You might have noticed that I didn't review last night's episode of Standoff. It's not because of election coverage. I'm just super bored with the show. Here's why.

1. It's like Mad Libs. Seriously, all you have to do is fill in the blanks with each episode's set up, confrontaion, and resolution. The two hostage negotiators are called in, Matt gets on the phone, Emily figures out what's going on in the hostage-taker's life that would make him do this, Frank wants to shoot them instead of talk to them, Matt and Emily banter about their relationship, their boss stands around and looks concerned, and then Matt or Emily talks the person out of doing anything else. Noun-adjective-adverb. Yawn.

2. I don't see the characters changing or growing. I hate this feeling in a TV show. Standoff just seems like a show that will bop along week after week after week with a different storyline, and even though certain episodes might be a little better than others, you don't get the feeling that anything else real is going to happen to these characters. They're just a device to get to the plot.

3. I keep thinking that this show would actually be better if they got rid of the Emily character and just focused on Matt being a daring, smart, rebel hostage negotiator. The whole relationship thing just seems forced now (though in earlier eps it was novel). But that's never going to happen.

4. I really wanted to love this show, and it just sorta bums me out that it isn't much better. Every week when the show is over I get this, "well, there goes another hour, and now I have to write this damn review." And then I sigh heavily.

5. Tuesday is usually the night when I do my laundry.