Not all those "For Your Consideration" ads bring home the bacon.
What did we think of the Emmy nominations? Glad you asked.
Broadly speaking, our thoughts on the Emmys go something like this: Hooray for scary shows; The Wire and Tracy Morgan was robbed!
But more specifically, there's a lot to unpack in this years crop of nominated comedies, dramas, dramedies, and com...mas? (That can't be right.) Ready to take a closer look at this, the best that TV has to offer. Also Two and a Half Men. See ya after the jump.
DRAMA
More on Boston Legal later. For now, we'll just say STOP THE MADNESS, note The Wire's perfect record of no Best Drama Series Emmys, and leave it at that. Also, we're gonna take a pass on getting into the whole Basic Cable/Mad Men thing right now, since we're already living in a Basic Cable moment, and a crazy Mad Men moment, and that show's coming back shortly. Also, generally speaking, we're guessing its the favorite whereever it's nommed -- so we'll have weeks to chew on all that.
No, we wanna talk about Damages and Dexter. Anyone else shocked to see these two intensely-if-not-widely loved shows in the lineup here? One, perhaps, but both? With six nominees -- and the others all pretty much either locks or well established contenders -- it seems like they decided to widen the field this year to accommodate them both. And we couldn't be happier, particularly about Damages, which despite the pedigrees of its actors and its gripping depiction of power and corruption was SO unrelentingly creepy -- it' s kind of a horror movie with briefcases -- that we never thought it'd get recognized. Dexter, at least, has a narrator, and he's likable and flawed, you know? We can see how that nomination happened, despite its grisly subject matter. But Damages? What did Damages have besides the dewy eyes of its star, Australian actress Rose Byrne? It's just too bad she was overlooked for her role as the slowly rotting center of a very, very dark chocolate. Next year, perhaps.
Other thoughts:
We're pretty sure we can pronounce HBO dead for a while, with not a single series in contention for the top award. Not even with the final (admittedly under-excellent) season of The Wire, the Greatest Show In The History Of All The Other Shows Going Off The Air Or Getting Crummy in their quiver could they land an arrow on that target. Ah well, that's another dead horse we've beaten in the past, so moving on... Nice ones Bryan Cranston and Michael Emerson, getting nodded for a couple of very tricky and affecting performances. And a huge Boo-Ya to In Treatment's Glynn Turman, who has been on everything from A Different World -- you know, that army guy? -- to The Wire and is never less than magnetic.
COMEDY
Why Two and a Half Men keeps getting nominated, we'll never know. It's a decently funny show -- and we gotta give props to any series that works in Oedipal lust as often as it does -- but come on? Better than How I Met Your Mother? Weeds? Ugly Betty? How about Pushing Daisies, which we are guessing ABC thought would have a better chance in the comedies than as a drama. Fair point, but how is it exactly that Pushing Daisies is a comedy but Boston Legal -- a show consumed with nyuk-nyuk sideways glances, broad legal/topical gags, and Bill Shatner's verbal tics -- well, that's a drama? Anyway. Oh, and who do we want to win? 30 Rock. Everything. Duh.
Other thoughts:
Hooray for Lee Pace, Neil Patrick Harris, and Mary Louise-Parker for getting their noms. Also, we'd love to have been in Will Arnett and Amy Poehler's bedroom this morning, since, um, duh, but also because they both got nommed for 30 Rock and SNL respectively. The latter of those noms was a rare endorsement of a member of the SNL ensemble, but was also well deserved, as Poehler could rightly be said to have anchored that at times rickety ol' ship for a few years now. If she wins -- a real possibility in our mind -- she can gloat over her hubby, who, we are happy/sad to say, will lose to Tim Conway if there's a God in heaven.
MOVIES, ETC.
We note here simply that we are puzzled by Extras being in this category and Comedy, and also that we found Recount and John Adams to be boring. Also that Tin Man got a bunch of awards in a year where SciFi's excellent series Battlestar Galactica did not should probably bum us out, but in fact encourages us. If that steaming, cliched hunk of junk can get noms, the BSG movies planned for the next couple years should blow everything else out of the frakkin' water.
REALITY SHOWS
Oh... you knowm, as long as Klum gets to wear something nice to the show, we're happy.