We’ve seen a lot of different things from Boyd Crowder in this show, but usually his more extreme impulses are tempered buy the better angels of his nature, as another backwoods philosopher once put it. Rarely have we seen the sort of cold-blooded behavior that this episode shows us. And yet, you can’t help but still be on Boyd’s side, especially in the conflict that approaches him in the person of the man from Detroit (they still haven’t told us his name have they?). The first move of that conflict takes place in this episode and, as per usual, it looks like Boyd may have been underestimated. The question Boyd asks at the end of the episode is a good one:

“Knowing me the way that you do, whatever led you in your imagination to believe that you could pull this off?”

At the start, Detroit Guy is recruiting Devil to run his enterprise in Harlan County. Apparently, Devil’s buddy Tanner is working as a sort of talent scout for Detroit Guy and he has recommended Devil as just the guy to get the job done. Detroit Guy’s recruiting speech is hilarious, as he inexplicably rolls straight from CEO to Old Time Gospel Hour Preacher in the blink of an eye. Devil seems reluctant but in the end, he appears to get in bed with Detroit. Doesn’t seem like a good idea.

Dicky and Dewey are making good on the plan to bust out of prison, only Dewey wasn’t officially invited to the party. As usual, he’s just riding along on dumb luck. The guard, Ash, and prison doctor who execute the plan are not nice guys. Looks like staying in prison might have been the safer option.

Raylan shows up with Rachel to investigate the escape and the doc has his story down and some wounds to lend the story credibility. Raylan isn’t sure he’s buying it, but there doesn’t seem to be much alternative but to go along with it for now. Dicky and Dewey are in the truck with a dead body that was driven out to be buried. Dicky is in on the plan, while Dewey is twitching like a stuck bug inside his body bag. The next order of business is to go to Nobel’s Hollow (or Holler, if you’re from around there) where the black folks live, and talk to Limehouse to get the money he’s holding for Mags. Something tells me it’s not going to be that simple.

Raylan goes to visit Loretta, who claims to be dealing Heroin, but is really doing a lot of babysitting. He asks her if she knows where Mags kept her money, and apparently she does, because Raylan ends up heading For Nobel’s Holler as well. Apparently, it’s the place where emancipated slaves were sent after the civil war. Raylan and Rachel go to talk to Limehouse and get nothing to speak of besides having a lovely little conversation about Rachel’s past. They decide to set up a roadblock on the way into the Holler and see what shakes out.

Dicky and Ash find the roadblock and decide discretion is the better part of valor. They head to a hotel where Doc and the gang are holding Dewey. There’s bad blood between Dicky and the father/son team that are acting as muscle for the Doc, and Dicky’s response is pure Dicky:

“No need to get all spun up there, Tater-tot.”

Dicky calls Limehouse and finally gets Limehouse to agree to consider bringing the money down to Dicky.

Meanwhile, Boyd is distributing cash to his boys, including Devil, who clearly isn’t satisfied with his cut. Raylan shows up and wants to talk. He tells the story about Nobel’s Holler being the place where abused white women could go for sanctuary, which is what happened with Raylan’s mom, whereupon Arlo tried to go get her and got beat up by Limehouse. Fascinating. Raylan wants to know if Boyd has any info on Dicky and Dewey and Boyd sees that his interests are best served by getting Dicky back into prison where he can find him. He gives up Ash as the person who most likely got Dicky out.

Devil is trying to recruit Johnny to join him in his rebellion against Boyd in favor of Detroit. Johnny appears to go along, but I’m more suspicious than Devil seems to be.

Raylan tracks down Ash at the hotel, and Ash tries to draw on him. Raylan doesn’t bother with a gun, just runs him over with the car. Works pretty well. Doc and the others get away, but Raylan finds out the info from Ash.

Doc is making Dicky go pick up the money from Bennett’s store, while he and Dewey do something else. Raylan figures he has to go save Dicky from the bad guys and the irony is not lost on him. Dicky is going to get shot if he doesn’t find the money, but it’s tough digging it out of the abandoned store. He finds a cooler, but the guys with the guns can’t figure out how to let him open it without risk. They finally get it open just in time for Limehouse to show up and blast the two gunmen. The cooler doesn’t have much money in it because Limehouse used it to buy property for the mine deal that took place last season. Dicky isn’t happy and wants to stay in business with Limehouse, hoping his money can increase that way.

Raylan gets to the store and finds Dicky with the two dead gunmen, claiming to be the victim. Dewey is still with Doc and Doc is planning something terrible, like selling Dewey’s organs or something. Devil comes to see Boyd for the come-to-Jesus meeting he has been planning. It goes about the way you’d expect. Your move, Detroit.

First up Fringe. I know it’s expected to be canceled but man this has been a great season. It’s really coming together right now with the return of a dead character from season 1. I have to admit I’ll miss this one. I think they made it just a tad too complex and impossible for newcomers to follow. My suspicion is that a show like Lost just can’t be done again and Fringe is showing that.

On the other hand Alcatraz appears to be a hit and seems like it contradicts that claim. It’s an other J. J. Abrams show like Fringe and I have to admit I love it. They’ve wisely made it so there is basically an independent quasi-normal police procedural each week with then the underlying plot thrown in. Burn Notice did that you might recall (although I’ve given up on Burn Notice – it just went downhill too much). I think that Fringe managed much more one off episodes the first season but with the dual universe there was just too much going on for that to work.  We’ll see how well Alcatraz manages with that balance.

I’ve not watched Luck yet. The first episode was directed by Michael Mann and the series was created by David Milich of Deadwood fame. It stars Dustin Hoffman. What’s not to love?  I just haven’t had time yet to check it out. If you have, let us know if you like it.

Justified is going great. While the villain of the season isn’t as compelling as the past two years the writing is as good if not better. I’ll not say more on that as we have a weekly post on it.

White Collar is an other show I used to let build up on my DVR and watch is swaths. It was never quite good enough to follow closely but I usually enjoyed it when I had time – although I did skip through it a bit at times. However much like Burn Notice the formula was wearing thin and I just couldn’t justify it too much.

So You Think You Can Dance is starting up soon. (They’ve been filming tryouts already)  I just can’t get excited this season. Last season the dancers were better than ever but somehow completely uncompelling.  I have a feeling that’s going to happen again.

Of course the Superbowl is this weekend. Normally we have a big party. This is the first year in a long time I’ve not. Just too much going on – plus no network television.  Bummer. And of course it happens the year it looks like it’ll be a fantastic game.

So what are your favorites? Anything those of us network challenged should be looking at?

A lot happens in this episode and a lot of people get shot, but since it’s mostly people we just met, we won’t worry too much. We’re learning more about the Oxy trade in Harlan, and it looks like there’s a headlong convergence of people looking to take it over. The new guy down from Detroit is all set to get involved in the business, while Boyd Crowder is interested in taking over all criminal activity in Harlan (except prostitution, apparently) There are a lot of addicts in Harlan nowdays, so business is booming. Raylan has a joke about that:

The difference between a drunk and an addict is that a drunk will steal your wallet and feel bad about it later; an addict will steal your wallet and help you look for it.

Ava is a old friend of Limehouse and goes to talk to him to set up a meeting with Boyd. Among other things, Limehouse makes really good BBQ. They meet up on a bridge, where Limehouse says his father always kept an armed guard. He’s not interested in talking about Mags’ money, but he is interested in Boyd’s moldy weed, which Boyd eventually sells him for pennies on the dollar. Boyd’s mad about Devil not burning the weed and punches him in the face. Between Ava and Boyd, poor Devil’s ending up like an abused child.

Raylan and Winona are looking at houses but Raylan gets a call that Wade Messer is going to be caught in a roadblock, so he goes to get him. Wade is in a truck with JT and they try to turn the truck around but crash instead. Messer runs off and JT gets caught.

Dicky Bennett is still in jail and getting hassled by the guard, who wants in on the money that Dicky has in the possession of Limehouse. Dicky tries to play it off like there is no money but the guard isn’t having it. Dicky wonders how he can get the money while he’s in jail and utters one of the great Dicky lines of all time:

Y’all are just going to have to h-h-hold your horses till I am home sweet outta here.

The guard’s response: “Is that all?” Looks like he may be planning to help Dicky bust out or something.

At a pawnshop, the pawnbroker is haggling with a customer over wrenches when Wade Messer shows up and the pawnbroker quizzes him about what happened. The broker has an assistant named Wally Beckett who will be going to bail out JT.

Raylan is still talking to his cop friend about JT and the truck and the cop says that the truck was full of stolen merchandise, and that someone is paying addicts in Oxy to go around and steal swag for them. Raylan wants to meet with whoever bailed JT out.

JT gets back to the pawn shop and the pawnbroker, Glen Fogel, is not happy. He makes JT play “Harlan Roulette” with a .44 in order to see if he gets any Oxy or not. JT survives a couple of pulls of the trigger but when he gets laughed at, he turns the gun on Fogel. Fogel reveals that there were no bullets in the gun, then puts one in and shoots JT in the head. Messer and Becket have to clean up the mess.

Boyd makes a speech to Ava, Devil and Arlo about his father and the mistakes he made. Boyd wants to correct those mistakes and take over all crime in the county: protection, pills, robbing, gambling, all except prostitution (out of respect for Ava, and the fact that the working man is more interested in pills). Arlo says they need more people, and Boyd says he’s got that covered and that they will be going to take back something that rightfully belongs to the Crowder family. Turns out to be Johnny’s bar.

Meanwhile, Detroit Guy is making a similar speech to Win Duffy, all bout how the Oxy business has been relying on “Florida pill mills” but that source is drying up, and Detroit guy wants to fill that void. Duffy says that the reason Florida worked so well as a source was that Florida doesn’t track Oxy users, but in Kentucky, they do. Detroit guy has a solution for that, he wants to set up mobile trailers in Harlan with doctors who rotate between them setting up users with phony medical records and prescriptions. The users will get half the pills at the regular price and the other half will go to Detroit where they can be sold for ten times the amount. During this chat, Duffy goes looking for the bathroom and finds a guy tied up on the bed in a back bedroom. This Detroit guy is looking more and more insane.

Raylan shows up at the pawn shop looking for Beckett and meets Fogel. He figures out that Fogel is in charge and goes to get a warrant after threatening him. Fogel calls Duffy to report Raylan’s threat and Duffy confers with Detroit Guy. They decide to have Fogel kill Raylan because Fogel is more trouble than he’s worth so, no matter how it comes out, Duffy and Detroit Guy win. Fogel passes the buck on to Messer, and orders him to kill his “friend” Raylan. Messer is funny in this episode: “I strung him up in a tree, is that a friend?” He seems to genuinely wonder.

Boyd and his group take back Johnny’s bar with some real style, while Messer finds Raylan already at his house. Raylan was probably already there when Messer called him. Messer tells him politely that he could have gone in, but Raylan tells him a story about having a rule that you never go into a person’s house without being invited. Well, of course, it turns out Raylan broke that rule and got Messer’s gun already. He tells Messer to call Fogel and tell him he killed Raylan but got shot and needs help. Fogel seems not to believe it and goes packing heat. Raylan pulls up while Fogel and Beckett are still checking out Messer’s house and threatens to shoot them. Fogel offers a deal where he gives up info on Win Duffy. Beckett gets mad that he’s not getting a deal and offers to give up info on Fogel shooting JT. Beckett and Fogel end up shooting each other in the dumbest hillbilly standoff of all time. Raylan is pissed off that he doesn’t get the info on Duffy, but has a good line in this scene where he gives some counsel to Fogel:

You should be asking yourself if I care whether you walk out of here or get carried out in a coroner’s bag. Me and dead owls don’t give a hoot.

Boyd and Devil are drinking Wild Turkey in the bar. Devil is reminiscing about the good old days when they were neo-nazi commandos operating out of a church. He liked Boyd back then and wants to know which Boyd Crowder he’s following now, that one or some new incarnation. Boyd refuses to be baited into choosing:

I can’t discard my past anymore than I can these tatoos.

This ignores the fact that tatoos can be removed, but it’s good enough for Devil, who agrees to follow Boyd in his new adventure of becoming the new Harlan County Kingpin.

Unknown to Boyd, Detroit Guy will have something to say about that. He’s oiling up his sleeve gun and reminiscing with Duffy about how his dad made him watch Taxi Driver instead of Sesame Street when he was a kid. That explains a lot. Raylan shows up and beats up Duffy for ordering Fogel to kill him. He drops a bullet on Duffy and warns: “The next one will be coming faster.” Raylan doesn’t know Detroit Guy so he takes a picture of him. Detroit Guy smiles. “How fast do you think those bullets will be going when they’re coming back at you?”

The names of the episodes continue to be interesting double entendres, and we see more of the scheming and planning in this episode that will set up the big conflicts of this season. Boyd’s scheme to get the Benett’s money, Raylan’s plan to buy a house with Winona, Bad guys planning and scheming all over the place, and a couple of new players with plans of their own.

Carla Gugino shows up here as Karen Sis–ahem–Goodall who is an old flame and fellow marshall from Raylan’s Miami days. Questions raised include whether Raylan still has feelings for her and whether those feelings are going to disrupt Raylan’s new relationship with Winona. It appears those questions are answered in the negative. Or to put it in a positive light: Winona wins. In an interview, Graham Yost has said Carla Gugino will NOT be sticking around for more episodes this season. So I guess that’s that.

But this episode mostly showcases Art’s ability to still kick ass with the best. The old guy still has the brains and brawn to get the job done, and it seems like he has more in common with Raylan than we knew previously.

A little more of Raylan’s relationship with Winona is revealed as the episode opens with Raylan waking up in Winona’s house that she owned with Gary. Even ignoring the fact that Winona is as hot as a Las Vegas sidewalk on the fourth of July, their dialogue is pretty awesome:

Raylan: At least this time I don’t have to worry about you taking up with the realtor (which he pronounces “relitor”).

Winona: Why’s that?

Raylan: She’s too old for you.

Winona: That guy was cute though.

Raylan: He’s married.

Winona: So was I. Too short for me though. I need someone tall and strapping like a …fireman.

Raylan: Like a… lion tamer.

Winona: Mmmmm, outdoorsy, good with animals, can find alternative uses for houshold furniture…

Something Winona says about realtors always lying makes Raylan finally figure out Boyd’s plan, so he makes a visit to the prison to screw it up. He’s just in time to stop Boyd from ruining Dickie’s breakfast. During some awesome-as-usual jawboning with Boyd, Raylan tells him he will be released the next day. Boyd looks for Dickie but finds out he is in solitary, courtesy of Raylan.

An old friend of Art’s named Bill is visiting and Art tells him that he thinks Raylan is Art’s penance for the grief he gave his own chief years ago. Apparently, Art was a bit of a hell-raiser himself back in the day. Bill is with witness protection and is making his rounds to the protectees, including one named Mary who has a baby and a little girl named June. Bill is making sure they are following the guidelines as Mary is expected to testify against some high-level baddies soon.

But someone is following Bill and when Bill gets wise and confronts him, the guy gets the drop on him and Bill gets shot. BTW, this all happens before the theme song and opening credits. That has to be a record for opening scenes.

After the credits, Rachel sets up camp with Mary while Raylan and Winona check out the baby’s ultrasound photo. Did I mention Winona is super hot? Raylan has to run to the office after turning on his phone and noticing he has 17 missed calls. Oops. He walks in and meets up with Assistant Director Goodall (Carla Gugino), who he knew by a different last name in Miami. The previous name is not mentioned. Goodall is in town to help out with Bill’s murder, as it looks like Bill’s protectees have been compromised. The other marshalls are already with the protectees, while Raylan will be going with Goodall to check on Little Joe Delahunt, a gangster who just happens to be in Lexington. Apparently one of the protectees, Terry Poe, fingered Little Joe’s dad, so Joe’s presence in Lexington cannot be coincidental.

On the way to the hotel, Raylan comes up with a plan of attack and talks about the past with with Goodall. She was apparently married for only a few months, but kept the guy’s last name (Why?). Raylan flirts a little with her: “Nothing I can think of that would keep a guy from coming after you.”

Art goes to sit on Poe to make sure he isn’t the target of Little Joe and his boys. We recognize Poe as the guy that shot Bill, but Art doesn’t know that. Will he figure it out, or will he become the next victim. Poe packs a gun in his overnight bag.

Meanwhile, Boyd is trying to figure out how to get at Dickie before Raylan’s release kicks him back out on the street. It looks like he’s found a cooperative guard, and he decides to povoke a group of black weightlifters by showing off his white supremacist tattoos. That should get him in the hospital at least.

Raylan and Goodall work Raylan’s plan and it gets them two of Little Joe’s boys cuffed in the hallway of the hotel, but Little Joe locks himself in his room. Goodall makes a pretty good argument for Joe to give them the info they want.

Art gets a call from Raylan telling him what they found out from Joe. We don’t hear what it is, but Art tells Poe thay have to move, and he notices that a chair has recently been placed under a vent in the wall. It’s a hiding place, but for what? They get in Poe’s car and drive off to a safe house. Art asks to use the GPS system and finds out the car was at the site where Bill’s body was found. Seems too easy. Do GPS systems really do that? And wouldn’t you delete that info if you had just dumped a body? He goes back to Poe’s house, disarms him and gets him back in the house. How much did Raylan tell him? Did he know Poe was selling info to Joe before they got in the car?

Boyd is getting treated in the prison hospital, then gets put into solitary, right next door to Dickie. The friendly guard is pretty friendly.

Art has Poe tied to a chair in his house and finds that the vent is concealing a big bag of cash. He tells Poe what the GPS told him and says he needs to start talking or he’s going to get the “old testament” treatment, which pretty much consists of getting hit repeatedly in the face. He has apparently been reading Deuteronomy 7:

9 Know therefore that the Lord thy God, he is God, the faithful God, which keepeth covenant and mercy with them that love him and keep his commandments to a thousand generations;

10 And repayeth them that hate him to their face, to destroy them: he will not be slack to him that hateth him, he will repay him to his face.

Art says Little Joe confessed that Poe was offering 2 million bucks to get forgiveness from Joe for ratting on his dad. Art figured out that Poe must be selling info on one or more of the protectees in order to get the money to pay Joe. Now he needs to know which protectees have been compromised. But Poe’s not talking, so Art threatens to shoot him and say that he was shot in a struggle. He makes Poe believe, and finds out Mary is the one Poe sold out.

Art calls Rachel to warn her but the bad guys are already there to kill Mary. Raylan and Goodall get to Poe’s house and go with Art to help Rachel. It’s a tense cat and mouse game at Mary’s house. Rachel and the family hide in the attic while the gangsters search for them. The baby is not quiet enough and Rachel has to shoot the gangster that tries to get into the attic. Art shoots the other guy downstairs.

Boyd gets help getting into Dickie’s cell in the night and threatens to cut Dickie’s throat unless he gets the info on Ma Bennett’s money. Dickie tells him the money is being held by Limehouse, who won’t give it up to anyone but Dickie. You can see the wheels spinning in Boyd’s head while he formulate’s a new plan. The problem is, the friendly guard heard the whole thing too.

Goodall lets Raylan drive back and invites him to come to Miami with her, but Raylan doesn’t take the bait. He tells Goodall that Art saved his life. apparently, Goodall doesn’t know where Raylan’s from. Raylan tries to help talk to Rachel about her shooting, but she’s not having it. Winona shows up and Raylan goes right to her and kisses her in front of everyone, including Goodall. Seems like he’s sending a message. He leaves with Winona while Goodall casts some longing glances after him.

Boyd gets sprung from prison and tells Ava that getting the money will “take some doing” because it’s with Limehouse. Then we meet Limehouse. Looks like a serious dude. We’ll be seeing a lot more of him.

Last season we saw the end of the Bennet clan as Mags committed suicide and all her sons were dead except Dickie, who was in custody for doing all kinds of bad stuff. Meanwhile, Boyd Crowder was going back into the family business by taking over the drug trade in Harlan. Raylan got shot in the process of bringing the Bennetts down, so when this season opens, we see Winona getting pulled over and informed of Raylan’s injuries. He’s in the hospital and Art tells her he’s going to be ok: he was shot straight through with no major damage. Lucky.

Three weeks later Raylan is still recovering, and having a lot of trouble shooting and walking, when he decides to talk things over with Boyd in the office. The subject of discussion is the missing money and weed from the Bennet’s operations. As usual, the dialogue between the two is priceless:

Raylan: There’s a sizable amount missing.

Boyd: How sizable?

Raylan: Well over ten dollars.

Boyd: If I found that kind of money, I’d be in Mexico by now.

Raylan: Boyd, I’ve been to Mexico, and I don’t think you’d like it.

Boyd: How so?

Raylan: There’s a lot of Mexicans.

Boyd: Raylan, if a book could only be judged by it’s cover, you’d be a best-seller.

But Boyd doesn’t want to talk about that. He wants an apology from Raylan because Raylan never brought Dickie back after Boyd rescued Raylan from Dickie’s clutches last season. Apparently, Boyd was under the impression some kind of deal had been made. Raylan takes offense to that and a fight erupts, wherein both go through the glass into Art’s office. Not good for either one of them.

Emmett Arnett is dealing with a man from detroit about a loan. The lenders are getting nervous and want repayment. Arnett promises payment tomorrow, but it looks like he’s planning something else on the sly. He’s got a man names Nix (Desmond Harrington, on loan from Dexter) working for him who’s upping the creepy factor considerably.

Boyd’s partners Arlo and Devil are trying to unload the big haul of weed they took from the Bennets while Boyd spends some time in prison. It’s a no go because the customer, Hot Rod Dunham, says the weed is now moldy. Ava saves the meeting from deteriorating into a shooting match.

Winona is pregnant, as we learned last season, and despite her condition (and Raylan’s) she has certain needs, which Raylan seems just barely able to fulfill. Raylan wants to move into a house now that the baby is on the way but Winona seems noncommittal.

Nix is doing a little work, taking some watches from a guy he installed an alarm system for. He plays a little psycho game with the guy where he allows him to try to get his gun, then stabs his hand with an ice pick and shoots him. Then he kills a pizza delivery guy. Seems like maybe he wasn’t held enough as a child.

Tim comes to Raylan at the office the next day and has recognized the previous night’s exploits as the work of Fletcher “the ice pick” Nix, who is a fugitive. He wants Raylan to talk to Win Duffy (Jere Burns, who is BTW also currently playing a bad guy in Burn Notice) who owns the company that installed the alarm system on the house where Nix did his business, Duffy is also our friend from last season who was involved with Gary, Winona’s ex. Raylan says no to Tim, because he’s on light duty and because he told Duffy last time they spoke that if they had another conversation it “won’t be a conversation.” Tim doesn’t give up, so Raylan gives in and goes along.

The conversation with Duffy goes pretty much as Raylan thought, and they don’t learn anything new, so Raylan goes to visit Duffy’s boss, Emmett Arnett. Duffy calls Arnett and tips him that Raylan is coming. Raylan runs into Nix in the elevator and doesn’t know who he is. Nix appears to get a call about Raylan at the same time, and is apparently told to stand down.

Raylan meets Yvette, Arnett’s assistant and mistress, who volunteers to have drinks with Raylan and tells him about Arnett’s plan to meet Nix that night. She is apparently actually working for the man from Detroit however, as she gets into a car with him and tells him that Raylan took the bait.

Meanwhile, Ava visits Boyd to tell him about the weed issues and Boyd orders the weed burned. Later, Ava relays the orders to Arlo and Devil and enforces obedience by frying pan. Something about that scene reminds me of Tangled:

Raylan is back in the office and finally looks at a picture of Nix, and recognizes him from the elevator. He’s having second thoughts now about the whole Yvette thing and tells Art the info came too easy. Art’s not bothered and tells Raylan to go home. Later at the meeting, the whole thing goes south. Neither Nix nor Arnett shows up. Nix watches from a cab as Arnett’s bodygurad is arrested, then drives away.

Raylan and Winona walk into Raylan’s motel room to find Nix sitting there. He wants to play his little game again. I don’t know if Arnett told him to go after Raylan, or if this is just Nix’s own thing, but it’s a mistake. Raylan knows the game, having seen the crime scene file from the last time. As Winona counts down, Nix goes for his ice pick, but Raylan just pulls the tablecloth, moving the gun his way. He shoots Nix and apologizes to Winona about the tablecloth.

The man from Detroit meets with Arnett and Duffy, who insists on patting down Detroit guy because he doesn’t know him. Detroit tells Arnett he tipped the marshalls. Arnett thinks it’s a joke but it’s not. Detroit guy has a sleeve gun and kills Arnett and Yvette, yet for some reason leaves Duffy alive. “You know me now?” he asks.

Boyd seems to have had a plan all along to get himself thrown in jail so he could have Dickie for lunch. Dickie looks none too happy about it, but at least it will relieve the boredom of hanging out with Dewey Crowe.

Great start to the new season.

First up if you haven’t been watching the BBC’s Sherlock shame on you. For those of you who didn’t watch it last year this is the famous detective living in contemporary London. The season this year (also short) is even better than last year. They’ve been updating some of Doyle’s most famous stories in very creative ways. Sunday had the Hounds of the Baskerville (still available for play at BBC). Before that we had a very interesting take on Irene Adler. This Sunday we have a take on the story where Doyle actually killed Holmes (only to be forced to bring him back). It’s his confrontation with Moriarty: The Reichenbach Fall. Seriously you need to watch these. Great acting. Very creative direction. They are far better than the recent films (although I liked those too)

If you’ve been missing your Justified fix the season premier is on the 17th — just scant days away. Most interesting they are bringing in a thinly veiled return of Karen Sisco played by the same actress: Carla Gugino. They changed the name somewhat but everything I’ve been hearing is that it’s close to the same character only 10 years older.

Last season’s Justified wasn’t quite as good as the first season. I appreciated that they tried to shake it up a bit more however a few elements just felt forced. Still the villains were fantastic and it remains the best show on TV in my opinion. I really appreciate that they aren’t trying to stick to a fixed formula that has made so many other good shows stale.

Not exactly TV news but the movie version of 24 starts filming next month. Let’s hope it’s better than the last few seasons of 24. I love the character but man, talk about being stuck into a stale format. Still I think the first season of 24 remains one of the best things in TV history.

I’ve not been following a lot of shows. However I’ve heard from several people that AMC’s poorly received Hell on Wheels has actually become quite good. So I may be downloading the episodes to check out.

In case you missed it Community has been cancelled. (Edit: Apparently not) As I said way back in my Jump the Shark entry most new shows this year and even a lot of returning shows have plain sucked. I mentioned this when I made my decision to get rid of my Dish. It was made much easier by so much TV just being plain bad. I wasn’t missing a lot. Now I can get caught up on all the movies I’ve missed!

That said there are several new shows coming up. Fox has an animated Napoleon Dynamite. The series starts Jan 15th (yes – this week) I’m not quite sure what to think about it yet. The buzz is that it’s pretty bad though.

Alcatraz starts on the 16th and looks like it might be interesting. It’s an other “big conspiracy” show. Since Fringe appears to not be long for this world this might make up for it’s passing. Alcatraz is getting pretty good reviews unlike Person of Interest which seemed a lot more pedestrian than expected.

Speaking of Fringe Fox execs have been talking about how expensive the show is and how they are losing money on it. Not exactly the kiss of death but about as close as we’re likely to get until the cancelation is announced. Hopefully the producers have had enough warning with Fringe so they can wrap things up. Fringe returns on the 18th. I’ve really loved this season although I know a few fans have been turned off. (Which probably accounts for the dropping ratings) Supposedly there’s a pretty good chance House will be cancelled too. I have to admit I gave up on House this season.

In other new series news Kiefer Sutherland returns in Touch about a semi-autistic kid who is an genius who can see patterns no one else can. Sutherland plays the child’s father. Danny Glover also is in it. I’ve not heard much about this one other than it’s from the team that brought us Heroes. Which isn’t exactly auspicious considering how that went.

Life’s Too Short comes to HBO although I suspect many of you have watched it on the internet since most of the episodes have been widely available. That’s the Ricky Gervais faux reality show about little person Warwick Davis. We talked about the show here back in November. It’s pretty funny, but is also one of those show not quite as funny as it thinks it is – if you know what I mean. It’s definitely worth checking out though.

Anything I missed?

The series tells the story of Birgitte Nyborg, a female politician who navigates around Macchiavelli to become prime minister of Denmark. There’s not much more to say than that, only that it deftly portrays the machinations of European coalition politics and makes its characters believably human, i.e. they do human and not TV-human things. I physically applauded at the end of the second episode, which is an RJH sign that something is good. Fans of The Killing II will be delighted to see the return of the actor who played Strange, Lund’s sidekick. Man crush alert.

Borgen shows on LinkTV. Alas, a US remake is apparently on the cards.

I can’t find an embeddable trailer anywhere. Follow this link instead.

Music: [from metacritic]

Critics pick the best albums of 2011

Added in last update (Jan. 2): Cleveland Plain Dealer, NOW Magazine

Below is our updated running tally of the albums most frequently mentioned by individual music publications in their year-end Top Ten lists. Although most of the lists come from publications whose reviews are included on this site, we have also included a few extra lists from prominent music stores, websites, and publications not normally found on Metacritic. Note that if a source ranks more than the standard 10 albums, we will not include titles ranked 11th or worse. In case of a tie for first or second, each album will receive the full points for that position. Our points system works as follows:
•3 points for each 1st place ranking
•2 points for each 2nd place ranking
•1 point for being ranked 3rd – 10th, or for being included on an unranked list

1 Let England Shake by PJ Harvey

2 Bon Iver by Bon Iver

3 21 by Adele

4 Watch the Throne by Jay-Z and Kanye West

5 whokill by tUnE-yArDs

6 House of Balloons by The Weeknd

7 Strange Mercy by St. Vincent

8 Take Care by Drake

9 Helplessness Blues by Fleet Foxes

10 Black Up by Shabazz Palaces

11 David Comes to Life by Fucked Up

12 James Blake by James Blake

13 Smoke Ring for My Halo by Kurt Vile

14 Hurry Up, We’re Dreaming by M83

15 Skying by The Horrors

16 undun by The Roots

17 Kaputt by Destroyer

18 The Whole Love by Wilco

19 Father, Son, Holy Ghost by Girls

20 Bad As Me by Tom Waits

21 The English Riviera by Metronomy

22 Burst Apart by The Antlers

23 Wild Flag by Wild Flag

24 Metals by Feist

25 The King of Limbs by Radiohead

26 Days by Real Estate

27 Glass Swords by Rustie

28 The King Is Dead by The Decemberists

29 Nostalgia, Ultra. by Frank Ocean

30 So Beautiful or So What by Paul Simon

I love the fact that Metacritic does these compiled lists, so you hopefully get the individual biases of all the individual publications and critics filtered out somewhat, and you get a picture of the artists that got the most aclaim from the most number of critics. The result is hard to argue with, although there are some surprises. For me, I would have included Foo Fighters and Elbow, instead of some of the hip-hop artists, but that’s just me.

For movies, the list looks like this:

Critics pick the best movies of 2011

Added in last update (12/31): Baltimore Sun, Houston Chronicle, Miami Herald, The Playlist, Reelviews, Reverse Shot, Salt Lake Tribune, St. Louis Post-Dispatch, Time (Pols)

Below is our updated running tally of the films most frequently mentioned by individual critics on their year-end Top Ten lists. Note that if a critic ranks more than the standard 10 films, we will not include films ranked 11th or worse. In case of a tie for first or second, each film will receive the full points for that position. Our points system works as follows:
•3 points for each 1st place ranking
•2 points for each 2nd place ranking
•1 point for being ranked 3rd – 10th, or for being included on an unranked list

1 The Tree of Life

2 The Artist

3 Drive

4 The Descendants

5 Hugo

6 Melancholia

7 A Separation

8 Certified Copy

9 Take Shelter

10 Moneyball

11 Margaret

12 Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy

13 Martha Marcy May Marlene

14 Shame

15 Beginners

16 Uncle Boonmee Who Can Recall His Past Lives

17 Bridesmaids

18 The Skin I Live In

19 Meek’s Cutoff

20 We Need to Talk About Kevin

21 Mysteries of Lisbon

22 Poetry

23 A Dangerous Method

24 Weekend

25 The Interrupters

26 The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo

27 Midnight in Paris

28 War Horse

29 Rise of the Planet of the Apes

30 Of Gods and Men

31 The Future

32 Margin Call

On this list I was a bit surprised that “Dragon Tattoo” wasn’t higher, but I know some critics were not big fans of it. I was also surprised because there were a number of movies on this list I had never heard of, but will now make it a point to see if I can.

Here’s the TV list:

Critics pick the best TV shows of 2011

Added in last update (Jan. 2): Cleveland Plain Dealer

Below is our updated running tally of the TV shows most frequently mentioned by individual critics in their year-end Top Ten lists. Note that if a critic ranks more than the standard 10 shows, we will not include titles ranked 11th or worse. In case of a tie for first or second, each show will receive the full points for that position. Our points system works as follows:
•3 points for each 1st place ranking
•2 points for each 2nd place ranking
•1 point for being ranked 3rd – 10th, or for being included on an unranked list

1 Breaking Bad (AMC)

2 Homeland (Showtime)

3 Downton Abbey (PBS)

4 Parks and Recreation (NBC)

5 Game of Thrones (HBO)

6 Louie (FX)

7 Justified (FX)

8 The Good Wife (CBS)

9 Modern Family (ABC)

10 Community (NBC)

11 Friday Night Lights (DirecTV/NBC)

12 American Horror Story (FX)

13 Boardwalk Empire (HBO)

14 Enlightened (HBO)

15 The Walking Dead (AMC)

16 Revenge (ABC)

17 Awkward. (MTV)

18 The Big Bang Theory (CBS)

19 Happy Endings (ABC)

20 The Middle (ABC)

Of these I was most surprised by The Middle, which I’ve never really watched because it seemed, well, dull, and Awkward, which I have watched, but seemed just ok. I’m glad that Happy Endings got included, because I think that’s one of the best comedies in recent years. I love a lot of the others in the top ten, although I’ve never seen Game of Thrones because I don’t take HBO anymore, and I haven’t watched much of The Good Wife, but I’ve heard good things. I like Louie, but I’m a little surprised it’s ranked as high as it is because, to me, it’s a bit uneven. I haven’t seen Boardwalk Empire or Enlightened, but I’m surprised we don’t see Dexter on this list.

Let me know your thoughts on these lists and other top things from 2011.

My daughter got me hooked. I’ve only seen the most recent episode and the second episode so far (I’m waiting to watch more with my husband), but there’s something about it that’s really compelling.

At least for me–and it might be a bit girly for some of you, I’m not sure.

The trailer explains the premise. Some of the things I love about it:

• The acting. The evil witch character is played really well, in fact she’s my fave character so far. She’s evil, yeah, but she’s just in so much pain that you kinda feel for her.
• The wardrobes. Everyone during the normal-human-earth scenes looks like a normal person, yet if you were to line them up, you’d be able to guess which is Snow White, which is Rumpelstiltskin, which is Prince Charming, etc.
• Characters yet to be revealed. Everyone in the town is supposed to be a fairytale character, but not all of their fairytale identities have been shown. The waitress in the diner has to be Red Riding Hood! But who is the doctor?

And just the feel of the whole thing. I can’t even really put my finger on what I love about it. But it’s great.