First of all, I loved this episode. It really provoked me to think a lot about what we’ve seen until now. I know I’ll spend the next nine months really chewing on this, but here are my thoughts fresh after watching.

The episode opens with Jacob and Jacob’s Enemy, who a lot of the fans are calling “Silas” or “Esau.” Whoever he is, he looks a LOT like the quick flash of a character we saw way back in “Cabin Fever.” The circle of ash around the cabin suggests a barrier used to contain a demon, and the fact that it was broken suggests that the demon escaped. Illana was not looking in the cabin for Jacob — she was looking for his enemy. She knew the enemy was heading for Jacob, and that’s why she ordered the place torched. She understood it was an evil place. Ironically enough, while season 3 suggested that Horace built the place, it looks an awful lot like the hut Rose and Bernard had built for themselves. But since the blueprint was in Horace’s pocket, this is probably just a coincidence.

The dog painting in the cabin suggests that the inhabitant (the Enemy) is the Cerberus — also known as the smoke monster. The various apparitions that have manifested have been the Enemy trying to manipulate events forward to create the “loophole.” The Enemy poses as things that have died on the island, because it is a creature that is somehow involved in death (hence the picture of Anubis and the monster in the temple). The reason the monster allowed Ben to live was so it could manipulate him into killing Jacob. For some reason that has yet to be explained, Ben is able to break the rules that the monster cannot.

When we first see the Enemy in the opening scene, he comes to the beach to see the ship that is coming in. That is yet another clue that he is the monster — the defense system for the island. We know that the ship is the Black Rock, and that it’s probably captained by Magnus Hanso. I suspect that this adversary influences the Hanso  to go back into the real world, create the legacy that becomes the Hanso Foundation / Dharma Initiative, and initiate the situations that will lead to the conflict.

You see, these two have been playing this game for some time now. Jacob and the Monster have been playing a giant game of Backgammon since the beginning of the show. John Locke explained to Walt in the first season that it’s an old game, the oldest game, of good versus evil. As Desmond explains in season 5, all of the people on the island are just pawns in this game. In the past, Jacob visited those he would send back in time when flight 316 came in. He was monitoring the lives of his pieces, and ensuring that they would fulfill their destiny. The finale in season 3 included these same players. Jack, Kate and Sawyer were taken to Hyrda Island, Hurley was sent back to the camp to tell the others what had happened, and Sayid, Jin and Sun were on a rescue mission. Juliet was the only player in this final drama who was not visited by Jacob — but since she lived as an Other, it’s likely that she was influenced and monitored directly.

We should also consider that when the resurrected John Locke made Alpert speak to the time-traveling John Locke, he told John that he would have to die. This bit of knowledge was convenient… for the Enemy, which clearly needed Locke to be dead so it could impersonate him. Alpert was apprehensive about this, but didn’t realize that he was speaking to the Enemy, so he went along with it. All in all, Alpert doesn’t seem like a very smart guy. He even played a hand in helping Locke become the leader of the Others by helping Locke find a means to kill his “father.” Alpert is acting on Locke’s claim from 1954 that he is meant to be the leader, not Jacob’s guidance.

All in all, I like where things are going. The mythology of the show is finally beginning to unravel, and we’re beginning to see that the conflict here is between a force of good and a force of evil. But there are still some questions that will require pondering:

Why did Jacob disregard Ben? It’s clear now that the “Others” are followers and protectors of Jacob, and that Alpert is one of Jacob’s devoted followers. But why was Ben placed in charge of the Others if he was such a great pawn of the enemy? Was Jacob trying to keep his friends close, and his enemies closer? Was Ben the least threatening when he was distracted with leadership? Jacob must have given Ben the same kind of gift of eternal life that Charles Widmore and Richard Alpert seem to have. (Ben indicated that Widmore couldn’t be killed, and Alpert seems to never age). I also suspect that Illana is older than she looks since she has no idea who Benjamin Linus is when Sayid asks her on the plane, but knows her way around the island.

Still, it’s unclear why Jacob is so cold to Ben, knowing that Ben will kill him if he doesn’t explain himself. Maybe it’s because he knows he’s already won, and doesn’t want to give his Enemy the satisfaction. Or maybe it’s because Ben is not in a position to understand.

What is Jacob’s purpose on the island? Jacob seems to be immortal, unaging, and powerful. He is not Egyptian himself, but he seems to be at home with all of the Egyptian ruins on the island. He indicates that he has had the time to weave a complex tapestry by hand, and he doesn’t seem to have a sense of urgency in anything. He can leave the island if he wishes, and he is aware of the events in the lives of his “pawns.” Clearly, he’s intruding on the island (since the monster wants to kill him), but some mechanism is in place to make him unkillable. It’s an intriguing mystery!

Why did the scene with Juliet getting yanked down the pipe so closely resemble the Monster trying to pull Kate into a hole in season 1? Was this foreshadowing, or is the monster trying to recreate events that have already occurred on the island? Maybe the monster was trying to make Kate hesitate down the road so Juliet would die?

What did Juliet’s setting off the bomb accomplish? Fans are already saying that the discharge propels the Losties into 2007, and that when Jacob says, “they’re coming,” he’s referring to Jack and crew. I’m not so sure about this myself. Why should the Enemy be afraid of them? But since the last electromagnetic discharge we saw (in season 2’s finale) made the sky change colors, yanked Oceanic 815 out of the air, and sent Desmond traveling in time, we should assume that something unusual is going to happen. As it happens, the events of the finale coincide with future events, so it’s hard to believe that the past can be changed. The tunnel into Ben’s future Dharma house is opened, Pierre Chang’s arm is injured, Radzinsky causes the Incident, and the non-essential Dharma personnel leave the island (including Miles and Charlotte).  So, if the bomb changes history, none of these things should have ever happened in the first place.

Whose eye opened at the end of the teaser during the credits? Good question. The eye was green, though. Since the producers have said that the time-traveling will end in the sixth season, we can assume that wherever the Losties have wound up, it’s somewhere (or somewhen?) where everyone will be reunited at last… and where the final conflict between Jacob and the Enemy will be fought. It’s going to be a long 9 months….

I was taken aback by the question — do I really want to explain that the latest season is about those who were rescued trying to get back to the island? — but it led me to think about why this show continues to be so compelling to so many people despite the many twists and turns it’s taken into the realm of science fiction. And then suddenly, the answer hit me.

LOST is religion.

Don’t misunderstand me here — I’m not saying the show is a religion. I’m saying that it’s a metaphor, a thorough look at the ideas of mysticism and the supernatural, but through a lens that doesn’t require a Bible, a priest, or even a church.

I’m going to talk about things that may be spoilers if you haven’t been keeping up with the show, so if you want to continue to be surprised, don’t read the rest of this article until you’ve got yourself caught up. (But since you can watch the entire run for free on ABC.com, why not get started now?)

I’m pretty well-read on religion, particularly the Judeo-Christian faiths. I’m also interested in ancient Egyptian, Sumerian, and Babylonian religious mythology, and I can explain how these faiths tie in to the Judeo-Christian tradition fairly well. I would tend to argue that many of the Judeo-Christian ideas about religion come from ancient Egypt, that the pharoah Akhenaten bore some relationship to Moses, and that the book of Genesis is retelling myths from the Egyptian and Sumerian mythologies with a monotheistic twist.

Therefore, it’s no surprise to me that LOST, which takes place on an island that has ancient Egyptian temples and remnants of a statue of an Egyptian deity (probably Anubis), has a lot of religious themes, like life after death, judgment, penance and resurrection. These themes are all central to Western religious traditions because they derive from Egypt, and the Egyptians themselves were very concerned with death, and the passage to the next world.

So, let’s look at all of the Biblical elements first. The Island is a lush, beautiful place where death does not have a hold on people and where sickness and health do not exist. This ties in to two Biblical locations — the Garden of Eden and the land of Caanan, described as “a land of milk and honey.” Since Canaan is a real place out in the Middle East, it’s probably safe to assume that the Island is closer to the Garden of Eden. This is fitting, since the skeletons found in the cave in the first season are nicknamed “Adam and Eve” — a potential nod and wink from the producers.

The Island is patrolled by a defense mechanism that is unique, and possibly spiritual — a smoke monster nicknamed “the Cerberus.” In Greek mythology, the Cerberus was a three-headed dog that guarded the gates to the afterlife. More on the Greek connection in a moment. But the Bible indicates that the Garden of Eden was blocked off on the east side by the Cherubim, and that the tree of life was guarded by a flaming sword. Cherubim are angels that are a tetrad of beings, with faces both animal and man. They are mysterious creatures that often seem to change shape in the Bible. It could be that the smoke monster is a representation of the cherubim, which explains why it appears as both people and animals at different points in the show.

But the smoke monster has another tie to the Bible — in the book of Exodus, the Israelites are escorted out of Egypt by a pillar of cloud during the day, and a pillar of fire at night. It guides them at first, and then gets between them and the pursuing Egyptians so Moses can part the Red Sea. The Smoke Monster, with its cloudy appearance and its constant flashing, could be interpreted to be like this manifestation.

The Island has an exit to Tunisia, a country in the middle of the African continent, not far from the Mediterranean Sea. It’s also one of the places where Paleo-lithic humans are known to have lived. If we think of this as being an exit from the Garden of Eden, a place where the Semitic peoples described in the Bible began their lives, we can see a definite connection between the mythology of the Island and the mythology of the show.

Moving on, another major Biblical connection in the show relates to the mysterious “Jacob” and the equally mysterious “Christian Shepherd.” In the Old Testament, Jacob is the name of Abraham’s grandson, the man who literally wrestles with God and becomes known as Israel. Jacob is the man who sees a literal ladder to heaven, with angels ascending and descending on it. He is also the father of the twelve tribes of Israel, the last of which is Benjamin.

The Biblical Jacob is an interesting character — he begins life fighting his brother Esau in the womb, and while his brother grows up to be a mighty hunter, covered in red hair, Jacob is slender and cunning, with a smooth face and (it is traditionally believed) black hair. Jacob deceives his father, Isaac, to gain a birthright that rightfully belongs to Esau, and is forced to leave before he is killed. This story actually alludes to two places in ancient Egpyt — the “Red Land” and the “Black Land” — but it also plays an important role in religious tradition. In the Bible, Jacob goes on to be repaid for his bad decisions in life; his uncle deceives him and costs him seven years’ labor, and his favortism towards his son Jospeh results in ten of his sons faking Jospeh’s death and selling the boy into slavery. But God is faithful to the covenant made with Abraham, and takes care of Jacob and his family through Joseph. Thus while Jacob is not the best role model in the Jewish Torah, he is an important character whose struggles with God characterize the nation.

On the Island, we can see that Jacob’s people clearly consider themselves set apart from everyone else, and they follow his ways and his traditions without question. In the Bible, from the time of Moses and Aaron, the people of Israel needed a mouthpiece so they could speak to God directly, and assigned their leaders to do just that. Though the priests and the politcal leaders were supposed to serve different functions, the desire to be a nation like all others led to putting some really terrible kings in power who essentially led the people of Israel into idolatry and eventual exile. The Benjaminites, in particular, were responsible for some pretty heinous atrocities. (See Judges 19 for more.)

And yet we also have Christian Shepherd (notice the name!) appearing on the Island and guiding people. Christian was not a good person in life — he was an adulterer and a drunk, emotionally distant from his son and in a constant state of lying and denial. Somehow, he has been resurrected into a being with great power and presence, seeming wisdom and knowledge. This relates to the Christian idea of baptism — Christian’s sins died with his body, but he has been brought back from the dead in a perfect form, following some higher path. He interacts with Jacob, and perhaps has the same goals in mind as Jacob. But he is different as well, and seems to also have some relationship with the Smoke Monster. By the same token, Christianity and Judaism have many similar goals, but only Christianity teaches that the dead are resurrected now; Judaism teaches that the dead will be resurrected later, in the end. Christianity is concerned with the perfection of heaven; Judaism is concerned with the struggles in the present world.

The concept of judgment at the hand of the smoke monster has been a central theme of two episodes. It appears that the monster seeks repentence, and that it cannot tolerate those who sin in the name of self-preservation. This is very much in line with the Biblical sense of judgment, and it explains why Mr. Eko is destroyed by the Smoke Monster, but the coniving Benjamin Linus is not. Several times in the Jewish scriptures, the “Angel of the Lord” administers judgment and slaughters those who are being punished by God.

LOST has recently turned around the relationships of several characters, making Jack a follower instead of a leader, Sawyer a man of the law instead of a man of crime, and Juliet a willing inhabitant of the Island instead of an unwilling one. This could just be the writers sensing the fun in irony, but it also relates to the book of Matthew, chapter 19, where Peter asks Jesus what reward the disciples will receive. Jesus replies that eventually, those who follow him will be rewarded in heaven, but that “many of the first will be last, and the last will be first.” This also echoes the beatitudes in Matthew 5, just before the Sermon on the Mount, where Jesus teaches a theology of opposites, where the meek will inherit the Earth.

How appropriate that this theme should arise in season 5, when the “messiah” character, John Locke, is resurrected! And the relationship between John and Ben is also interesting, as it mirrors the relationship between Jesus and Satan to some extent. Ben is a liar who makes false promises, and who ultimately is concerned only for himself. Even he is not more powerful than Jacob, but he often breaks the rules. John is not entirely Christlike (he is imperfect and makes mistakes), but his faith is in the pattern of Christ as he gradually realizes who he is meant to be. I would argue that John represents the RELIGION of Christianity better than he represents the PERSON of Christ.

I mentioned that I would return to the Greek mythology connection, and I think it’s important to bring up the point that the DHARMA initiative has been tied into several Greek mythological concepts. We’ve had the DHARMA people who nicknamed the smoke monster the “Cerberus,” we’ve had a Cyclops (Mikhail) in a DHARMA uniform, we’ve had a station called “the Hydra” on “Hydra island,” and we’ve had a shipwrecked sailor in the pattern of Odysseus (Desmond) with a girlfriend named Penelope. DHARMA also includes ideas from Eastern Religion (its name, DHARMA, and its greeting, “Namaste”) and allusions to literature (such as the Looking Glass station). Simply put, DHARMA represents the religious traditions of the rest of the world, primarily those of the Hellenized world (an empire that extended from Europe to India) and the Romanized world (which also included the British Isles). Once again, there is a Biblical connection here, since the book of Daniel describes empires that will rise and full, culminating in a beast with seven horns. Rome was known as the city of the seven hills, and its impact upon the world has been huge. Christianity itself is a religion that could not have existed without the influences of several other religions, including Greek mythology and Zoroastrian ideas.

This Greek connection is also evidenced by the fact that the DHARMA initiative engages in logical and philosophical experiments and that it does not view the island in a mystical way, but a scientific way. This is a very typical approach for one with a classical upbringing. DHARMA represents not just religion and mythology, but Western culture.

So, where does that leave us with LOST? The story is wrapping up, and it’s fairly apparent that the Island has been a part of history. The literal truths about it are sure to be far less high-minded than the themes around the Island. But it will be interesting to see if these Biblical and religious connections continue until the end… or if they will be replaced by something far less metaphysical when the show is over.

The Office is a great show... but it really peaked around the fourth season.

It’s a shame when a favorite show starts to go downhill, and I’ve watched more than a few good comedies go down the drain. I watched the slow decline of The Simpsons from genius to banality, and I watched Scrubs go from a sharp sense of humor to a dull set of goofy gags. (Though I will say that in its new eighth season on a different network, Scrubs has reclaimed a lot of its bite.) I watched the promising My Name is Earl go from being a quirky comedy to a ho-hum farce.

I’d always hoped that the same thing wouldn’t happen to The Office, which was one of my favorite shows when it originally aired on the BBC, and which had a wonderful transition to American TV thanks to Greg Daniels. The British version was full of snark and bite; its purpose was to build up a villanous doofus who was not so unlike a real boss and then to watch him self-destruct. At the same time, viewers were built up to expect that the only two likable characters in the show, Tim and Dawn, would wind up together, only to be slapped in the face with reality at the end. The subsequent Christmas special, which tied up all the loose ends and redeemed the characters, was produced as a means of giving the fans the happy ending that they demanded, even though it went against the spirit of the show somewhat. The BBC show has some real moments of genius, finding comedy in long pauses and awkward behavior. That’s one of the reasons it caught on so quickly and remains popular today.

The American version, on the other hand, was forced to trade a lot of its bite for goof, and the result has been a show that began on firm footing, but that’s been slipping a lot over the last few seasons. It’s not too late for the show to eschew some of its goofiness and get back to being relevant, and Scrubs has proven that you can reboot a series properly when you have  the right motivation to do so. In the case of The Office, the best thing the producers could do would be to remember what made the show so popular in the first place… and make adjustments now before the ratings start to slip and NBC sends out a cancellation notice.

1) Tone down Dwight. Dwight Schrute began as an American version of the original’s Gareth Keenan, but he came into his own quickly as the writers found a unique voice for him. Dwight is at his best when he’s a sychophant, taking every word of his boss seriously and treating every workplace situation as a chance to improve himself in the eyes of Michael. He is also interesting when his meglomania gets the best of him and he tries to make a power grab. That second element makes him human; we realize, as viewers, that he only adores Michael because he has a fierce respect for the chain of command. When Michael is removed from a position of power, Dwight is all too happy to make changes.

Dwight is also an excellent target of office pranks, since he takes everything so seriously. But the temptation to overplay Dwight’s seriousness has resulted in some really over-the-top antics. One example occurred in the third season, when Dwight attended a party at the CFO’s house, only to get locked into a sideplot where he was inspecting the place for structural damage.  Another occurred in an episode where Dwight tricked his former girlfriend into marrying him. And in the recent hour-long episode following the Super Bowl, Dwight staged a fire to play “gotcha” with a staff that had not been paying attention to his fire safety procedures. Later in the episode, Dwight became annoyed with a CPR trainer and used his knife to cut the face off the doll, offering a hideous impression of Hannibal Lecter that was, to put it plainly, bizarre.

Dwight is one of the most memorable characters on the show, and it’s a shame to see that the writers don’t know where the line is in how they should use him. To paraphrase the character, “The writers should ask themselves, would an idiot do that? If so, Dwight should not do that thing.”

2) Give Andy some better scenes. Andrew Bernard is a character introduced in the third season from the Stamford branch. He’s a great character, too – a frat boy who is slightly smarter than most of his co-workers, but who irritates everyone with his personality, poor sense of humor and anger issues. Andy started off as one of the best additions to the show, but the writers have relegated him into “B-story” and “C-story” scenes as of late, turning him into somewhat of a hard luck doofus who’s always getting himself into awkward situations while everyone else ignores him. Andy is at his best when he’s trying to compete with Dwight and when he’s annoying his co-workers by trying to scheme his way into being friends with them. He’s also very funny when he is the target of a prank where he can’t let something simple go. Andy is not funny when he’s a pariah or dealing with some weird subplot, like having sensitive nipples, getting knocked into the river in an inflatable sumo suit, or trying to plan a wedding that everyone knows isn’t going to happen.

3) Bring Michael back down to Earth. Michael is the dumbest character in the office, and he does some absolutely stupid things. But where Michael is at his best is when he is deluded enough to think that the terrible things he’s doing are for the good of the office. Where Michael is at his worst is when he is involved in a romantic subplot, where he is inviting people to his house, where he is giving inane motivational speeches, or pretty much anything else that takes him out of the office and into the real world.

I would argue that one of the best Michael episodes was in season 2, where it’s Halloween and Michael has waited until the last minute to fire someone. Michael tries every trick and stall he can think of, and he even goes through the painful experience of trying to fire an employee and then finding himself taking it back and firing someone else instead. Michael goes home, feeling awful about what he’s had to do, and he takes some consolation in the trick-or-treaters who come to his house, because he realizes that there is a life outside his office.

That is The Office at its best. Michael’s antics have to have a purpose, and they have to be the actions not of someone who is genuinely dumb, but rather, someone who is simply incompetent and deluded.

Phyllis’s wedding showed Michael at his worst, as did the episode where he drove his car into a river because he was blindly trusting technology, as did the episode where Michael and Holly staged a fundraiser to replace stolen items and Michael promised everyone that he would sell off his (nonexistent) Bruce Springsteen tickets. When Michael is played so over-the-top that he cannot understand any consequences for his actions, he stops being funny and starts being irritating. And while irritation is part of the humor of the show, it’s a poor substitute for smartly written comedy.

4) Get rid of Ryan. I realize that BJ Novak is one of the writers and producers on the show, and that his character is going to be involved in the story somewhat. But Ryan is really one of the show’s biggest excesses. Sure, it’s funny when he’s a temp and Michael continually makes unconscious advances towards him. Sure, it’s funny that Ryan winds up in an office relationship he hates and that he’s constantly getting dragged into drama he doesn’t want any part of. But the entire subplot in the fourth season about him being an executive was a wasted effort that was rarely funny, and having Michael hire him back on was indulgent, to say the least. Ryan’s rarely funny, and when he does tell jokes, they’re barely worth a chuckle.

5) Narrow the scope – The show is called The Office, but lately, very little of the plots have had to do with the workplace. The show is blessed with a great ensemble cast and some good writers.  There’s no reason the show can’t narrow its focus back down to the monotony of working together instead of trying to see what crazy plot Michael or Dwight can get involved in this week. As Tim explains in the end of the BBC version, the office is a tragic place, because it’s somewhere that we spend a lot of time, with people that we don’t always know very well or even like, and yet it becomes so much of our life. Some of us (like myself) are blessed with office environments where we have little drama and everyone gets along. But most are more like Dunder Mifflin than we care to admit. So, the writers should focus not on breaking out of that environment, but rather, in focusing primarily upon it.

Canada has some great shows, eh?

Puppets Who Kill is a Canadian show about a halfway house for troubled puppets. One is a comfort doll named Cuddles who is highly suggestible and fairly neurotic. Another is a ventriloquist doll named Bill who is a sociopath and a serial killer. Rocko is a talking dog with a tattoo, a love of cigars, and a complete disregard for others. And Buttons is a former corporate mascot whom the ladies find irresistible… and who isn’t above committing crimes to add to the thrill of the chase. While this might sound like a fairly odd idea for a comedy, it’s extremely well-written, and the puppets are operated by some people who really know what they’re doing. And, since the puppets are cursing, drinking, committing crimes and serving as the worst role models possible, even the few ho-hum episodes have some great moments. I’d recommend this to anyone who doesn’t have small children who might mistake these puppets for, I don’t know, Muppets or something.

(Get Puppets Who Kill Season 1 here on Amazon.com)

If you haven't seen this show, get your hands on it IMMEDIATELY.

Police Squad! is the subject of one of the most tragic stories in television history. The show aired on ABC in 1982, and it’s clear that the network didn’t realize what they had, because it was cancelled after only six episodes. And yet this show, written by Zucker, Abrahams and Zucker (the writers behind the film Airplane!) and staring Leslie Nielsen, was absolutely one of the best comedies every produced in the 1980s, and way ahead of its time. The people involved went on to develop the idea for the silver screen and released The Naked Gun down the road, but Police Squad! is where it all begins.

It’s hard to describe this show’s rapid-fire jokes and do it any justice. From the moment the credits begin to roll, the jokes pour out of the screen. Every episode has two titles – one announced by the narrator and another shown by the title card. They generally have nothing to do with each other, or with the content of the episode itself. Every introduction also noted a “special guest star” who was immediately killed off in some horrifc way.

Nielsen plays Detective Frank Drebin, a straight man in a world of lunatics. There are all sorts of running gags, such as a scientist in the lab who always seems to be instructing children on how they can do dangerous science experiments (a la Mr. Wizard), or how one character will use a doorway while Drebin will walk around the set. There’s also a shoeshine boy named Johnny who seems to know everything, and who is visited by other well-known people looking for advice (such as Joyce Brothers or Tommy Lasorda) once Frank departs.

I cannot recommend this show highly enough. It’s one of the best comedies ever made, and it’s well worth watching over and over since there are so many jokes that you’re bound to miss a few.

(Get Police Squad! on Amazon.com)

What a great name for a cop, huh?

Sledge Hammer! follows in the spirit of Police Squad! by featuring a cop named Inspector Sledge Hammer who embodies the spirit of all those police dramas from the ’70s and ’80s. He looks down on women, has a strange, almost sexual love for his .44 magnum, and is thrilled by gratuitous violence of any variety. He never stands down from a gunfight, and he isn’t afraid to use excessive force or to create massive collateral damage to win. Hammer also isn’t exceptionally bright, which makes his catchphrase, “Trust me. I know what I’m doing,” all the more hilarious. This show aired on the USA network and got two seasons. Most of the episodes are send-ups of cop movies, shows and stereotypes (parodying popular works was quite common in the ’80s), but the show eventually evolves into something not so different from the classic spy show, Get Smart.

I found myself enjoying Hammer’s antics once I got into the spirit of the show, and some of the comedy bits were absolutely priceless. One of my favorites was in an episode where Hammer finds out he’s been poisoned and only has a few hours to live. He goes on a rampage, wrecking an entire office by breaking things, throwing books on the floor, knocking over bookcases, and so forth. Then, he turns to the doctor, smiles as if nothing happened, and says, “Are you sure?” That mix of gratuitous violence and destruction aside a nonchalant attitude towards it all really makes Hammer a fun character to watch. And the supporting cast is very good as well.  I’d say this is a great show for fans of Police Squad! to check out.

(Get Sledge Hammer Season 1 on Amazon.com)

Man, this show is out there. In a good way.

Manhattan AZ is a single camera comedy that aired on the USA network several years ago. It’s about a cop from Los Angeles who gets tired of the daily routine and who takes a job as a sherriff in a little town in Arizona that’s named after its founder, mayor, and resident movie star, Jake Manhattan. The town is just outside a secret government base, and it’s populated with some really strange people. Sherriff Henderson also has a son named Atticus, named after the character Atticus Finch in To Kill a Mockingbird to instill some values in him. But Atticus is actually a surly jerk who absolutely hates the town and who frequently tries to run away to return back to Los Angeles. Most of the episodes revolve around Sherriff Henderson trying to clean up a mess made by the bizarre antics of the mayor or trying to repair the damage caused by his son. There are also some pretty good running gags involving a local tribe of American Indians who look suspiciously Anglo-Saxon and the sherriff’s aversion to tuna, due to a tragic accident involving his deceased wife, a Greenpeace mission gone wrong, and an accident at the canning plant.

This is one of those comedies that’s in the spirit of Police Squad! and Sledge Hammer!, but with a little bit of the film Raising Arizona and the series Northern Exposure thrown in for good measure. Best of all, it’s available to watch on Hulu.com for free, so go check it out!

This show was a gem. Fox should have never cancelled it.

Titus is the only show on this list that has a laugh track. And I’m sort of glad it does, because this show is one of the darkest sitcoms I’ve ever seen. The show is loosely based on the life story of Christopher Titus (also the star), a comedian who grew up with a disinterested, alcoholic father and a flighty schizophrenic mother. Somehow, Titus managed to turn his comedy routine, “Norman Rockwell is Bleeding” into a sitcom that isn’t banal or predictable. That alone is an achievement. But what’s even better is that the show is brilliant, using its misfit cast of characters in inventive ways and really torturing them with awkward situations. Titus’s father, played by the marvelous Stacey Keach, is one of the greatest villains ever crafted for a comedy.

Fox cancelled this show in its third season for daring to make fun of airline hijackers months after 9/11/01. It was probably in poor taste, but the show couldn’t help itself. Here was a show that was willing to take the sacred cows of society – the nuclear family, the joy of a relationship, the bonds between friends and siblings – and absolutely shred them apart. I’ve never seen a comedy manage to be so raw and real, and yet so funny at the same time.

(Get Titus here on Amazon.com)

LOST is one of the best shows on television, period.

LOST is back for its fifth season, and like many people, I made a point of getting together with some other LOST fans and watching it. I’ve been keeping up with the show since the middle of the first season, which means I’m all too aware of its brilliant moments… and its slumps.

As it happened, the premiere hit on a lot of the strengths and the limitations of the show. So, while it’s fresh on my mind, here are a few observations I have about LOST overall:

Five things I HATE about LOST:

1) The characters never talk to each other about anything. So much in this show could be solved if these people would just sit down, ask, “what do we know?” and compare notes across camps. Instead, every time someone’s about to make a revelation, it has to be in the most dramatic manner possible, and generally accompanied by the line, “there’s not enough time to explain this to you!” This device has been so overused that even the writers seem to be bored with it; watching Sawyer slap Farraday in the face when he said it in the Season 5 premiere was funny, but it was also a reminder of how often it’s used as a way out of explaining the show’s mysteries.

2) Many of the show’s original mysteries still haven’t been resolved. The producers keep promise that the answers are coming, but it seems like they’re continuing to stretch things as long as they can. When you sit down and outline all of the mysteries that were raised in the first season, only a handful have actually been solved. Most of the mysteries that have been solved are those that arose later when, instead of offering answers, the show brought up more questions.Some answers to the big questions this season would be a welcome change.

3) The show has become mired in its own fan culture. Did you play the last several years’ worth of LOST alternate reality games? Did you read The Bad Twin, or play the video game? No? Yeah, me neither. And while I like the idea of the extended universe giving the hardcore fans a little extra bang for their buck, I feel a little left out when I’m not keeping up on the podcasts, monitoring Lostpedia or seeking out cryptic interviews given by the producers, writers and cast. Isn’t it enough that I watch every episode? Do I really have to scrutinize deleted scenes or watch all the extras on the DVDs?

4) The show has too many red herrings. This is particularly true of the constant allusions to literature, mythology, and popular culture. Often, things that seem to be significant aren’t, and it’s hard not to feel like the people involved in the show are using it as something of a vanity project to constantly tip their hats to their favorite influences. Granted, LOST goes beyond the typical stale literary illusions to things like The Wonderful Wizard of Oz, but when you look at the fan-made liner notes for some episodes, you have to wonder if the show’s got a little too much padding. Speaking of which…

5) LOST still has too much padding. It’s a lot tighter now than it was in the second and third seasons, but it’s still brimming with scenes that aren’t necessary and that serve as little more than overly complicated ways to get characters from point A to point B. Even the 2-hour premiere for season 5 probably could have been cut down drastically if some of the slower scenes with Hurley and Kate had been left out.

Five things I LOVE about LOST

1) After five years, it’s still intriguing. While questions may still be lingering from Season 1, the show has done a darn good job of explaining later mysteries without destroying the mystique of the show. LOST producer Carlton Cuse worked on another show in the 1990s that involved time travel called The Adventures of Brisco County, Jr., and once that show wrapped up its main mystery with the John Bly gang, it quickly ran out of steam. LOST hasn’t made that mistake. It can be maddening to realize the lengths that the show goes to not to answer questions, but at least the mysteries are still interesting in light of the other revelations that have been made.

2) The characters have depth. You can’t say this about other serialized shows, like Heroes or Terminator: The Sarah Conner Chronicles, where the characters are mere caricatures. LOST’s characters aren’t dumb, and they have motivations for the things they do. They’re all people who have been beaten and broken in some way, and even when their actions are mysterious, they don’t seem like two-dimensional morons who make the wrong choices for the sake of sticking with the plot.

3) The show’s not built on ridiculous twists. LOST does have twists, of course, and lots of them. Some have been well-received, while others have been criticized for being too convenient and easy. But the twists aren’t what make the show entertaining… it’s the perceptions that viewers build up of characters, only to see the characters in a different light at different points in time. LOST isn’t as much about twists as it’s about shifts in understanding. It’s very hard to predict what some characters will do because we don’t know enough about their motivations. Twists only serve to further illuminate LOST’s characters.

4) LOST has big moments that are hard to forget. Think about a network television program that has had a major moment that you’ll forever associate with the show, like the episode of M.A.S.H. where Henry’s plane is shot down as he’s heading home, bringing a somber reminder about the costs of war to the audience. Most shows have one of those moments per season, and generally, in the finale. LOST has one of those moments at least four or five times a season. It’s easily one of the most dramatic shows ever made for television.

5) LOST is intelligent. I don’t think I’ve seen a show that’s this smart since The Prisoner. Sure, there’s some pseudo-science, and there are moments where the show reveals that it’s not written by scientists. But in terms of its scope, its characters, its plotlines and its literary allusions, this is a show that reaches around the world and brings in all sorts of ideas about culture, philosophy, theology, metaphysics, and other heady topics. Many shows try to be this smart, but fail miserably. LOST, on the other hand, is the real deal.

Anyhow, with all that said, I’m sure you know now where you’ll be finding me for the next few months on Wednesday night. LOST might have its drawbacks, but the show’s so good that I can overlook them.

As it happens, I don’t watch a lot of television anymore, because most of it is garbage. But over the last few years, with seasons of shows popping up on DVD, I’ve found myself watching a lot of television shows. Part of the appeal of watching shows is that they’re just about the right length (20-40 minutes) for me to watch while I’m eating or resting, and they don’t require me to sink the time I’d put into, say, a feature film. TV shows are also typically less demanding in terms of my attention; as long as I know the characters and the premise, I don’t have to have much more information, unless I’m watching a serialized show like Lost or Heroes.

One of the things I’ve found out in recent years is that many of the best shows produced for TV are fairly obscure titles that were either cancelled prematurely or aired on networks most people don’t watch regularly. So, I thought I’d put together a list of five really solid shows, all of which are available on DVD, but most of which you’ve probably never heard of. All I ask is that you do the right thing and buy them on DVD if they’re available, and reserve searching bittorent sites for those which are out of print or not yet available on DVD in your country.

With that said, here’s the list!

The name "Trailer Park Boys" really tells you everything you need to know aboutt his show, doesn't it?

Trailer Park Boys: The premise of this popular Canadian show is simple: Ricky and Julian are two criminals who live in Sunnyvale Trailer Park, and Julian’s hired a documentary crew to chronicle their lives as they move from scheme to scheme and find themselves in and out of jail. Julian is cool and collected, the brains of the operation, with big muscles, a goatee and a tumbler of rum constantly in his hand. People in the park respect Julian, and he certain sort of code that he lives by, looking out for others and trying to get himself out of crime and into something more legitimate.

Then, there’s Ricky — a raging id of a human being who lives in Julian’s old beat-up car, who is well known throughout the park for his wild behavior, and who has fathered a young girl named Trinity with one of the women in the park. You never know what Ricky’s going to do, because he often doesn’t know himself; he’s often the reason that Julian’s schemes fall apart at their most critical moment, but Julian can’t seem to get rid of him.

Ricky and Julian also have a friend named Bubbles, described as “the smartest guy in the park,” a peculiar guy who wears big glasses and lives in a shed that’s been rigged up with electricity. Bubbles tries to keep Ricky and Julian out of trouble, but he inevitably winds up left behind in the trailer park as his friends are dragged off to jail.

This probably sounds very heavy and dramatic, but believe it or not, this show’s a comedy, and a very good one at that. If you enjoy the mockumentary style of The Office, This is Spinal Tap or some of Christopher Guest’s films (Best in Show, A Mighty Wind, Waiting for Guffman), you’ll feel right at home in Trailer Park Boys, provided you can put up with the heavy used of the f-word, the regular drug use, drunken antics and other general shenanigans caused by Ricky and Julian’s criminal behavior. I wouldn’t say that this show glorifies criminal life so much as it lampoons it. It’s surprisingly smart and well-written, and fun to marathon.

The show began with a TV movie pilot shot in black and white, which you won’t find on DVD and may have to locate online to watch. It’s not crucial to see it, though, and it’s missing a lot of the regular cast. Seasons 1-7 are all available on DVD, and each has between 6 and 10 episodes. I personally feel that the show peaked somewhat after its fifth season, but seasons six and seven are still enjoyable enough. There’s also a prequel Christmas special that takes place before the pilot; it’s one of the best episodes in the series, and definitely worth watching. Try to buy these if you can, but since the DVDs are so expensive, I won’t complain if you search for them online (especially since many episodes can be found instantly on Google Video). Watch an episode or two, and you’ll either be disgusted or you’ll be hooked.

There was also a Trailer Park Boys movie called The Big Dirty that features the same characters, but outside the continuity of the show. The film also sheds the mockumentary style and is a little more conventional in its storytelling. The movie’s funny, but it’s not nearly as good as the show. It’s easily obtained on DVD

Julian, Bubbles and Ricky are pretty bad at being criminals. That makes their show all the more entertaining.

Since the show was running out of steam in season 7, the creators apparently decided to release a new special in December, 2008 subtitled Say Goodnight to the Bad Guys and a new film in Fall, 2009 subtitled Countdown to Liquor Day. The special brings the show back to its roots somewhat, and the film will presumably pick up where the special leaves off.

DVD Sets on Amazon:

• Seasons 1-2
• Season 3
• Season 4
• Season 5
• Season 6
• Season 7
• Trailer Park Boys: The Big Dirty (feature film)
  
• Trailer Park Boys: Christmas Special

Don't let the simple animation style fool you. Clone High is one of the smartest animated series I've ever seen.

Clone High is a show that appeared on MTV’s animation block, but which never made it past the first season. That’s a shame, because the show was brilliant. The premise is that the government cloned a bunch of famous historical figures in the 1980s, and they’ve all been growing up in the same town with surrogate parents. So, it’s only natural that they go to high school together, right? The main characters include Abe Lincoln, a lanky, awkward teenager who’s obsessed with the sexy Cleopatra, a vain and petty girl who is upset when people aren’t paying attention to her. Cleo begins the show dating JFK, who is popular, but self-absorbed and dim-witted, and he becomes Abe’s rival for her affetions. Abe is also friends with Joan of Arc (who has a secret crush on him) and Ghandi, who’s a lot more free-spirited than you might think.

The show has some light continuity, but it differs so greatly from episode to episode that you never quite know what’s going to happen. Sometimes, you’ll get biting social satire, while other episodes are parodies of popular culture. One even features Jack Black as the villain of a rock opera. Several episodes feature voices from the cast of Scrubs, and that’s no accident – Scrubs creator Bill Lawrence was one of the producers of Clone High. Meanwhile, the creators, Phil Lord and Chris Miller, have gone on to write and produce How I Met Your Mother. It’s obvious that a lot of talent went into the writing and production of this show.

Oddly enough, the show was much more popular in Canada than it was in the US, and thus the DVD set is a Canadian release. You can find it on Amazon, and it’s worth every penny — I’ve watched these 13 episodes many times over, and still find it extremely funny. If you’d like to test the waters first, try Google video.

Rather than simply making fun of the pop culture of the 1980s, Freaks and Geeks gently reminds us how awkward that decade really was.

Freaks and Geeks is a show you might have heard of, but probably didn’t watch. You missed out — it’s easily one of the best “dramedies” ever made, a wonderful look back at the early 1980s that lacks both the annoying narration of The Wonder Years, the yuppie culture of My So-Called Life and the tiring goofiness of That 70s Show. It’s also one of those shows that was the launchpad for many young comedic actors and actresses whom have gone on to become stars in their own right, such as Seth Rogen, James Franco, Jason Segal, Busy Phillips, John Francis Daley and Linda Cardellini. The show was created by Paul Feig (who now works on The Office as a director and producer and has directed episodes of 30 Rock, Weeds, Mad Men and Arrested Development) and produced by Judd Apatow (the writer of The 40-Year-Old-Virgin and Knocked Up and producer of many popular comedy films).

The show begins with a high school-aged girl named Lindsey Weir beginning to question her place in the world following the death of her grandmother. She leave behind her honors student friends, dons a green army jacket and begins hanging out with a group of stoners, the “freaks” of the show. Lindsey doesn’t fit in very well with the group, but soon finds herself becoming somewhat of a moral compass to her new friends — she accepts them for who they are, and they help her to break out of her shell and enjoy life. Her young brother, Sam, is trying to find his own place in junior high school along with his two geeky friends, Neil and Bill. Sam has a crush on a girl named Cindy Sanders and idealizes her, but as the show goes on, Sam discovers that she’s as human as anyone else.

Some people view Undeclared as being a spiritual sequel to Freaks and Geeks.

Part of what makes the show so compelling is its heart. These kids feel like real teenagers, struggling with real teenage issues and not the artificial stuff you see on shows like Beverly Hills: 90210 or Melrose Place. This isn’t a high school drama about jocks and cheerleaders, and it really stays away from stereotypes. One of the most endearing characters in the show, the ultra-awkward Bill Haverchuck, could have been portrayed as a two-dimensional nerd, but instead feels like a real person. You start off pitying Bill in the first few episodes, but by the end of the show’s 18-episode run, you realize he’s far stronger and deeper than he appears to be.

Sadly, NBC really squandered this show when it was on TV, and it never got the chance it deserved. Many of the cast members went on to work on Apatow’s Undeclared on Fox, which takes place in the modern day on a fictitious college campus. Though it’s also very good, it’s more of a comedy than Freaks and Geeks and less enduring.

Fortunately, since the show has achieved cult status, it’s available on DVD. You should watch it. It’s good. You might also check Google Video for some episodes.

Don't let the DVD cover fool you. Wonderfalls's main character, Jaye, is a pistol!

Wonderfalls was a show created by Bryan Fuller, who’s better known as being the creator of Dead Like Me and Pushing Daisies, as well as being one of the best writers on Heroes. The show had a short run on Fox before being canceled, but if life were fair, it’d still be running, because it was absolutely brilliant. The premise is sort of strange: a sarcastic and unlovable girl working at a gift shop outside a waterfall that looks suspiciously like Niagra Falls inherits a peculiar gift from a commemorative statue of an American Indian princess who perished going over the falls. This power gives her the ability to receive strange and cryptic messages from things that look like animals, such as a figurines, bookends, stuffed bears, or a little deformed plastic lion that she carries around with her. But Jaye is a reluctant heroine, often trying to shirk the quests that are given to her instead of following through. What’s more, she often thinks she’s being told to help one person, only to find that someone completely different requires her help. You never quite know where the show is going until an episode reaches its conclusion.

While the premise is a little weird, the characters are very interesting and well-realized. Jaye’s acidic, sarcastic wit is truly entertaining, and her entire family, which includes a meddling mother, a repressed and still-in-the-closet lesbian sister, and a brother with a secret girlfriend, adds to the color of the story. There are also some wonderful background characters, like a young boy who somehow orders himself a mail-order-Russian bride.

It’s very sad that this show got killed before the creators could really take the time to explore the powers behind Jaye’s gift, because it was clearly headed somewhere very cool and interesting. At least Dead Like Me (which was also prematurely canceled) got a follow-up film. I’m guessing we’ll never get to see any more of Wonderfalls. Thankfully, it’s available on DVD, and you can probably find it on Google Video.

Thank god for DVD re-releases of Fox shows; I never even knew this one was on the air or I would have watched it!

Action was another show prematurely killed off by Fox, but it never really belonged on a network to begin with. On the DVD’s special features, the creators and writers of the show explain that Action was meant for HBO or Showtime, but they got greedy, tried to get a bidding war going, and wound up on Fox instead. It starred Jay Mohr as the Jerry Bruckheimer-style movie producer Peter Dragon, an amoral character who secures funding for ridiculously stupid action movies so he can live a lifestyle of excess. Illeana Douglas (one of those actresses you see all the time, but who never seems to star in anything) plays a former child star turned Hollywood prostitute whom Peter Dragon signs on as his assistant when he begins production of the ill-fated film, Beverly Hills Gun Club, a movie that’s being produced soley because Peter’s people bought the wrong script by accident.

This is one dark show, and it’s got one of those cynical takes on Hollywood that would lead you to believe that the inmates are running the asylum. It’s easy to see why it couldn’t survive on Fox, since it debuted in 1999, when single-camera shows were still a curiousity and laugh tracks were expected. Had the show done better, it’s very possible the producers would have released a cut of Beverly Hills Gun Club during the second or third season. But since it was axed after a mere thirteen episodes, the writers decided to end the show with an episode that potentially secures Peter Dragon’s success, but has his assistant going back into prostitution because she wants to feel clean again — apparently, the film industry is just too dirty for her.

The show is pretty hard to find online (a Google Video search turned up few relevant videos), but it is available on DVD. Provided that you’re into dark humor that has some subtlety, it’s well worth the purchase.

Next Thursday, I’ll follow up with five more great shows you’ve probably never heard of, so be sure to check back!