Tuesday Night TV

While feeling excited that Veronica Mars is in good shape for next year, I caught up on The Riches, and then started in on Tuesday Night TV. When watching Gilmore Girls, I started getting the feeling that the commercial breaks were long, so I went back and checked the times. One was over 5 minutes, another was 4:40. Whatever happened to two minutes and two seconds, Chuck Woolery? My Tuesday night rundown after the jump...

The Riches: Wayne wants to be a partner at PanCo (with keys to the executive washroom... "I want to wipe my ass with a swan!"), and Hugh won't decide til the Malloys (or Riches) have him over for dinner. So the family's in a panic to throw a buffer dinner party.


Dahlia runs into Chunky K, her cell mate from prison who killed her husband, and even though she knows she should run away, she brings the friend home to show off the house. Wayne's obviously upset, but you can tell immediately how close they were. Chunky K's not having Dahlia's luck though, renting a fold-out couch that she has to fight two pit bulls (Britney and K-Fed) for, so Dahlia invites her to stay with them. Doug is freaking out though when she doesn't seem to leave and the dinner party's coming up soon. But Dahlia thinks its their duty to spread their good fortune around, and hires Chunky K to be their maid.

At the party, Chunky K's having trouble holding it together. She has a business idea breeding rabbits for meat, and Hugh laughs in her face. Sam doesn't help matters by coming downstairs in drag. Later, holding a knife to carve the pork (a nice choice for fake Jews), she seems to have flashes of killing her husband. Chunky K throws a fit, embarassing everyone, except apparently Hugh who ends up with his face buried in K's rather Chunky cleavage snorting what I assume is cocaine.

Thanks to K, Hugh agrees to make Doug a partner, but when presented with the papers by a noticeably high Hugh, Doug has second thoughts. Dahlia says it's because they're turning into buffers. Chunky K takes off with a big wad of cash, most of it given to her by Dahlia but some stolen. And in a strange development, we learn that Nina (the Riches' neighbor) has been in denial for years about her husband's homosexuality.

Gilmore Girls: Lorelai did give Logan her blessing, though they kinda glossed over it, as Gilmore Girls often does. Logan ends up proposing at a graduation party thrown by the grandparents, and Rory says she needs time to think. This is a show about girls, but can you imagine the hell Logan's going through while she weighs her options. She thinks about it for a while but decides she likes being at a point in her life where her options are open. Logan takes it hard and ends their relationship entirely.

Rory's graduating, and the entire town apparently wants to come, but tickets are in short supply, so somehow town outrage snowballs into planning an entire graduation reenactment in the Stars Hollow town square, but I guess that's not until next week.


Luke decides to reciprocate the sentiment from Lorelai's karaoke serenade and gets her a gift, but overhears Lorelai try to downplay the significance of it, and is completely crushed. They have an insane conversation when Rory was thinking about Logan's proposal that was one of those about-one-thing-but-really-about-another conversations that only happens on TV.

Veronica Mars: Desmond Fellows, played by Paul Rudd, is the guitarist from a band called My Pretty Pony, whose lead singer died ten years ago. He plans to play a benefit concert for Piz's radio station by playing along to old tapes of background vocals, but the tapes disappear, so Veronica's on the case.


Desmond's a hilariously (more on that later) drunk has-been, who Piz almost gets back into songwriting, but a news report comes on showing his old band, and he goes right back to Behind the Music downward spiral. So will they find the tapes, allowing him to continue to suckle at the teat of past glory, or somehow fix the guy and have him do a concert of original material and turn his life around?

Well it turns out to be both. They find the tapes, arrive at the show, but call Desmond from outside and tell him they won't get there in time, so he'll have to fill. He plays his new stuff and everyone loves it, for an atypically happy ending for Veronica Mars.

Still, Paul Rudd is possibly the best guest star the show's ever had. And they gave him a lot of great lines:

• He calls Piz "Fez," "Plax," "Pez," "Puz," and "La Paz."
• "Anyone ever tell you you look like a fiesty, young Barbara Eden?"
• "How old are you, Monica?"
• Veronica: "What are you taking pills for?" Desmond: "Eh, you know. Life."
• Piz: "Brought to you by Wrigley's Extra gum." Desmond: "Wait, their leftover gum?"
• "Oh yeah, all the old hit. You bet."
• The entire Beatles conversation with Keith, especially "I used to know a rent boy from Oslo who called himself that."

There was also a bunch of relationship crap. Mac broke up with Bronson, probably to be with Max. Veronica continues to push Piz away and then be inexplicably forward. Logan gets all jealous of Piz. And Deputy Leo is back, and again a deputy.

The one development that wasn't relationship-y but was really awesome, is that Keith's opponent in the Sheriff elections is going to be Vinnie Van Lowe. I'm excited about that one.

The Shield: Vic's on the warpath after learning that Guardo didn't kill Lem. He visits Antwon (Anthony Anderson, one of the many awesome recurring guest stars on the show) and threatens him with everything under the sun, but Antwon is mostly proud at how Vic thinks he's a supervillain.

Vendrell is trying to push the blame back on Guardo, saying that Hernan is lying, but he pushes a little too hard. And for the first time Vic and Gardocki are thinking Shane might have done it. They count 73 grenades that they picked up before Lem's death, and will check that count against the number in the bomb squad locker. But they find 73 in the locker, and are terribly relieved. But Vic gets a hold of the lab report and Kavanaugh's confession, and when he reads it, he gets a look on his face like he's been kicked in the nuts. Gardocki later informs Vendrell that they need to meet at the site of Lem's murder to walk through the lab report and check it. But Gardocki isn't coming.

Vendrell shows up and its just him and Vic, and Vic knows everything. Considering the matters at hand, the words they exchange are surprisingly calm. But Vic makes one thing crystal clear: if he ever sees Shane again, he will kill him.

Guardo's girlfriend who the strike team kidnapped comes in asking Dutch about Guardo, Salseda, and her time in "protective custody." So Dutch and Colette are now suspecting Vic in Guardo's disappearance. They get Vic into the interrogation room without telling him who's in there, but he covers his ass pretty well. Dutch and Claudette are still suspicious, but as usual they have no real evidence.

The strike team catches a case where a city counselor's daughter is murdered. Turns out she was trading sex for drugs, which would be ugly for the counselor (and the barn, since he controls the purse strings). They find the guy who did it, and Vic convinces the guy to come up with a less racy story to confess to in exchange for a shorter sentence. And for his efforts, the counselor's going to try to pull some strings to keep Vic on the job.

Despite not just flipping out like he often does, Michael Chiklis' performance was really strong. It's hard to believe what we saw could be considered understated, but given the chair throwing, vein popping Mackey we've seen lately, it was relatively understated.