will play out long-term (I can't possibly be the only fan sitting there all, "Bring back Sal! BRING BACK SAL!"), but I think it will color rewatching of prior episodes in an interesting way. As embarrassingly desperate as the party in "Christmas Comes But Once a Year" is, how much more awful will it feel when you can put a date on when all that effort proves to be for naught?

- I've never really understood those people who believe in the Great and True Love of Joan and Roger, and I think the past few weeks have shown many reasons why they shouldn't be together. I mean, I get it: almost anyone seems like a better option compared with Dr. Greg. But Greg being kind of a horrible person doesn't make Roger not a horrible person too. The selfishness? The lack of respect for anyone besides himself? Betty gets a lot of press for being essentially a child, but I'd argue that Roger's development is similarly arrested.

- I like Abe.

- I don't think I've talked before about the wonderfully smarmy performance Kevin Rahm's given this season as Ted Chaough. I love straight-up shamelessness in a television character.

How I Met Your Mother

HIMYM is actually one of the major reasons I decided to try to do a weekly TV post. Back in the spring, I started to write a post about why I felt the show needed to establish an end date - it felt like they were spinning their wheels, and I didn't care about or like Don at all, to the degree that the writers' attempts to push him as Robin's potential soul mate actually made me angry. (The post was a tandem commentary on HIMYM and Big Love, and if that show's issues continue on to its next season, then I'll bring up those points again too.) The post sort of faded away, half-written and unpublished, and I finally deleted it when I realized that the points weren't really timely anymore. Hence, week-to-week observations. All of which is to say: I'm pretty sure that much of the audience got "closure" on Don a while ago, so hopefully Robin achieving the same will prompt the writers to pretend that whole thing never happened in the first place.

Glee

As far as Glee's themed episodes go, this was pretty middle-of-the-road for me. The question of how religion functions in people's lives is one that television shows rarely engage, so that was nice to see, but other shows have done it in recent years with a lot more nuance (Friday Night Lights, to mention one. This week's Community, to mention another.) Chris Colfer knocked it out of the park, though - among the show's main cast, I think he makes the most out of his showcase episodes - and "I Wanna Hold Your Hand" did make me tear up.

Sons of Anarchy

We've had enough of a break from Stahl's all-consuming craziness that I'm excited to see where her deal with Jax goes. Like everything on this show, it seems inevitably doomed to fail spectacularly, but it's always an interesting ride getting there.

Undercovers

I think this week pinpointed for me what's making this show so boring so far. While I understand why they wanted to stay away from a major conspiracy angle, there's also nothing cohesive driving the show from week to week. When you look back at the early episodes of Alias, the storyline that comes out of Danny's murder drives Sydney in a way that gave Jennifer Garner's performance a propulsive fire (Nikita, so far, has been similarly passion-driven). On Fringe, the circumstances are so crazy that they demand action. Chuck's writers have managed to make the wheels turn with a combination of Chuck v. Intersect and CIA/NSA v. various nefarious external groups and conspiracy-mongerers. "Spies plus marital drama" is an interesting idea, but without interesting execution the show is going to fail sooner or later. I really want to support this show and keep watching it, but without a creative bump it's going to turn into a chore.

Top Chef: Just Desserts

There's "not here to make friends" and then there's the cast of this show, who seem to have built up a serious amount of mutual animosity in a relatively brief period of time, even for a reality competition. You'd think that with people deciding to leave of their own free will, or having some sort of oblique not-entirely-on-camera meltdown, that the other contestants would just sit back and let it happen. You already look like the good ones by default! It's Sibling Politics 101! Instead, the overly critical tone from various others comes across as hyperbolic, needless bitchery and the whole thing seems like it's teetering on the precipice of descending into total mania.

Bones

If the writers aren't careful, Hannah is going to land firmly in the same territory as Don on How I Met Your Mother last year. Telling us a new character is awesome is demonstrably not the same thing as actually introducing a new awesome character.

Also Watched: Nikita from last week, Chuck, 90210, Gossip Girl, Hawaii Five-0, Raising Hope, Detroit 1-8-7, Caprica, Modern Family, Cougar Town, Hellcats, Terriers, Community, 30 Rock, The Office, Grey's Anatomy, Nikita, Private Practice, Degrassi

New Shows:

Law & Order: UK

It was interesting to watch this after seeing the Law and Order: LA pilot. The Los Angeles version made me doubt whether the franchise could really work in another city, but then the UK version restored my confidence. The show sticks very closely to the original show's template, but with a unique chemistry among the permanent cast that makes it work almost immediately.

The A-List: New York

True story: I turned this off after about 45 minutes. I'm not big into the Real Housewives genre of shows - after the cast members introduce themselves and start talking to one another, they tend to achieve a level of vacuousness where my brain just completely tunes out. Also, teen Liz, who rooted for Reichen and Chip to win The Amazing Race back in the day, is disappointed that Reichen seems to be kind of a fame whore. I believed in your love!

Gigantic

The N's original programming isn't bad, necessarily, but their writing is never quite as sharp, and the drama not quite as daring, as some of the comparable-age-group offerings from ABC Family or the CW. Still, half-hour shows are perfect for morning coffee, and the mix of actual children-of-actors and former child actors in the show's main cast suggests that the show could demonstrate a more knowing sense of the scene it depicts than was on display in the pilot.

Week in TV: September 5-11

Rubicon

- The structure of this show is starting to remind me a bit of the first season of Mad Men. No, not because they're both on AMC. Remember how in the early episodes of Mad Men all the different twenty-something guys at Sterling Cooper seem like interchangeable shmucks, and then as the season moves on you start to really get a sense of what distinguishes Pete from Ken from Paul from Harry? We're moving out of the interchangeable shmuck phase for the folks at API. I'm particularly growing attached to Miles - Dallas Roberts infuses him with so much twitchy paranoid energy - and Kale, whose verbal smackdown of Will's less-than-fully-thought-out snooping in Spangler's office was a highlight in an episode full of great two-person scenes.

- In the spirit of what's probably Annie Parisse's best-known role, she has to be more than a silent neighbor, right? I'm pretty sure she's too well-known an actress to play someone negligible.

Mad Men

- And this is why AMC should continue to shower Matthew Weiner with cash. At least once a season Mad Men pulls out an episode that, like this one, is so riveting that I end up watching the 11:00 repeat too just because I feel like I can't bring myself to move from the couch once it's done. It's a show that's always had a good handle on thematic and plot continuity, but this episode managed to pull together so much about Don and Peggy and their respective histories and their relationship with each other and their relationships with a multitude of other characters that it'll probably stand as one of my all-time favorite episodes of the show. It's redundant at this point to say that Jon Hamm and Elisabeth Moss should submit this episode for Emmy consideration next spring (and, who knows, I wouldn't rule out there being another amazing episode in the pipeline for either one of them; it's been a good season) but: seriously.

- Gorgeous, quiet goodbye for Anna Draper. Her appearances were rare, but I'll miss her.

- For the emotional wallop this episode packed, it was also unbelievably funny. I particularly loved Pete's fleeting look of panic as he saw Peggy and Trudy exiting the bathroom together. As if Peggy would just suddenly lose all sense of discretion and be like, "Well, I know when I was pregnant with Pete's baby..." Also, Roger's memoirs are comedy gold.

- How great is Mark Moses? Seriously, I'm one more quality Mad Men episode away from being talked into picking up Desperate Housewives again.

Sons of Anarchy

- The first episode I've watched live and unspoiled, and shaking for an hour afterwards was totally worth it. So, RIP Deputy Sheriff David Hale (I assume. I mean, I guess anything's possible on television, but that head wound looked pretty grisly and this isn't a show that's afraid to kill people off.) and a round of applause for Tayler Sheridan. He was a unique presence on the show, not only as the rare law enforcement official both dedicated to taking SAMCRO out and to using legitimate means to do so, but also as a Charming-bred contemporary of Jax, Opie and Tara. I was always intrigued by that part of Hale that couldn't seem to completely let go of the image of the kids he grew up with. It's a credit to the writers and Sheridan that I ultimately feel sorry for Hale, that he'll never get the chance to even try to implement change in Charming.

- It's a small continuity detail, but I love that Jax's patches still look all wonky. It's a subtle reminder of the fact that from "Balm" to "So," we're only talking about days, not weeks, and that there's a lot of remaining emotional fallout yet to be fully dealt with. This season's got a lot of rich veins to tap into, and I can't wait to see where it goes from here.

New Shows:

Hellcats (CW)

Fantastically manic pilot, that seemed to cycle through the plots of what most shows would use to constitute their first four or five episodes. There's a decent number of actors I like in this, and I think they elevate the material just enough to make it appealingly cheesy/campy, rather than straight-up terrible. (Todd VanDerWerff's A.V. Club review really hits the nail on the head there.) I love to have a few CW shows sitting on the DVR for when I drink my coffee on the weekends, and this show seems ideally suited to that purpose.

Terriers (FX)

I never watched The Shield, so I come at this one as just a curious viewer, rather than as a Shawn Ryan evangelist. (It seems to be one of those things where critics in the know can't resist making comparisons, like The Wire and Treme, but hopefully that impulse will dissipate as the season progresses.) I liked it a lot, especially the easygoing chemistry of Donal Logue and Michael Raymond-James. It seems like Terriers will have a lot of the same charm that the first season of Veronica Mars had, simply in sitting back and watching slightly unorthodox PIs do what they do.

Nikita

A solid, enjoyable pilot. The winning presence of Maggie Q in the title role and the genuinely surprising twist ending lifted it a few steps above "generic spy show" and convinced me to tune in again, at least for a few weeks. (However: Can the Alias pilot be required viewing for anyone planning a young-lady-spy show these days? Normally, the similarities are easy to write off, but Nikita had a doomed fiance named Daniel whose tragic untimely death at the hands of her nefarious employers turned her into their sworn enemy? Come on, people. At least call him "Steve," or something.)

Week in TV: August 29-September 4

Primetime Emmy Awards

- I may or may not have watched the opening number ten times since Sunday.

There are many things I love about this, including but not limited to: the "prize" for the competition being $1205, Joel McHale's huge, super-fake smile in the segue into the dressing room sequence, and Jon Hamm's unflagging commitment to the whole thing. I don't think it's possible for him to be overhyped - just when you think the awesomeness has hit the roof, there he is, shimmying with Betty White.

- Other highlights: that shot of Jesse Tyler Ferguson weeping in the audience as Eric Stonestreet gave his acceptance speech; Temple Grandin enthusiastically embracing the producer of the biopic based on her life (it's kind of the perfect epilogue to the movie; they should make it a DVD extra or something); Matt Weiner pointedly taking exception to his being cut off earlier in the show when he accepted the Best Drama Emmy - I know some people find him annoying, but I love what a control freak he is.

- Jimmy Fallon did a respectable hosting job, and the show moved at a fairly quick pace. The structure was a little shaky - the show felt like it ground to a halt once they moved into Variety, even though they were still efficiently moving through awards. This is TV, and it's 2010; there's no need to give Al Pacino free range to ramble at will near the end of the show. I'd go Comedy, Miniseries/Movie, Variety, Drama, Reality, but that's just me.

- New winners! Just when you think the television academy is the stodgiest of all the awards-giving bodies, they pull out a slate of first-time winners across the board. This doesn't fully negate the argument that they are stodgy - their blind spots around shows like Sons of Anarchy, Treme and Friday Night Lights (sure, Chandler and Britton got nominated this year, but Zach Gilford not getting nominated - which, don't get me wrong, he still would've lost to John Lithgow, I'm not crazy - shows that there are still apexes of talent and quality left unrecognized) show that there's still room for marked improvement.

- Some interesting food for thought from Regina King - I really shouldn't be surprised by misidentified black actors anymore, but seriously? Identifying Rutina Wesley as Regina King? Seriously? I wish she wasn't so reluctant to engage the central conceit of her argument - for all its relative improvements in diversity in recent years, there is still a lot to challenge and question in television. Not asking the questions doesn't make the problems go away.

True Blood

- It's interesting watching this now after watching the final season of Deadwood and learning about their cancellation woes. (HBO didn't let them know until right before the season started airing that they wouldn't be renewed, so the season was left with plotlines that didn't quite neatly wrap up.) It remains to be seen with the season finale how things are left, but a lot of this show is feeling very disjointed, and several of the stories are feeling very "theater troupe"-esque. That is to say, would seem pointless if there was no season four.

- If there's anything we've learned from this season, it's that Bill and Sookie are much more interesting apart than they are together. Their drippy discussion about what they would do if their lives were "normal"? I can't be alone in thinking that Bill would be the worst third-grade teacher ever.

Mad Men

- I've always wanted to see a flashback to Don's storied fur-selling days, and this episode didn't disappoint. Jon Hamm seems to have such a clear sense of the differences in personality and physicality that distinguish Dick Whitman from Don Draper, and it was nice to see comparably nuanced work from Christina Hendricks and John Slattery.

- The drunken interludes leading up to this episode's blackout have cast alcohol consumption in a decidedly different light than previous seasons, but I think it's also interesting to see the way that they've put vocal criticism of that lifestyle in the mouths of the younger characters. SCDP is starting to build up a stable of new talent, but one comprised of people who see Don not as a suave role model, but as a shambling drunk.

Rubicon

Just when I'm ready to table this for the remainder of the season, they pull out an episode that grants depth to some of the supporting characters and subtly advances the conspiracy narrative. Though the conspiracy-deconstructing advancement wasn't big, I think it was important for Rubicon to show Will and Katherine getting the same information (Atlas MacDowell? That's a conspiracy-mongering corporation name if I ever heard one) at roughly the same time. It made it feel for the first time like their storylines could organically converge, where before Katherine's tie to the other plots felt very shaky.

Huge

A wonderful finale to a wonderful show. I hope ABC Family renews it, but it could easily remain as a time capsule of ten quality episodes (much like co-creator Winnie Holzman's lauded My So-Called Life). The finale was filled with finely-executed, low-key scenes - the conversation between Becca and Chloe in particular was painfully true to life. And I think it says a lot about the quality of the show that I actually felt surprised when Will, Ian and Trent's band came together - they managed to make me forget, temporarily at least, Nikki Blonsky's previous musical work. If Huge is through, I hope that the actors find good work in other projects; their work here should stand as a strike against flat characterization and typecasting.

Top Chef

Is it wrong if Tiffany being dismissed this week makes me not want to watch the remaining episodes in the season?

Ongoing:

Sons of Anarchy, Season Two

- Retroactive entry for the Dream Emmy Ballot! Katey Sagal was robbed, y'all. The narrative balance that the show maintained between its normal testosterone-heavy plots and the subtle handling of Gemma's feelings post-rape is a mark of how good this show truly is. "Balm" and "Service" are just a great, great duo of episodes. Entertainment-world nepotism would never have gotten such a bad rap if it was all as good as the material Kurt Sutter's written for his wife over the past two years.

- Beyond the fine dramatic beats Sagal got to play, the best part of the post-rape storyline was Gemma taking Tara under her wing and schooling her in the fine art of being a totally fierce shitkicker. Tara should've gotten her own Prospect vest, for all the Head Bitch in Charge training she got this season. Speaking of Prospects...

- Half-Sack! Noooo! I knew it was coming, but I still cried. Something always feels so incomplete about character exits dictated by actor dissatisfaction, but I guess those are the most like real-life deaths in that way. It's not difficult to see where Johnny Lewis might have felt unfulfilled by his second-season storyline. The testicular implant subplot never quite seemed to gel, though it did give us that excellent scene where he shows it to Tara, and she starts to address him but can't quite get the second syllable out, like she's physically incapable of saying the word "sack" in the presence of his grotesquely infected scrotum, plus Kim Coates' amazing spewing double-take. Broad comedy, but hilarious broad comedy nonetheless. (Can you tell that I'm in love with this show now? I'm so excited for Tuesday, you guys.) I still wish we could've seen Sack get patched in, though.

- I'm totally fascinated by Sutter's decision to put himself in the role of Otto. The writer-actor is something you see more frequently in comedy, but I'm hard-pressed to think of a drama that's featured one of its own writers, much less the showrunner, in a role that prominent. It seems to speak to a sense of camaraderie that Sutter feels with his cast, the kind of "us against the world" relationship that you see in some shows that have a strong ensemble, take place in a very unique universe and/or have a cult following (Joss Whedon and Firefly, Dan Harmon and Community).

- In the commentary for "Balm," Sutter jokes in discussing the introduction of Titus Welliver's character that he'd like to get all the actors from Deadwood on the show eventually, then says something slightly unintelligible about Ian McShane. Can I just say that McShane on SoA would probably be more awesomeness than the world could handle? I'd flip my shit if that happened.

So...

The Emmys technically mark the delineation between the television seasons past and present, though the increasing cable presence in the summer means that there's no hard-and-fast line between the two. There's sort of a breather here, but the new season of SoA starts on Tuesday, and the next three weeks have season and series premieres coming down like falling dominoes. Every year I think about trying to watch all the new pilots - we'll see how that all shakes out. I've got actual academic shit to do, so technically I shouldn't have time to tackle it all, and I already know that making myself watch some of them will be like pulling teeth. Like I said, we'll see.

Week in TV: August 22-28

True Blood

- Annual exposition dump! Sookie's part fairy! (As she so succinctly put it, "fucking lame." Hopefully, the inclusion of this plot point so early on in the series relative to the books means that the writers want to bring in those storylines where *spoiler alert!* fairies are less "fucking lame" and more "psychotically violent" and "doing terrible things to everyone, but especially Crystal.") Crystal's a were-panther! Hoyt loves Jessica and Jessica loves Hoyt!

- I like that the show has used past series regulars this season in sparing cameos - Michael Raymond-James (Rene) in a dream sequence two weeks ago, and then Michael McMillan this week. It was a perfect brief scene - Reverend Steve taking the opportunity to offer a televised "told you so" in the aftermath of Russell's on-air meltdown.

Mad Men

- Last week saw the return of Ken Cosgrove, this week Smitty. It's interesting that we're getting little hints that the splintering of Sterling Cooper set into motion by the events of "Shut the Door. Have a Seat." was followed by an exodus of personnel. Where did everyone else end up? I'd love to get an update on Paul Kinsey, just because you know his pompous ass had to seek out some new place to be as smug a hipster as he wanted to be.

- Lesli Linka Glatter is becoming the Queen of the Machine among Mad Men's directors, adding to the classic "Guy Walks into an Advertising Agency" with this episode's Honda subplot, including the hilarious shot of Peggy riding the motorcycle in circles around an empty soundstage.

- I didn't mention it previously, but I love that Deborah Lacey (Carla) has been bumped up to recognition in the opening credits. She frequently makes Carla seem like the most responsible, competent and professional adult among Mad Men's overgrown children and functional alcoholics. Her role remains small but vital; for all of Betty's hyperbolic whining about Don, it's striking that she didn't care to find the time to accompany Sally to her first session with the psychiatrist.

Rubicon

I think I'm going to let this one move to the background until its season wraps up - I'm liking it so far, but the conspiracy feels so dense right now that I don't feel like I can offer a coherent opinion from week to week. Hopefully the remaining weeks will give me time to start to distinguish between all the different conspiracy-mongering old white men - they might as well be called Shadowy Cabal Member A, B, and C for all I can tell them apart.

Degrassi: The Boiling Point

The end of this daily summer run was a little anti-climactic - there's only so much you can do when you've been teasing a lockdown for the past two months. I think the set-up for the upcoming fall season worked well, though. Making the demand for change Snake's idea - putting it in the hands of the franchise's longest-running character - optimized the dramatic potential of it as a cliffhanger. I'm intrigued to see how the show shifts once it returns, and that renewed sense of excitement in a show is rare.

Also Watched: Huge, Top Chef

Ongoing:

Sons of Anarchy, Season 1

I've mentioned this before, that I started watching SoA when it first aired, but it fell by the wayside with the start of the school year and the rest of the tv season. Also, as an Undeclared fan from back in the day, I couldn't stop hearing this every time Charlie Hunnam does an American accent:

But I've so enjoyed the other shows I've crossed off the list in the past couple of months that I wanted to tackle another one, and with only two thirteen-episode seasons, I figured I'd have just enough time to catch up before the new season starts. And I'm glad I did, because it's my new most favorite thing ever. This season was a bit of a slow starter out of the gate, but once the insane ATF agents came into play, then everything just started clicking. One marker of a really great show for me is still enjoying it even after I've been spoiled on major plot points. (I read too many TV writers, it happens.) I was still riveted by the season's final episodes, even though I already knew about Donna's tragic fate.

- Gemma Teller Morrow may be one of my new favorite television characters. That scene with Cherry and the skateboard was amazing. Move over Cat Deeley - Katey Sagal is the new face of Things that are Wrong with the Emmys.

- I could rave about all the actors, so I'll just try to limit myself to a few: The Now-Obligatory Deadwood-related Excitement! Dayton Callie! Remains Awesome!; having grown up in Northern Virginia means that I've seen Remember the Titans approximately 50 times, and it always seemed like Ryan Hurst should've been way bigger after that movie, so it's exciting to see his work as Opie; did someone say "Inappropriate Crushes on Men Old Enough to be My Father"? Because, hellooo Kim Coates.

Week in TV: August 15-21

True Blood

- It's time to pull the cord on both the "What is Sookie, really?" story and the "What's the deal with Jason's girlfriend and her weirdo relatives?" story. They passed suspenseful a few weeks ago, and we're heading into "audience impatiently twiddles their thumbs" territory. Having read the books just means that I'm that much less interested in the overplayed mysteriousness of it all. It's answer time.

- I understand why, narratively, there's no incentive for the characters to all go to therapy, no matter how much they may need it, but I was glad to see Tara going to the rape survivors meeting this week. I like that the writers have imbued her with a new sense of perspective in the aftermath of last season and the Franklin debacle. Heaven knows, someone in this story needs to make strides towards consistently embracing logic.

- Denis O'Hare's agent must've clapped their hands with glee upon the conclusion of this episode - that last scene is one for the reel.

Mad Men

- A great episode, well-directed by John Slattery. I particularly liked the way he utilized the show's set to give a sense of layout to the new office - Pete's office, Peggy's office, the setup of the focus group, the shot down the hallway as Allison finally snaps and yells at Don, the hilarious shot of Peggy peeking into Don's office after the fight, the final shot of Peggy and Pete looking at each other through the glass wall. SCDP is finally starting to approach the familiarity of its predecessor. Slattery also got the best tandem performance from Elisabeth Moss and Vincent Kartheiser since "Meditations in an Emergency."

- There's something very satisfying about seeing Peggy make friends with other people her age who work in creative fields. Where it was once a radical step for her just to be a woman copywriter at her firm, now she has to decide whether she wants to become a radical woman in her 1965 milieu. Weiner willing, this will coincide with a decreasing interest in tolerating Don's shifty bullshit. I hope we'll see more of Joyce - I really liked Zosia Mamet in United States of Tara and The Kids are All Right. I'll also say that I loved Joey's "yeah, duh" reaction to Peggy asking if he'd heard about Malcolm X being shot. She's still got a ways to go.

- So, a Gen-X Campbell in the pipeline. I can't be the only one imagining a St. Elmo's Fire-style preppie nightmare, right?

Rubicon

A good episode, in that it stepped back from the conspiracy a bit to tell the audience more about the analyst group - a necessary, but deftly executed expository episode. The discussions among Will's co-workers reminded me a bit of The West Wing in the pure wonky delight of watching a debate play out.

Huge

- After watching the pilot weeks ago, something prompted me to dive back into Huge with a Hulu/On Demand mini-marathon. I'm glad I did - it's in the same camp (no pun intended) as other well-written, well-acted ABC Family shows like Greek and 10 Things I Hate About You. It's refreshing to see a show where the writers understand how teenagers speak and interact with one another, and that features a varied ensemble of characters without valorizing or demonizing any out of proportion.

- One of the best things about the Twilight phenomenon? Satiric fake Twilights in teen shows. The girls-bunk hysteria over "Phantasma" (about a girl who moves to a new town and falls in love with a mysterious boy...who's a ghost from the 1700s. They can never touch! It's so romantic!) was pitch-perfect and completely hilarious.

- I'm pretty sure me as a tween is encapsulated by some combination of Becca from Huge and Alex from Modern Family. As someone who once got called "that girl who reads" by a contemporary, I identify so much with the shy girl who keeps her head in a different book every day. True Confessions of Nerdy Youth: Once upon a time, like Becca, I went through a period where I wrote my journal in runes as an extra privacy safeguard. I know.

Also Watched: The Big C, Top Chef, Degrassi: The Boiling Point

Ongoing:

Deadwood, Season 3, Episodes 8-12

- A good run up to the end, though you could see the effects of the show being written without its creative team initially knowing that they weren't getting a fourth season. However, the episodes did a beautiful job of showing the sense of community that grew around the characters of Deadwood. There was something oddly touching about the scene of Al's men standing sentry in the street as Alma completes her walk to the bank post-shooting in "A Constant Throb," and the sense of grief around Ellsworth's death in "The Catbird Seat" made up for the loose ends remaining in the finale.

- I've got other shows in the pipeline, but I wouldn't be averse to someday taking on John from Cincinnati. Certainly this new acquaintance with the David Milch oeuvre makes me more interested in checking out Luck when it comes along.

Rewatched:

Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Season 2, Episode 17, "Passion"

- Now that I've finished my month-and-a-half race through Buffy's entire run, I can pick and choose among the reruns aired daily on Logo. In retrospect, this may be my favorite episode of the series. I had enjoyed the show up until this point, but this was the first one that I watched where at the end I couldn't wait to start the next. The episodes I liked best were the ones that clearly demonstrated the stakes involved in challenging whatever villains were at hand - a necessary part of building tension over a 22-episode season is talking (a lot) about the threat, but the moments where that threat really lands are the best. "Passion" is an exquisitely tense episode - it's clear that the newly de-souled Angel is going to do something terrible, just not where or when. The episode's use of a particular piece of vampire mythology - the need for an invitation into a home - only heightens the sense of creeping menace. (It's in episodes like this that you can really see what Stephenie Meyer lost in discarding traditional vampire mythology for Twilight - if I were doing work on either one, I'd definitely try to remark on the polar opposite ways the whole "vampire boyfriend watching you sleep" thing works in this episode and that universe.) The scene where Giles discovers the horrifying tableau set up at his house is one of the series' best. By adding a familiar face to the list of Angel's terrible deeds, the show dramatically underscored the stakes involved in him losing his soul, which would resonate through both Buffy and Angel.

- I'll probably talk more about Bones once the regular season starts, but I will say that watching Buffy and Angel has made me appreciate Bones more. Bones managed to find the happy medium between David Boreanaz's performances as good Angel and bad Angel - Booth is driven and principled, but also has the joie de vivre that makes Angelus kind of fun, even when he's being evil.