(S10E16) After a week of hellish home buying, Bad Guys was a welcome episode of SG-1. I didn't take the plot very seriously - and neither did the entire cast. Most of the performances were a bit over the top - from the hysterical screaming woman to the hero wannabe security guard. Despite being completely unrelated to the current story line, the writers did make some effort to tie things in.

Fans of Standoff, the FOX hostage negotiator drama starring Ron Livingston and Rosemarie DeWitt, were worried when it was announced that the show was moving to Fridays. Now here's more to be concerned about: the show isn't returning at all until the summer.

It was supposed to return in April, but FOX has decided the show won't be back until after the network announces its fall schedule in May. I wonder how this will affect their decision, since the show has been on hiatus for a while and they're not going to know what the summer numbers are until, well, the show airs in the summer. They insist the show isn't canceled, but this can't be seen as a "good" sign, that's for sure. It got pretty good numbers when it was on.

For the record, I thought the show was so-so.

(S01E06) The people who don't like this show anymore (after the pilot) don't know what they're talking about. Are they expecting some sort of big conspiracy plotline? Something supernatural? A big mystery to be unveiled at the end? Do they expect something darker because of the bank robbery/flashback device the show is using? Do they expect the entire show to be set in the bank? They're watching the wrong show. This is a character-driven drama, period, and a damn good one.

They're into hour two of the hostage drama (in the flashbacks), and we get to see how they came to decide who should be the hostage released from the bank...

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.

(S01E05) As you can tell from the episode title, tonight's episode focused exclusively on Jeremy. Ha! Just kidding. But it didn't really focus completely on Eva either. There was also plenty about the Lucas/Randall relationship, Franny, Kathryn and the baby, and the new Odd Couple, Nick and Egan.

"Can one divorced man and one soon to be divorced man share an apartment, without driving each other crazy?"

(S01E05) This show is just too formulaic. It's not that the plots aren't a tad innovative - not just hostages at a bank but hostages in a airport control tower, a diner, and in this episode, a hospital operating room - it's just that the structure is just so formulaic and tedious. Guy with a gun takes over a place, the only two hostage negotiators in L.A. are called in, one of them calls the guy with the gun, things seem to be about to go well, then someone screws it up and this pisses off the guy with the gun and it makes everything harder for the FBI team. So they have to work harder to figure out what is motivating the guy, by going into his past (with the help of the cute girl with the Apple laptop back at HQ). That's pretty much what happens.

(S01E04) It's interesting how this show is becoming something different than how it started. Oh, the set up is the same, a group of strangers coming together after a horrifying bank hostage situation. But the stage it's in now is intriguing. The group started out as complete strangers who just happened to find each other together at a bank. Then, they find themselves becoming great friends and even meeting on a regular basis for dinner to help each other through this. And now comes the inevitable third stage: still great friends, but little differences in opinion are starting to create little irritations and disagreements.

And we find out that one of the bank robbers had a chance to escape, but decided to go back into the bank...

(S01E02) I love how this show isn't toying with us. Sure, they're holding back on many of the details about what exactly happened during the 52 hour bank robbery, but you don't get the feeling they're taunting us or teasing us (*cough* Lost *cough*). Everything that is happening and the way they're showing it seems natural to the story, and it's amazing how intriguing a two or three second flashback snippet can be.

In this ep, the survivors are trying to get on with their lives, but it's not going to be easy...

I'll have the full review of the first episode of The Nine when it premieres later this week (Wednesday night at 10, after Lost), but I wanted to tell you the 10 things I jotted down as I watched it.

1. This show isn't just "involving," it's mesmerizing, and that's unbelievably rare on television.

2. The cast is like a greatest hits of television from the past 10-15 years: Tim Daly (Wings, The Fugitive, Eyes), John Billingsley (Star Trek: Enterprise), Scott Wolf (Party of Five), Tom Verica (American Dreams, Will and Grace, Central Park West), Chi McBride (Boston Public, House), Kim Raver (24, Third Watch), and others. The cast is so good it's scary.

(S01E04) I hate it when TV shows or movies are really "predictable" in how "unpredictable" they are. Case in point, tonight's Standoff. Have I just been watching too much television the past 40 years or were the two "twists" at the start of this episode pretty easy to guess? Yeah, it was kinda obvious that the first team assault on the house was just a training exercise, and it was equally obvious that the girl was in on the bank thefts with the serial bank robber, just wearing different wigs.

That's not to say that there are worse ways to kill an hour than watching Standoff. This was actually the best episode so far.

(S01E03) There were two great things about this third episode of Standoff. One was a joke at the start of the show, when Matt says to Emily that he "feels like Lindsay Lohan," and Emily replies "oh come on, you're not that drunk." Matt was actually talking about everyone looking at him.

The second great thing about the episode was the commercial for a new Victoria's Secret bra. Something called the "Infinity Edge" bra. Awesome commercial. The rest of this episode? Meh.

(S01E01) I'm one of those people that truly believes that any TV show or movie premise could be great. Because it's not the premise of a show that's most important. Really, what does the premise of a show have to do with anything? A "great" premise could have horrible writing, acting, direction, while a show that seems to have a "typical" or "boring" premise can be great if it has good writing, acting, and direction. Seinfeld was a show about "nothing" but it was the writing and the cast that made that show great. Heck, what was the movie My Dinner With Andre but two guys eating dinner and talking for two hours?

So it's not the premise of Standoff (hostage negotiators are also lovers!) that is disappointing, it's that there's nothing really special about it. Not yet anyway. But it's a show that has promise, and here's why.