Just as I'm Getting Into It...

So, I watch four TV shows; CSI, Extreme Makeover: Home Edition (EM:HE), Supernanny, and Ghost Whisperer. It has become routine to end my Thursday, Friday, and Sunday evenings with this mix of drama and family-friendly reality TV (you didn't think that "family-friendly" and "reality TV" could go together, did you?). There is something in each of these shows that either totally draws me in (in the case of the dramas), or makes me feel like parts of the world are being made a better place (in the case of the reality shows). These are mental and emotional states I look forward to each week. And this routine is slowly unraveling!

EM:HE has not lost any of its wonderful-ness. If anything, it's getting better. So we will give praise where praise is due (yay, EM:HE!), and move on. CSI still boggles my mind (in a good way) with the crime situations it solves each week. Brilliant CSIs whose attention to detail make me look I have ADHD (okay, maybe not quite that bad). Overall, I'm not disappointed in quality. But I am concerned. Last season, CSI Sarah left, and that was a bit of an adjustment. This season, CSI Warwick got killed, so more adjustment. And there's a bit of a shift in the overall tone of the show because of it all. Grissom, the solid core of the team, is acting occasionally in un-Grissom-like ways--not way extreme, just subtle; but enough that it makes me wonder if the quality of the show is not going to crumble in the near future. That's where I stand with CSI.

Ghost Whisperer and Supernanny are on the Friday line-up. What a treat to have two great shows back-to-back! That was my thought when the season started. I have come to enjoy Ghost Whisperer, primarily for two reasons: 1) Melinda sort of has to solve a mystery each week and she does a good job at it, and 2) Melinda is married to Jim, and they have a wonderful marital relationship--and as far as I'm concerned, it doesn't come across as artificially wonderful. It comes across as a REAL marriage (except for the whole she-sees-ghosts thing), and it's refreshing to see on TV.

Except that last Friday Jim died. I was choked. This changes the entire show! ...So of course I was tuned in tonight. In a nutshell, Jim didn't want to cross over. Melinda understood but told him he had to because it's what has to happen and it's best for both of them. While dealing with that, together they help this other ghost cross over. Yes, pretty predictable. But Jim doesn't cross over the entire episode. By the end, even I'm getting impatient. And at the end, what does he do? He decides to jump into the body of someone who's died at a car accident scene. No! Nonononono! And not only has he jumped into some random person's body, but when he wakes up, he looks at Melinda and asks, "do I know you?" The body possession didn't even work properly! Are you kidding me?! I don't mind storylines that continue over more than one episode, but they have to be credible. This is not credible (although how writers thought this would be a good move is rather incredible). And the whole rhythm of the show has changed. It's no longer about helping ghosts reconcile with their issue and cross over while running an antique store and creating a life with a loving husband. It's moved into the realm of weird. Lois & Clark did that in its last season (ever so long ago), and I held out to the end, but I remember that the series finale was less than satisfying, because the last season hadn't been its strongest overall. I fear the same is happening.

It was just so unexpected--this season started with Melinda and Jim trying to get pregnant--and then they kill him off? Ya just don't see that coming. There are so many things that could end up happening in this show, now that the game has changed, and each of these possibilities is just... well... stupid. But of course, I'm going to keep watching, because I am hoping that the pain of watching crappy episodes will be short-lived and that the show will get back on some credible track. But BOY is it frustrating when writers take something that isn't broken and try to fix it. Which brings me to Supernanny.

Supernanny is still fabulous. Nanny Jo is smart, and is good at what she does. She is consistent within and between families, and it is clear that what she teaches families to do is based on sound child development principles and best practice. So what's the problem, you might ask? The problem was that Supernanny was not on this evening. A show called Super-Manny was on instead. In the aftermath of a less-than-stellar Ghost Whisperer, I wasn't even sure I wanted to watch, but I tuned in (only part way, cuz that's when I started blogging here), because I thought the dynamic of a male doing the Supernanny thing would at least be interesting. ...Well, yes, it was interesting, I can at least say that.

I know things happened, and I know that in the end, the family was happy with the improvement, but I didn't get the process. There was no plan to say, "we're going to focus on A, B, and C" with teaching days followed by practice and then review. Super-Manny Mike never really explained what he was doing and why; he just kinda did things. And he did a couple things that I felt were counter to what Jo would have proposed (and I kinda like her better at this point). The whole thing seemed highly disorganized. There were a couple good points, but overall, it has not scored any pilot points with me. And I would like to know where Jo went.

So this is where I'm at. Somewhat disgruntled with the ways of my TV shows. Only two more sleeps until EM:HE. Thank goodness!