Friday, July 25, 2008

TV: Middling Bad News

I didn't hold out much hope that The MiddleMan would be anything more than a 13-and-out summer series. I liked it a lot, but thought pace and subject matter would doom the interesting little comic book conversion to short run memories.

Looks like I was wrong, and not in a good way.

The 13-and-out now looks like 12-and-out. And that's too bad. Cuz, in fact, the show has recovered to eliminate the one real roadblock, the staccato pace of verbiage delivery, and turned into an amusing campy sendup of comic books ... just like the printed version. It's become a not-so-guilty pleasure of mine.

Unfortunately, creator Javier Grillo-Marxuach announced over the last 24 hours that he and ABC Family have agreed that shortening the season by an episode was in everybody's best interests. Surrrrre, just like sticking the show at 10 pm was a good idea. Nope, the series is baked come summer's end.

There IS a promise of a boffo season-ender. That BETTER include lots of Mary Pat Gleason, who's been entertaining beyond all belief. She's sort of a hefty female robot version of snarky David Spade, without the desperateness of most of Spade's characters. Almost shed a tear this week when it looked like Gleason's Ida might have bit the electrical biscuit for a bit.

And let's be honest, if The MiddleMan IS going to bite the big one, then it should be made law that Natalie Morales, the exception to the rule that girls who wear glasses never get passes, HAS to appear in the outfit she wears in the opening credits for the WHOLE SHOW!

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