1. Way more about epidurals than I even wanted to know.
2. "He-he-he-who"

Last night April and I completely vegitated out in front of the TV. We watched:

1. Veronica Mars
2. Studio 60 on the Sunset Strip
3. My Name is Earl (April fell asleep during)
4. The Office
5. Jericho
6. Lost

Jericho vexes me. April likes it a lot, and I want to like it a lot, but I feel that they are not doing enough with the show to warrant my affections. The premise is great: nuclear bombs go off and we get to see one dinky little town in Kansas as they fight for survival. That's great. My very favorite novel of all time, Stephen King's The Stand, has a very similar premise. The problem with Jericho, though, is that they don't look like they have any idea what they're doing with the show. Let me give you an example or two.

Last week, the power came back on. Yeah! We have electricty again, said the residents of Jericho. Unfortunately, the influx of electricity must've overloaded the sleeping transformer boxes, because fires sprung up all over town! Oh, no! The library's on fire! Oh, no! A little girl ran in to go save her favorite copy of Alice in Wonderland. Oh, no! Her teacher ran in after her! Oh, no! They both end up trapped in the inferno, with smoke filling their lungs! Oh, no! The son-of-the-mayor/deputy-mayor/husband-of-the-doctor/volunteer-firefighter ran in after the teacher and the girl! Oh, no! He gets trapped with them, too!

Sound familiar? This was about half of the episode. Watching these people breath through clothes they soaked with the handy water cooler that was present in the library room they ended up trapped in. This is a fine story to tell, and about a million other television shows have told it. I generally do not mind watching this particular story. My main beef with Jericho here is that there should be about a million other interesting things going on. It's the end of the world as REM knows it, and we are watching stupid people nearly die from running into a burning building. I honestly felt like the week before the writers were sitting around, and had this conversation:

"So, boss, what should we write to fill in this half hour of TV we haven't written yet?"

"Oh, crap, we didn't plan anything! Quick, what's a dramatic incident we can use to fill in a half hour of TV time?"

"How about a burning building!?"

"Yeah, yeah, and we can have a little boy trapped in there!"

"No, no, make it a little girl. They're much more sympathetic."

"Wait, let's add in a courageous teacher who runs in to save the little girl!"

"Yeah, but then they get trapped!"

"And one of our lead characters puts on firefighting gear and runs in to save them!"

"Awesome, yeah! Keep it coming!"

"And then he gets trapped with them!"

"Wait, wait, won't it look ridiculous if a firefighter gets trapped in a room for half an hour?"

"No, no, he's not a full-time firefighter, so it'll be OK. He'll use his smarts to tell the ladies to lie down on the floor and breath through wet cloths!"

"I smell deep-fried Emmy."