Season 4, Episode 10 - Night Out

After last week’s amazing episode, it was highly likely that this episode would be a disappointment, but fortunately it wasn’t. Although, it wasn’t quite up to par with the quality of the previous episode, it was pretty good.

Ryan has plans for the Scranton branch to come in on Saturday to input their own sales as if they were sales from the Dunder Mifflin Infinity website, which does not appear have turned into the success that Ryan thought it would be. After giving the gang a pep talk, Ryan mentions to Michael that he “should see” the women that Ryan meets in clubs in New York, which Michael takes as an invitation to join him for a night of club hopping.

So, shortly after Ryan leaves the office, Michael and Dwight are on their way to New York to party down.

Meanwhile, Jim has come up with the brilliant idea to have people work a few hours later on Friday, and not come in on Saturday at all - which sounds great, in theory, but nothing ever seems to quite go right when Jim exerts his managerial role.

In New York Michael and Dwight meet up with Ryan, who is abnormally happy to see him (and hanging out with a man that Dwight is convinced is a hobbit). As you can imagine, a night of hilarity ensues.

Back at the branch the work is complete, and the gang is leaving for the evening…except that Jim forgot to tell the security guard they were staying late, and he locked them all in. The team quickly turns on Jim and Pam. Tobey makes several attempts to impress Pam, including being very proud of having the security guard’s home phone number, and finding a football to throw around (which Pam then accidentally throws into Meredith’s face).

That comes to a head as Tobey accidentally puts his hand on Pam’s knee…and keeps it there just long enough for everyone to notice…utterly embarrassed, he announces that he’s decided to move away and jump the fence to run home…which he proceeds to do.

Jim and Co are finally free when the cleaning ladies show up, and Oscar talks to them to get everyone out of the parking lot.

Back in New York, it has become clear that Ryan has a drug problem, and he eventually collapses on the dance floor and Michael and Dwight take him home. It looks like Ryan’s life is going to fall apart this season - who know’s where he’ll be next year?

All in all, it was a good episode. If you want to check it out right now, for free, you can do so a Hulu.com.

Is it just me, or has the past month flown past?

Just a friendly reminder that Lost returns to air tonight with its second batch of episodes, beginning with “The Shape of Things to Come”, a Ben-centric episode. ABC’s official description:

Locke’s camp comes under attack, and Jack tries to discover the identity of a body that has washed ashore.

Tonight is also the latest of Lost’s many timeslot jumps…it airs at 10/9c after an all new Ugly Betty and Grey’s Anatomy.

When we left off, Sayid had just revealed Michael’s true identity to the Freighties, and Karl and Rousseau had been shot by snipers while heading to “the Temple”, causing Alex to call out that she’s Ben’s daughter.

In the mid to late 80s and very early 90s “junior” versions of classic cartoons were all the rage. While the idea, on the surface, seems really uncreative and potentially stupid, this concept managed to produce some absolutely fantastic cartoons.

Here’s our list of the top 5 ‘Kids’ cartoons of all time…

Tom and Jerry Kids

One of the last entries into the ‘Kids’ cartoon sub-genre, Tom and Jerry Kids was a great modernization of the ‘Tom and Jerry’ formula for the 90s. The show aired on FOX from 1990 to 1993, and featured short segments staring Tom, Jerry, Slowpoke Antonio, Kyle the Cat, and Wildmouse.

The Flintstone Kids

From 1986 to 1988, The Flintstone Kids aired as an hour long show that featured the most popular characters from The Flintstones in junior sized versions. Most character personalities remained the same, but the show also introduced new characters like Captain Caveman to the Flintstones mythos. The show actually caused controversy among hard core Flintstones fans because it contradicted prior established continuity with the Flintstone’s history. Still, it was a great series, and one of the top ‘Kids’ series from the era.

A Pup Named Scooby Doo

How good was A Pup Named Scooby Doo? So good that it still airs daily on Cartoon Network (and it has been on the network since 1993!). This was the 8th incarnation of Scooby Doo as a saturday morning cartoon, and it ran from 1988 to 1991 on ABC. It follows the same formula as the original series, but with a much more sarcastic tone. Of every show on the list, this is the easiest to find. It still airs on television, and is available on DVD as well.

Jim Henson’s Muppet Babies

Muppet Babies started this ‘Kids’ trend, and ran the longest of all the series on this list - from 1984-1992 (new episodes ended in 1990). The series is an animated classic that featured the famous Muppet characters as children, going on imaginative adventures (often parodying popular culture and current films) - all from the safety of their nursery. The series has not, and probably will not, come to DVD. One reason sighted is that the series featured a great deal of footage from other sources (including Indiana Jones and Star Wars in the series opening) and rights may be difficult to iron out.

Tiny Toon Adventures

With a high production budget, fantastic writing, and the backing of Stephen Speilberg, Tiny Toons put Warner Bros. animation back on the map in the 1990s. This series took a slightly different route to the ‘Kids’ concept, with the Tiny Toons being unrelated animated kids who were taught by the previous Loony Tunes generation. The show ran for almost 100 episodes, including several specials and a direct to video movie, and often lampooned pop culture and current events.

The series is finally coming to DVD on July 29, 2008.
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Larry King is 74 years old, and while most men would be retired at that age, King just won’t have it. Sure, he’s looking more and more like Mr. Burns every day, but that’s not stopping him from doing his show on CNN until at least June, 2011.

There have been rumors that Katie Couric might replace King in his CNN primetime spot. She’s not exactly burning up the ratings charts doing the evening news, and I’m not sure why anyone would want to have her replace a ratings mainstay on their network, but the rumors existed non-the-less. CNN, however, has squashed them, saying that “Larry is the best there is. He’ll be here for a long time.”

TV Squad points out that there are a few signs that Mr. King might be losing touch with the modern world. Apparently over the last year or so he’s had some problems with things that a host should probably know, for example he didn’t know that Seinfeld had been cancelled when he interviewed Jerry Seinfeld last year. He accidentally called Ringo Starr “George” in a recent interview, and a couple of years ago he admitted that he’s never been on the Internet.

You have to assume that this was intentional. In Terminator canon, Judgement Day takes place on April 21, 2011. For the 3-year pre-anniversary of the end of the world as we know it (a.k.a. yesterday, April 21, 2008), FOX announced that Terminator: Sarah Connor Chronicles will receive a 13-episode order for the 2008-2009 season. It had been rumored for a while…and even the head of FOX Entertainment said that they were hiring staff.

Though I wasn’t crazy about it at first, T:SCC grew on me quickly, and actually became one of my heavily anticipated shows by the time it ended. Definitely looking forward to next season.

Last night was a monumental night for World Wrestling Entertainment. Not because the “King of the Ring” was great or anything…oh no…but last night was the first time that presidential candidates have address the WWE fans directly on WWE TV.

Hilary Clinton, Barack Obama, and John McCain all gave wrestling-themed, pun filled, speeches last night, and thanks to YouTube, we have them for you in their entirety:

First up Hilary…

Do you smell what Barack is cooking?

John McCain gives the most wrestling referenced speech of the night…

While each of those is terrible in their own way, they’re also all kind of charming, in my opinion. What a unique race this is going to be…

NBC is making a shift to its Thursday night line-up this week, moving “30 Rock” to the post-Office 9:30 (EST) time slot. The slot is considered an upgrade for the show, since it should benefit from the large audience attracted to the goings-on of Dunder Mifflin - Scranton, each and every week.

“30 Rock” is already renewed for next season, while “Scrubs” will soon be moving to ABC, and will air its last NBC broadcast episode in a few weeks - so it only makes sense that the network would want to put “30 Rock” back in the 9:30 slot.

Viacom, MGM, and Lionsgate are teaming up for a new pay-cable channel that will compete with the big boys like HBO, Showtime, and Stars in 2009. So far, the new channel is unnamed, but we do know that it will be the only place to watching upcoming Paramount movies on pay-cable.

So when that new Star Trek film hits television, it will be on this network first, along with anything else that comes out of the Paramount stable in the near future.

In addition to being a pay-cable channel, services will also include video on demand. The channel will, of course, combine new and classic feature film output, and they are also going to produce original television series to compete with HBO and Showtime.

Interestingly, the press release mentions Robocop and The Outer Limits as two new ventures that the network will have access to. One has to wonder if either of those will end up being television shows on the network after it launches.

Some of you may recall that Britney Spears recently appeared on “How I Met Your Mother” as a semi-crazy receptionist who fell in love with Ted, and was eventually taken advantage of by Barney.

She will be making a return appearance in the near future, which isn’t terribly surprising since her first guest spot on the show garnered huge ratings.

What will her return involve? Don’t have a clue at this point, but my guess would involve some kind of retribution for Barney being…well…Barney.

First of all, I’ll start by saying I’ve never watched one second of Gossip Girl. I know that there are many who enjoy it, but nothing about the show interests me at all. However, this move by the CW piqued my interest.

Like virtually every other show on television, Gossip Girl has been off for a few months because of the WGA strike. When it returns to air on April 21, the CW will not be offering it for viewing online. Gossip episodes usually pull in a few hundred thousand viewers online, and the network wants to see if the loss of the ability to view for free will “move the needle at all” with regards to Neilsen ratings.

I don’t make a habit of watching anything streaming online unless my DVR didn’t record for one reason or another. But I know that there is a large chunk of viewership that does. What about you? Do you watch a lot online? Would you switch to traditional television if it was your only option?