TV Update Five

A diary of an evening's TV watching:

8-9: "Gilmore Girls", season six, episode three. Still loving this series. About tonight's episode: Liza Weil appeared in a skirt that showed off her legs. I've spent much too much time talking about what a good actress I think she is and not nearly enough about the babeage. She's the girl on your right, BTW.

And I only say this to troll for Google searchers: Rory Gilmore sex boat. If you watched it you'd get it.

Only drawback: Tonight's episode was interupted by a friend's unfortunately-timed, and insensitively glib, response to my latest work in progress.

9-10: "Commander in Chief". Sigh. As some predicted, the inexplicably frenzied reaction of conservative bloggers to the very idea, the very notion, of this series starring Geena Davis as a female president is looking like overkill. This series is so lacking in wit that I can't see it lasting more than six episodes, seven, tops.

Here's where they lost me.

"If Moses had been a woman leading Jews in the desert, she would have stopped and asked for directions and been in Israel in a week."

Ha ha, ha ha, ha! Because you know how guys just have the darndest time asking for directions! Ha ha, ha ha, ha! Did you ever notice how black people dance differently than white people? Ha ha, ha ha, ha! And McDonalds! What's up with that? Thank you very much, I'll be here at Bonkers all week...

Ahem. Comparisons to "The West Wing" are inevitable, but I was determined to try to judge this new series on it's own merits. Unfortunately, they refused to meet me halfway. There are things the show could have done to diminish the comparison. They could have scored it differently instead of aping Snuffy Walden's work for that series.

Here's a tip: Although "The West Wing" was a series that didn't shy from the swelling music to support a moment, it didn't need it to "sweeten" flaws in the script. "Commander in Chief" does.

They could have chosen an image for their title card that didn't look as though it was taken right out of "The West Wing's" opening credits. They could have avoided shots and editing choices that can't help but look like pages out of Tommy Schlamme's playbook.

But they didn't, and that left "Commander in Chief" to distinguish itself or not solely on the basis of Rod Lurie's script. And one thing they couldn't help that points up the difference between this series and "West Wing": Rod Lurie is not Aaron Sorkin on his most overworked day.

And it doesn't help to have Donald Sutherland crusting around looking like he wants to tell Davis, "If you give me a hard time, I'll have my son, Jack Bauer, disappear you!"

Also from 9-10: "Supernatural." You know what's starting to bug me about this series? The appropriation of famous images from horror films (last week "Carrie," this week "Psycho") without adding anything to them. On "Buffy," especially in the early years, what seemed like a played-out idea or image would be revealed to have a twist or be standing in for some adolescent angst. On "Supernatural" it just looks like directors playing "Hey, lookit me" Which is not at all a bad way to promote your directoral career--it's basically how Lucas and Spielberg made their millions--but it does nothing to make an audience care about your characters.

10-9: "Boston Legal." God, I've missed this show. Who else but Kelley would have a courtroom scene with a mute plaintiff giving her testimony by playing the cello? Also, in a weird coincidence tonight, both "Gilmore Girls" and "Boston Legal" did jokes referencing the Wicked Witch music from "The Wizard Of Oz."