jail

According to MediaWeek, FOX now has to plans to waive Prison Break's hiatus. Just like last year, FOX had initial plans to pull the show at the end of November and bring it back in March with new episodes until the May finale. However, as has been the case lately, networks seem to be listening to viewers more than they used to. Last year, there were plenty of angry viewers when the jailbird drama took over three months off. Looks like FOX was paying attention.

Apparently, airing re-runs was brought up but ratings for second plays of serials like Prison Break usually aren't that good. Didn't FOX run a few Prison Break marathons on F/X last year though? Regardless, it looks like we'll be getting the second half of the sophomore drama earlier than we thought. Don't be misled though because it won't be 100% straight through the final eleven episodes. Prison Break will take the night off when 24 premieres in January and it will also be shelved for the two Mondays when FOX airs a couple of BCS college football games. After all that, it will return to it's normal run on Mondays with Prison Break at 8PM and 24 at 9PM. Sounds like good news to me.

(S02E02) We got a good glimpse this week of how storylines won't necessarily be capped at one episode, plus we never really saw Earl cross anything off his list. It was funny, but in a smarmy sort of way, to see Randy get so overcome by the thought of Catalina dancing at Chubby's. We knew that he had a sort of fondness for her, but his feelings really overwhelmed him this time around.

(S04E05) Maybe I have some kind of chemical imbalance, or I just wasn't in a comedy kind of mood, but I didn't think this episode was that great. Normally I love this show, but this episode just kind of left me cold.

Fans might recall that in the first season there was a two-part episode where some officials from Home Land Security came to Reno to teach the deputies about terrorist training. It turns out they were actually con artists and they wound up stealing a bunch of stuff from the evidence lockers. In this episode, one of the con artists, "Spanish Mike" Alvarez, is placed in custody in the Reno jail where he tries to get inside the heads of each of the deputies. My favorite scene was with Junior, who he convinces to hand over his gun, but little does he know that Junior took the bullets out of the gun first. Junior taunts him: "Now who's in whose head?" That was pretty funny.

(S02E07) This episode begins with Tom sitting in a jail cell with another prisoner (Judd Hirsch) who's in jail because he locked his fifteen year old nephew in the cellar over the weekend for pooping and peeing all over his house. Tom, on the other hand, is in jail for killing about four thousand people. His cell mate reacts to this news with, "people are too sensitive these days."

Tom's tale of woe begins when he becomes a salesman for a new device called "Spray a Carpet or Rug," a gigantic machine that emits a foam that turns into carpet instantaneously. The Mayor loves the device because he can carpet all of Jefferton and not have to pay the "lawn mower man" who takes care of the grass and has been pestering the Mayor about a raise. The city council allows Tom to do a test run on Memorial Park, so Tom dons his chemical suit (the foam causes him seizures) and carpets the whole park.

(S01E22) This is interesting. The title of this episode is either "Everybody Hates Dreamgirls" or "Everybody Hates Jail," I've seen it listed as both. Odd.

Anyway, last night's episode focused on Chris having to sell thirty boxes of cookies to pay for a field trip to Washington DC. Of course, his teacher informs him that if "his people" can't pay money for the cookies, they can always use food stamps. Meanwhile, both his younger siblings get chicken pox, and their father offers to stay home while Rochelle goes to see Dreamgirls with a friend, rather than going with Julius for their anniversary as they originally planned.