VH1 Top 20 Countdown – 7/7/12

July 7, 2012

jmunney Music, Television, VH1 Top 20 Countdown Leave a comment

Bing!

Original Version
1. Maroon 5 ft. Wiz Khalifa – “Payphone”
2. Rihanna – “Where Have You Been”
3. Gym Class Heroes ft. Ryan Tedder – “The Fighter”
4. Katy Perry – “Wide Awake”
5. Ellie Goulding – “Lights”
6. David Guetta ft. Sia – “Titanium”
7. Kelly Clarkson – “Dark Side”
8. Carly Rae Jepsen – “Call Me Maybe”
9. Demi Lovato – “Give Your Heart a Break”
10. Usher – “Scream”
11. Carrie Underwood – “Good Girl”
12. Ed Sheeran – “The A Team”
13. Calvin Harris – “Let’s Go”
14. John Mayer – “Shadow Days”
15. Nicki Minaj – “Starships”
16. Linkin Park – “Burn It Down”
17. Neon Trees – “Everybody Talks”
18. Emeli Sandé – “Next to Me”
19. B.o.B ft. Taylor Swift – “Both of Us”
20. The Lumineers – “Ho Hey”

Jmunney’s Revision
1. Starships
2. Titanium
3. Lights
4. Where Have You Been
5. Wide Awake
6. Ho Hey
7. Good Girl
8. Call Me Maybe
9. Give Your Heart a Break
10. Let’s Go
11. Next to Me
12. Burn It Down
13. Scream
14. Dark Side
15. The A Team
16. Everybody Talks
17. Both of Us
18. Payphone
19. Shadow Days
20. The Fighter

Best Episode of the Season: Awake Season 1 (First and Only Season!)

July 3, 2012

jmunney Awake, Best Episodes of the 2011-2012 Season, Best Episodes of the Season, Television Leave a comment

Season Analysis: Seemingly burdened by a concept that looked like it would work better as a movie or at most a miniseries, Awake did a more than passable job of stretching it out to a full season and looked like it was ready to make it work over multiple seasons if given the chance.

“That’s Not My Penguin”

Most of Awake’s episodes followed the tried-and-true cop show formula to an almost painful degree, but they were always saved (at least somewhat) by the twist that the lead detective was working two separate cases concurrently in two different worlds that tied into each other obliquely.  “That’s Not My Penguin” thankfully mixed up the formula by having Detective Britten held hostage by mental hospital patient Gabriel.  A hostage situation is not an unusual one for a stunt episode, but it did work strongly in Awake’s favor, allowing it to really take advantage of its premise in astute and truly weird fashion.  Gabriel’s mental construction of an alternate reality obviously paralleled Britten’s situation, suggesting that Britten might be crazy enough for institutionalization but also presenting a contrast that showed that even if he is crazy, he has found a way to make it work (for now).  Britten’s hallucination of Dr. Lee in the hospital actually served to demonstrate his ingenuity in solving this crisis, and it added to the whole show another layer to chew over by showing that hallucinations could possibly be appearing within Britten’s hallucination/dream.  Combine that with the penguin hallucination in the other reality, and it seemed to be that Britten’s mind could be going in any number of directions at any time no matter what the location.  More than any other episode of Awake, “That’s Not My Penguin” pressed the rhetorical question, “What’s so crazy about being crazy if you know how to make it work?”

Best Episode of the Season: Don’t Trust the B—- in Apartment 23 Season 1

July 3, 2012

jmunney Best Episodes of the 2011-2012 Season, Best Episodes of the Season, Don't Trust the B---- in Apartment 23, Television Leave a comment

Season Analysis: After a seven-episode first season, Apartment 23 hasn’t met its full potential yet (or at least, I hope it hasn’t met its full potential yet), but it has enough promising elements that it could very quickly become one of the best comedies on the air at some point in its second season just like another ABC sitcom that used to air Wednesdays at 9:30.

“The Wedding…”

Who ever thought that June was boring?  She is uptight, sure (though not uptight as all get out), but uptight hardly means boring.  Uptightness may make someone allergic to fun, but the uptight person could very well be fascinating as far as her uptightness is concerned.  So when June’s former fiancée called her boring, and Chloe’s response to that accusation was, “That’s, like, the worst thing you can say to anyone,” my reaction was, “Yes, it is, especially if you’re a character on a TV show.  So good thing June’s not boring.”  While June set out to show everyone at the wedding that she is an interesting person, Don’t Trust the B—- in Apartment 23 set out to show that it is a program that is putting all of its pieces in order.  Chloe has been rubbing off on June, and June has been influencing Chloe, though not necessarily definitively, but enough so that she cares enough to help June out with the whole charade to prove that she is not boring.  The fact that James van der Beek exists in these characters’ world has become something that is just accepted, which is surely necessary but sort of bittersweet (as June says wistfully, “I used to have a poster of you”).  And Eli is no longer just the creep who masturbates across the hall, with his gig in the wedding band making him more recognizable as an actual person than any other episode thus far.

Best Episode of the Season: Modern Family Season 3

July 1, 2012

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Season Analysis: During its first season, Modern Family was good – really good, easily one of the best comedies of the season.  In its third season, it wasn’t really bad, but it wasn’t exactly good either.  And the thing is, it still seems like the same show that it always was, which has led me to wonder if Season 1 really was as good as I remember it, or if I just imagined it.

“Treehouse”

Season 3 of Modern Family did not feature any overall brilliant episodes, but there were some episodes that had their moments.  The B- (or C-) storyline of “Treehouse,” with Cam attempting to prove that he could successfully fake being straight and pick up a woman in a bar, was pleasant enough, especially since it is always nice to see Leslie Mann.  She infused a great deal of personality into what was an otherwise nothing role.  But the best moment of this episode – and of the whole season – came at the very end of the titular A-plot.  I think that most viewers were as disappointed as Phil was that Luke eventually gave up on the father-son treehouse building, but all was forgiven in the sweetest, most unexpected epilogue of perhaps the whole series.  Phil’s interaction with Andre touched on the question of “How well do we really know our neighbors?” (Phil and Andre have lived next door to each other for nearly a decade and this is this their first conversation) as well as the struggles for male adults at making friends (Andre’s declaration of “Honey, the guy in the tree’s cool” represented a delightful overcoming of this struggle), and it also introduced plenty of people to the criminally underused Kevin Hart.

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