Tons of Television

Wow, I don't think I've watched that much television in a long time. Between taping things and a slightly off-kilter television schedule, there was a good four hours of Must See (to me) TV. Which sucks when you have to wake up at 5:30 for work the next morning.

Arrested Development wasn't the show's strongest effort so far. Don't get me wrong, there were a few laugh out loud moments (Tobias' business card, for example, and Super Dave as George Sr.'s surrogate). But a lot of it seemed... I don't know, tamer than usual. Scott Baio was almost too much of a straight man character, while Charlize Theron simply isn't funny. Still, I am HOPING this is not the last episode; that would be a terrible shame.

Raw Homecoming I really enjoyed, with the two main matches (Angle/Michaels and Edge/Hardy) as close to perfect as you're going to get on television. The HHH turn, though more than a tad telegraphed, made for some enjoyable television, and give Flair all the credit in the world: for someone his age, he is doing great in and out of the ring these days.

I would have preferred Austin not stun Linda (it just didn't make a whole lot of sense), but the rest of the segment was watchable enough. It's always great to see guys like Foley and Piper on the mic, and I'm assuming this means Mick is going to SmackDown. The Hogan segment was actually a bit short, but served its purpose.

The other retired guest stars were a nice touch (hey, they found a way to make a Rob Conway segment interesting!) and didn't take away from the show at all. And of course, the thought of a SmackDown-Raw feud is nothing to sneeze at, after three years of keeping the brands pretty much separate (in terms of cross-promotional feuds). I enjoyed the show, overall.

Lastly, caught TNA iMPACT (missed the Saturday airing) and was pretty impressed. The wrestling, obviously, was top notch and since I've last seen the show (back when they were on Wednesday PPV's), the look of the program has greatly improved. Sahadi's videos are tremendous and the crowd looked into the show.

Only a few complaints. First and most importantly, the sound was terrible. The crowd noise got extremely annoying after a while and didn't mix with the announcer/wrestler dialog very well. I'd get someone to work on that ASAP, and it really was a big annoyance. Also, I would seriously consider shifting Don West and Shane Douglas's roles. West would make a fine Mean Gene wannabe, but as a color commentator, he's (still) the pits. Douglas, on the other hand, looks goofy as a backstage interviewer, but would probably take to the heel commentator role.

And I think The Dud...er, Team 3D, needed a better introduction to TNA than they got. Why couldn't AMW have called out "any team in the back" or something? Or just had them cut a promo calling themselves the greatest team in TNA? Then you could have done the Nash-Jarrett confrontation in a separate segment and had TWO big promo segments instead of one.

Yet these are minor things. I really think that if TNA keeps at it, they will start to gain a following...