Now that was an intense season premier! (I sure hope the editor gets an Emmy nod for that opening sequence! And the score, too!)

And finally John Connor grows some balls! It was really pathetic how in the first season he was always crying to his mother. Now he takes charge. It's a brand new John (with hair cut- the Samson of the title) ready to lead.

I do have to say he puts too much faith in Cameron (the Delilah? How will she take away his 'power'? Will John's love for her be misplaced, causing Derek or Charlie their lives?)

My Picks:
Terminator: Sarah Connor Chronicles (Season Premier, 8pm, Fox)
Gossip Girl (8pm, CW)

Also On:
ABC
High School Musical: Get in the Picture (new, 8pm)
CMS Music Festival (Special, 9pm, two hours)

CBS
Big Bang Theory (repeat, 8pm)
How I Met Your Mother (repeat, 8:30)
Two and a Half Men (repeat, 9pm)
New Adventures of Old Christine (repeat, 9:30)
CSI:Miami (repeat, 10pm)

CW
Gossip Girl (new, 8pm)
One Tree Hill (new, 9pm)

Fox
Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles (Season Premier, 8pm)
Prison Break (new, 9pm)

NBC
Deal or No Deal (new, 8pm)

Season one of the Terminator 2: Judgment Day spin-off will be available August 19, 2008. (And, yes, there will be a season 2 starting in September!)

Available:
Standard DVD
BlueRay

Looks like Fox is renewing Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles!

And we all rejoiced!

Read that Fox is renewing Prison Break and might bring back Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles

Prison Break is one of those shows that people either like or hate, especially the last couple of seasons. Personally, I didn't care for the first season (In Fox River) or the second season (On The Lam) but I did enjoy the third (Sona). Sure, the Company storyline was a bit over the top, but seeing them in that prison under those circumstances was at least entertaining. (And killing Sara didn't bother me at all.)

As for Sarah Connor Chronicles, this show was screwed from the minute Fox didn't put in after the Super Bowl. Fox was advertising it during all those football games, and having it after the Super Bowl would have done wonders for its ratings. Instead they put House there, which already had a large viewership.

But I guess there were enough fans to warrant Fox to look into bringing it back.

Four things about the Sarah Connor Chronicles:

1. The name of the show is way too long.
2. I liked the show.
3. I didn't love the show.
4. I couldn't care less if it's renewed or not

There was something about this show that kept me at arms length from really getting into it. Something about the execution of the series that just didn't play right with me. I'm not quite sure I know what it is, but I'll take a stab at it.

"Don't drive yourself crazy chasing the future."

It's been a few days since "The Turk" aired and I have to say the episode left me a little confused. (I did take some notes - yes, I can be that anal - but most of the hour is a foggy memory.) The episode wasn't action packed, but I'm sure its purpose was to set the stage for things to come.

Gnothi Seauton means know thyself.

Oh, time paradoxes. I've posted before about my problems with time-travel and Heroes. And now this question keeps bothering me: Which John Connor is in the future and is the leader of mankind - the John Connor that was sending Terminahnold back in T2 or the John Connor that jumped 7 years in the future last night? Or has it always been the Time-Lagged John? As in, the Leader of Mankind John has always known he jumped ahead in time. But that can't be possible, since Sarah died two years ago and John became a drunk druggie who couldn't lead a pack of poodles let alone an army.

And if it is Time-Lagged John, then he wouldn't have known that Sarah died, so it has to be regular time John. But having a younger John would just screw things up.

I think I need a drink.

Questions, questions and more questions!

I was really looking forward to Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles. I'm actually finding this post difficult to write, since I didn't love the episode, but I didn't hate it either. I guess you can say I'm ambivalent about it.

I guess I'll post a SPOILER warning here.

The episode had a tough job to do. It had to set up the series, naturally, and bring folks who don't know what happened in Terminator 2 up to speed. (Thankfully Terminator 3 never has to be mentioned again!) And I thought the set-up went well. But besides the last few minutes, it felt like one long prequel instead of an hour long episodic show.

There were a lot of homages to Terminator 2. The voice over while Sarah was driving and the yellow lines in the road at night. Busting through the walls in the fight. "Come with me if you want to live." Nightmare with the nuclear explosion. The warehouse where Cameron (a nod to James Cameron perhaps?) tended to Sarah. (I do love the T2 line "Hey watch it, lugnuts!" Although it wouldn't have been fitting here.) And Sarah used the alias "Reese" which was John's father's name. (And it was extremely stupid of her to keep using it. Something tells me she's not firing on all thrusters.)

Since the show is called "The Sarah Connor Chronicles" the focus isn't on the Future Leader of Mankind, but his mom. I can't imagine living with all those nightmares. I think it would definitely screw with me, and I'm sure it will with Sarah. Hopefully that will be developed.

And Sarah was worried that John would run away, with all the pressure he's under. But I doubt that. John is all Sarah has in the world, and Sarah is all John has. He can't run away. In T2 when TerminAhnold was going to take John and leave town, John made him go get Sarah out of the mental hospital. "Fuck you. She's a priority to me!" That hasn't changed.

The last few minutes of the show we had the time shift, from 1999 to 2007. This, of course, brings up a lot of time-travel questions. John is now 8 years younger. Does that mess up the War time-line? By being in the future, will he be able to meet his father? Have they made things worse in the future by doing this time-jump?

I'll reserve judgment (pun intended) on this series for a while.

It's January and the holiday TV repeats are over... mostly. The writer's strike is still on, and that means many of the shows that began in the fall wont be back on for a while, save a few new episodes here and there. (Except for soap operas and animated shows.)

The networks were smart these past few months. They knew the writer's strike was looming so the networks saved some of their series for the winter. And they also didn't cancel many of the shows that normally would have been canceled early on (like Moonlight or Journeyman.) Of course, with the new shows debuting over the next few weeks, we also get new reality shows, such as that Dance Wars thing and Celebrity Apprentice. I guess we have to take the good with the bad.

So this winter, these shows are what I'm looking forward to...