Agent Carter

8 Episodes from 2016…

My list of favorite episodes each year is usually a combination of things that made me think, and things that just made me really happy. I always like to preface my list with the recognition that these are simply *my* favorite episodes, and not necessarily the best episodes, because I know that there is way too much good TV to make that statement, and that other people have different tastes than me. So, here we go…

1. Game of Thrones “The Winds of Winter”
The previous episode “The Battle of the Bastards” was also fantastic, but this is my favorite because everything starts to come together in the season finale. Cersei refuses to stand trial, and instead blows up the High Sparrow, the Faith Militant, and most of the Tyrell family. Tommen then kills himself, and Cersei takes the Iron Throne. Aria exacts vengeance on House Frey for the Red Wedding. Bran has become the Three-Eyed Raven and learns that Jon Snow is the son of Lyanna Stark and Rhaegar Targaryen. Jon and Sansa have reclaimed Winterfell for the Starks, and Jon is named the King of the North by the rest of the Northern families, with a little help from Lyanna Mormont. Daenerys makes Tyrion the Hand of the Queen and begins sailing across the Summer Sea with her dragons and her army, aligned with Dorne, Highgarden, and House Greyjoy. Everything seems to have fallen into place, and it set-up what will hopefully be a eventful season seven. I cannot wait to see what happens next.

2. Black Sails “XXVIII”
I had not read a lot about the show before starting to watch, and have never read Treasure Island, so I actually did not know that the show is a prequel to the book until the end of the most recent season. I mostly just like pirates and decided to finally catch up on the whole series this year. In this season finale, there is an epic battle between Flint’s and Rackham’s crews, the Maroons and the British. After the British are handily defeated, with help from Blackbeard, the pirate captains sit down together and begin to figure out a plan to take back Nassau. Meanwhile, Billy Bones and a few select others have been instilling fear in the people of the island, and Silver is finally given the name ‘Long John Silver.’ Lines have been drawn in Nassau, and if you are not with the pirates, you are against them.

3. 12 Monkeys “Blood Washed Away”
For me, this is the best science fiction show on television right now. Every season I think they cannot possibly blow my mind any more, and then they do, over and over again throughout the season. Cole and Cassie are stuck together in 1958, with no way back to the future unless they stop the primary from causing another paradox. When they fail, they FINALLY admit to each other that they are both in love, and they face those feelings head on. Back in 2044, everyone else is searching for Titan so that they can kill The Witness. This is not the season finale, but it ends in such a way that you have no idea how they could possibly go on from here, and yet they do somehow, and it is excellent.

4. Lovesick “Frankie”
This show makes me laugh a lot. This episode in particular made me cry with laughter. The reason this episode has made my list is because of one specific scene where Angus has eaten hallucinogenic mushrooms and somehow manages to get into the freezer at a grocery store. He is enjoying the cold temperature, and tells Dylan that it’s like being in Narnia. When the grocery store employee tells him to get out, he tries to hide by putting a bag of frozen peas over his face. Later, after Dylan’s car gets a flat tire, Angus is afraid that they are being watched so he runs into the woods and climbs a tree. I chuckle just thinking about it.

(more…)

Quotes of the Week: February 28-March 5

These are my favorite quotes from the past week, not just from shows currently on the air, but also other random things I happen to be watching.

Supergirl
Siobhan: I’m sorry, I have difficulty making conversation with men under six feet tall.

Kara: I save the world better when I save it *with* people.

The Magicians
Mayakovsky: Why are you both so determined to be so fucking bland?

Lucifer
Linda: God cast you out because He needed you to do the most difficult of jobs. It was a gift.
Lucifer: Gift? He shunned me. He vilified me. He made me a torturer! Can you even begin to fathom what it was like? Eons spent providing a place for dead mortals to punish themselves? I mean, why do they blame me for all their little failings? As if I’d spent my days sitting on their shoulder, forcing them to commit acts they’d otherwise find repulsive. “Oh, the Devil made me do it!” I have never made any one of them do anything. Never.
Linda: What happened to you in unfair.
Lucifer: Unfair? This is unjust! For all eternity, my name will be invoked to represent all their depravity. That is the gift that my Father gave me!

Lost Girl
Aife: Bach sounds delightful…as long as it’s followed by Sir Mix-a-Lot.

Trick: Always remember, you’re my blood too.

Blindspot
Patterson: Yes, you can for sure maintain enough air speed. I did the math.
Fischer: How? Where?
Patterson: In my head, where math is done. Please, don’t interrupt.

New Girl
Schmidt: Don’t tell me what to do! I’m her fiancé, not some schnook off the street eating a peanut butter cookie!

Reagan: I hope that the Chicago Cubs win the World Series while you’re in a coma
Nick: That’s one of the meanest things anybody has ever said to me.

Agent Carter
Howard: Jarvis, you just hit a woman with my car!
Jarvis: I know, sir.
Howard: She’s a 2-time Oscar nominee!
Jarvis: Miss Frost is quite resilient. She’s fine. Trust me.

Howard: If she weren’t a homicidal maniac, I’d be in love.

Howard: What am I doing wrong, Jarvis?
Jarvis: We are standing before an incomprehensible rip in the fabric of our world. Use a 7-iron.

(more…)

Quotes of the Week: February 21-27

These are my favorite quotes from the past week, not just from shows currently on the air, but also other random things I happen to be watching.

Downton Abbey
Anna: Why are you smiling?
Bates: Show me a man that doesn’t smile when his wife admits she’s wrong.

Mrs. Hughes: You’re such an old curmudgeon.
Mr. Carson: Don’t say you’re going off me.
Mrs. Hughes: No. Because you’re *my* curmudgeon, and that makes all the difference.

Violet: I believe in rules, and traditions, and playing our part, but there is something else.
Lady Mary: And what is that, pray?
Violet: I believe in love. I mean, brilliant careers, rich lives are seldom led without just an element of love.

Supergirl
James: When I’m getting a lesson in ethics and morality from Cat Grant, I *know* we’ve gone off the deep end.

Maxwell: So nothing for my largesse, then?
Kara: I was told you asked for, and received, Netflix.
Maxwell: If you thought I was dangerous before, you have no idea how dangerous I get when I’m bored.
Kara: I recommend Call the Midwife.

Kara: Ooh, I’ve wanted to catch a corrupt cop ever since we binge watched The Wire.

Professor Luzano: As the humans would say, we are up a creek without a poodle.

Kara: You make me a better hero.

Jane the Virgin
Petra: I think I got the wrong stroller. This pram won’t fold! …or respond to kicking!

Rogelio: Now get over here, Susan B. Anthony, and give me a kiss!

Alba: I won’t judge you… God might, but that’s between you and him.

Lost Girl
Trick: Sometimes the heart does what it likes, despite what the rules say.

Bitten
Roman: Every time I visit this house, you seem to be knee-deep in blood.

The Flash
Cisco: We’re gonna need a bigger Flash.

Lyla: He’s fast, John. Get over it.
Diggle: Never.

(more…)

Quotes of the Week: February 14-20

These are my favorite quotes from the past week, not just from shows currently on the air, but also other random things I happen to be watching.

The Good Wife
Eli: Now I get why people have children. They can admire themselves in someone else.

Shameless
Professor Youens: We have only two jobs on this earth. The first, to learn. The second, to cope.

Downton Abbey
Daisy: Oh my God!
Mrs. Hughes: I will thank you not to take the name of the Lord in vain.
Daisy: I hope it’s not in vain! I need all the help I can get.

Anna: They do say that opposites attract.
Lady Mary: Yes, they attract. But do they live happily ever after?

Castle
Beckett: Be charming, but not too charming.
Castle: That’s like asking Superman not to be too super.

Lucifer
Dan: What in God’s name are you doing here?
Lucifer: Nothing in His name. Here on my own, actually.

The Magicians
Margo: A great way to get the things you want is to be so miserable you don’t want them anymore.

Lost Girl
Tamsin: She broke my heart.
Acacia: Silver lining: it made you stronger.

(more…)

Quotes of the Week: February 7-13

These are my favorite quotes from the past week, not just from shows currently on the air, but also other random things I happen to be watching.

Supergirl
Cat: If they try to evade you, you remind them that I am still holding on to their Hamilton tickets!

Maxwell: That was one messed up daffodil.

The X-Files
Detective Gross: I don’t want to be confrontational here…
Mulder: It wouldn’t be Philadelphia without a *certain* degree of confrontation.

Mulder: Cutler’s eye-line is trained above the door, about Tim Duncan height. We eliminate any 76ers, ’cause those guy can’t find the rim.

Scully: I don’t care about the big questions right now, Mulder. I just want one more chance to ask my mom a few little ones.

Jane the Virgin
Narrator: This is making me feel a little pervy.

New Girl
Reagan: I think he’s having a seizure.
Cece: No, no. It’s just that when he has to process a lot of emotions, sometimes he likes to do Nick Cannon’s solo from Drumline.

Schmidt: Everybody knows that there is a window of time before any wedding where some amazing person comes out of the woodwork and tries to steal a bride. It’s the plot of every romantic comedy. I’m the Bridgette Wilson-Sampras here!
Cece: Who?
Reagan: I don’t know.
Schmidt: Oh, I suppose you’re both too “cool’ to have seen THE WEDDING PLANNER!

Winston: I’m sorry that I basically let you drown in the shower. And then called you a soggy little bitch.

(more…)

Quotes of the Week: January 31-February 6

These are my favorite quotes from the past week, not just from shows currently on the air, but also other random things I happen to be watching.

Galavant
Galavant: I didn’t tell you to die in a brown fart. The truth is, all I’ve wanted is to come back to you. You’re the love of my life. And if we survive this, I want to marry you. And I want to live by the sea…
Isabella: You had me at “brown fart.”

Richard: What? I’m singing a duet with my inner child.

Shameless
Sean: I’m a naturally helpful person.
Fiona: Must be tiring.
Sean: It is *utterly* exhausting.

Downton Abbey
Violet: When we unleash the dogs of war, we must go where they take us!

Isabelle: You will stop at nothing to get your own way. Isn’t that the truth?
Violet: Indeed. It is a quality I share with Marlborough, Wellington, and my late mother. I was trained in a hard school, and I *fight* accordingly.

Supergirl
Kara: Except for the fact that she talks like Cookie Monster, she is exactly like me.

Jane the Virgin
Lina: Look natural. Sexy natural.

The Magicians
Quentin: I don’t know what happened.
Eliot: You found out who you are. She found out who she’s not. Life.

The Flash
Cisco: Who’s the best hacker in the world, people?
Barry and Caitlin: Felicity Smoak.
Cisco: What is wrong with you two? That’s not friendship.

New Girl
Schmidt: We’ve always done everything together. I’m just worried that we’re gonna drift apart. You know, I’m gonna get married and have kids, and you’re gonna be wandering around the grocery store holding a bottle of scotch and an ear of corn.

Nick: If I can’t have a kid with a woman, maybe I’ll have one with my cousin.

(more…)

Quotes of the Week: January 24-30

These are my favorite quotes from the past week, not just from shows currently on the air, but also other random things I happen to be watching.

Galavant
Wormwood: Oh, Gareth, you’re smiling. Sorry, could you stop it? I just find it deeply unsettling.

Richard: I just can’t believe he’s dead.
Roberta: Does seem awfully early in the season for something like this.
Sid: Could he be mostly dead? But not all dead, ’cause mostly dead is slightly alive?
Neo: Yeah, that’s not a thing.

Downton Abbey
Edith: I suppose Cousin Isabelle is entitled to put up an argument.
Violet: Of course she is! She’s just not entitled to win it!

Violet: I haven’t been in the kitchens in at least twenty years.
Isabelle: Have you got your passport?

Supergirl
Kara: If you hate bigots more than aliens, then, why are you giving Senator Crane so much attention? She’s horrible.
Cat: Because, Kira, while bigots will always take the gold on the medal podium of my contempt, they make excellent click-bait. Also, the more they talk the more they sabotage themselves. It’s a magical implosion happening right before our very eyes.

Alex: There’s no shame in surviving.

Cat: I never got to put a picture that you’d drawn on the fridge. I never got to tell you stories. And I never got to teach you how not to be afraid of the world. And I never got to tell you how amazing I think you are. I never got to be your mom, but I am your biggest fan.

Jane the Virgin
Alba: Poor Manuel, living in the closet for so long. I’m glad he found his authentic life. I have a gay friend at church, and he explained everything to me.

Telenovela
James: I know I come on strong, okay? I’m just an all-in kinda guy. I’m all-in on love. I’m all-in on work. I’m all-in on Law & Order, I’ll tell you that much. Man, I have seen every single episode, including all the spin-offs. That’s like a thousand hours of television! Oh my good God, maybe I do go a little overboard.

(more…)

Quotes of the Week: January 17-23

These are my favorite quotes from the past week, not just from shows currently on the air, but also other random things I happen to be watching.

Critics Choice Awards
Rami Malek: It’s not just good to be different. It’s better to be different.

Downton Abbey
Robert: You can’t expect me to avoid talking to my own wife.
Violet: Why not? I know several couples who are perfectly happy, haven’t spoken in years.

Supergirl
Cat: A woman with brains who gives up everything for love inevitably finds herself staring into an existential abyss that men, babies and cardio barres simply cannot fill.

Cat: As much as I love watching you millennials deny your feelings, I pay you not to have them.

Smallville
Clark: Weird has become so normal it’s not even weird anymore.

Chloe: You can never be who you wanna be if you’re always looking over your shoulder at what could have been.

Telenovela
Ana: How does a cameraman get a nickname like “Fat Eddie” if he doesn’t have a secret stash of food lying around?!

The Flash
Barry: I didn’t realize roses were so flammable.

Cisco: Do you think it’s a good idea, when you’re fighting crime, to bring a date?

New Girl
Daniel: Trying to get out of jury duty?
Jess: Excuse me?
Daniel: The way you’re dressed, like you’re in a school play about old people. You want the judge to think you’re crazy.

Jess: Did he just kiss you? Why does he act like the Pope when he’s happy?

Schmidt: I bought you this burner phone from an unmarked storefront in Koreatown. I believe it’s small enough to conceal in the waistband of your underpants.

(more…)

8 Returning Mid-Season Shows

As I do every year, this is my list of returning mid-season shows that I am most excited about. I will get my list of new shows up in the next few days.

1. Galavant premieres January 3rd on ABC, stars Joshua Sasse, Timothy Omundson, Mallory Jansen, Karen David, Luke Youngblood, Darren Evans, and Vinnie Jones. Last season Galavant discovered the dark side of Magdalena, so now he must fight to rekindle the romance with his true love, Isabella. This show is just so much fun. I love that the first episode of the season is called: “A New Season aka Suck It Cancellation Bear.”



2. New Girl premieres January 5th on Fox, stars Zooey Deschanel, Jake Johnson, Lamorne Morris, Hannah Simone, and Max Greenfield. After a long hiatus due to Deschanel’s real life pregnancy, the gang is back and they are getting ready for Cece and Schmidt’s wedding. The show waivered a bit in season three, but was funnier than ever in season four, so I cannot wait to see what kind of shenanigans happen next.



3. Shameless premieres January 10th on Showtime, stars Emmy Rossum, Jeremy Allen White, Cameron Monaghan, Emma Kenney, Ethan Cutkosky, Shanola Hampton, Steve Howey, Noel Fisher, and William H. Macy. I am still mad at Fiona for screwing things up with Gus, but am so happy to have the Gallaghers back on my television. They make me feel so much better about my life and they always make me laugh.



4. Younger premieres January 13th on TVLand, stars Sutton Foster, Hilary Duff, Nico Tortorella, Miriam Shor, and Debi Mazar. Josh now knows Liza’s secret, but can he help her keep it? And can she continue to hide the truth from her new best friend and co-workers? I adore this series and the entire fabulous cast. If you are not already watching this show, you should start immediately.

(more…)

8 Servicewomen…

Since I gave you my list of favorite TV Servicemen for Veterans Day, I now present my favorite TV Servicewomen in honor of Independence Day.

1. Jill Perez – Enlisted, played by Angelique Cabral.
Perez is a Staff Sergeant in the United States Army assigned to a Rear Detachment Unit stationed at Fort McGee in Florida. She wants to be an Army Ranger and she smells like America.

2. Julia Richmond – Strike Back, played by Michelle Lukes.
Sergeant Richmond is the chief communication officer and field operative for Section 20, an elite covert British military intelligence and counter-terrorism unit originally formed within the Secret Intelligence Service.

3. Hollis Mann – NCIS, played by Susanna Thompson.
Before joining the Department of Defense, Hollis was a Lieutenant Colonel in the United States Army and part of the Criminal Investigation Division.

4. Margaret ‘Hot Lips’ Houlihan – M.A.S.H., played by Loretta Swit.
Major Houlihan was a member of the United States Army Nurse Corps and in charge of all the nurses at the Mobile Army Surgical Hospital (M.A.S.H.) during the Korean War.

(more…)