This Week on My TV: December 28, 2013

Disclaimer: Some shows I watch live and with others, I tend to be fairly behind on my tv watching. Even so, consider the fact that there could be spoilers ahead. All I can do is lead in with the show and episode. You read at your own risk!



**(Once Upon a Time, S3E5 "Good Form") Sword fighting! Now *that* doesn't get used enough on this show, one of the few shows where it makes perfect sense! -- Young Hook? Yes *please*. -- Sextant and leftenant? Am I watching Once Upon a Time or Sleepy Hollow? -- Second star to the right and straight on til morning! One of my favorite Disney movie quotes. -- Neverland holds the fountain of youth? Interesting spin, for the place where time doesn't exist.-- And cue the love triangle. Because every show must have one, I guess. Will Emma choose Neal or Hook?

**(Elementary, S2E10 "Tremors") I love when Sherlock messes with people. -- I thought the flashbacks through court testimony was a good and original format for telling the story of the week. -- I'm sad that Bell and Sherlock's relationship is under strain.

**(Elementary,  S2E11 "Internal Audit") Sherlock: You're not Alfredo. Unknown Man: You're Sherlock, right? Sherlock: And you are? Man: Randy. Sherlock: Name or adjective? Man we now know as Randy: What? Sherlock: Short for Randall or state of sexual arousal? Randy: Are you asking me if I'm horny?

**(Blue Bloods, S4E11 "Ties That Bind") I kinda love all the Christmas decorations scattered through this episode without looking like they tried too hard. Houses decorated with Christmas lights seen outside the window of Danny's house. The Christmas trees and the candles in the windows of the Reagan homes. Just another way this show feels to "authentic" and "identifiable" for me. -- Oof. I can't imagine Danny's position, being asked to help set up his childhood friend for mob association. -- Is the mayor permanently in a wheel chair as a result of that shooting? -- When whichever law enforcement group that's following Mickey wanted Danny to wear a wire, T asked why they wouldn't use some more modern technology. And then it comes out that Danny didn't wear the wire after all. He installed an app on a second phone, hidden in his sock, and used it to record the conversation with Mickey. ... Moral of the story: never underestimate a former police officer to be one step ahead while watching television. -- I do have one question, though. If it's Christmastime, why are the leaves on trees still all autumn-y? -- Forthwith at 46 minutes! And what's a 1085? Something that can be sent forthwith, that's for sure.

**(Scandal, S3E5 "More Cattle, Less Bull") Shonda Rhimes likes to recycle her actors. Cyrus (formerly Mer's father), Sally (formerly Mer's mother), now whoever this Leo character is (formerly Cooper on Private Practice).  -- BAHAHAHA! Leo just referred to Mellie as a "frigid shrew" right in front of her. -- Leo: But as hallowed as this office is...right now, it smells like desperation. Like losing. It smells like Nixon in '74 in here. -- From some angles, Lisa Kudrow looks exactly the same as always. From others...not so much. I don't like to think about how long it's been since Friends ended. -- I *totally* called it. Congresswoman Josie's baby-given-up is her "sister," Candy. -- ::snort:: Harrison's facial expressions while listening to Abby and Huck on their various phone calls on the car drive to Josie's hometown. -- That basketball game between Fitz and Jake was so clearly about Olivia, for Fitz. -- Cy's "do" boy, whose name I do not know: Sir...we've been Poped. -- I can't help it. Every time Lisa Kudrow comes on the screen as the Congresswoman, I keep thinking of Phoebe in the "what if" episode of Friends, when she's the stressed out money manger. -- Cyrus (after Josie spoke about her teenage pregnancy during the Democratic debate): She just won America's hearts. Olivia Pope...the gift that keeps on giving. -- Ugh. Olivia digging the Fitz phone out of her trash can when it starts ringing. Look up 'pathetic' in the dictionary. -- But oh...the chemistry of that call between Liv and Fitz. Darn it! Why must they be so perfect and yet so terrible for each other? -- David so totally busted Abby's lie when he walks into her office as she's sitting in it, claiming to still be in Montana. -- I feel like whoever is in charge of wardrobe on this show is influenced by too much Once Upon a Time. Olivia's dress was too severe. Mellie's dress was too "fairy tale." Both looked like dresses Regina would wear in Fairy Tale Land, which works for Once Upon a Time, not so much in Washington DC. -- I did NOT expect Mellie to be begging Olivia to come back and run Fitz's re-election campaign. -- Mellie: Do you remember what it was like four years ago, Liv? What *we* were like four years ago? Fresh and young and...full of ideas. now, four years later, my God, look at us. Congress has stalled everything we've tried to push through. Approvals are in freefall. People want change and, of course, that's exactly what the Democrats are running on. That's... I'm not even worried about all that. Anyone can fix that. That's not why he needs *you*. He needs *you*, Olivia. He is tired and broken and it isn't the job. It's doing the job without you. He's not alive when you're not here. He can't breathe when you're not here. He doesn't have the will to run, much less win, when you're not here, because you... You're everything to him, Liv. He needs you...so I need you. Come back. Come back to us. ... WHOA. I had no idea Mellie had that in her. -- Conflicted: I like Jake. I really do. The fact that he has to feel like second fiddle to Fitz makes me sad. -- What. Is. Up. With. Quinn. -- Holy. Crap. Fitz shot down a plane that Olivia's *mother* was on???

**(Once Upon a Time, S3E6 "Ariel") As Snow is running through the forest, The Queen's henchmen on her heels, and she comes to a screeching halt at the top of a cliff, overlooking the sea, I can't help but think that flashbacks lose some of their edge-of-your-seat-edness when you know that Snow still exists in the present day. -- Joanna Garcia Swisher is cast very well as Ariel. -- Regina: Focus! Concentrate!! Emma: It's kind of hard when you're talking in my ear. Regina: And when the wind blows or it's raining or...someone's shooting arrows at you. Yes, concentration's hard. That's the point. -- It's...weird to see Snow and Charming having parental conversations about Emma, who herself is a grown woman, but is still a "child" in the ways of magic. -- I will *never* see Peter Pan the same way again, but man, does that kid play a fantastic role. -- Ariel has on spot on one cheek that is more pink than anywhere else on her face. Lighting? Too much blush? Just the actress's natural coloring? It's distracting. -- Whoa! Rumplestiltskin's illusion of Belle was Pan's Shadow! -- Regina posing as Ursula! Brilliant! -- Did Regina call Mermaid-Snow "The Catch of the Day?" ::snort:: -- Ariel stabbing Regina in the neck with the "mini trident"/salad fork! And Snow told her it wouldn't be valuable. Ha. -- So, Snow's admitted secret in the Echo Cave, that she wants to have a baby, is how the writers are going to spin Ginnifer Goodwin's real life pregnancy?

**(Once Upon a Time in Wonderland, S1E4 "The Serpent") Jafar back story! He was the illegitimate son of the Sultan who sought the help of a sorceress to learn her dark magic for revenge! I approve! -- Very clever of Cyrus to coerce the guard to share his meat scraps with him so he could extract the wishbone to fashion into a tool. -- I totally called it that Jafar eventually turned on the sorceress and transformed her into his snake staff! -- So, the Knave has been turned to stone and Alice has used her first wish. Now what?

**(Scandal, S3E6 "Icarus") I did not even remotely follow Leo's plan for Sally's campaign. -- Quinn is a mess. Trying to secretly teach herself to shoot. Snapping at Huck. Actually referencing Liv and Fitz's relationship out loud. She needs to be reined in. Quickly. -- Jake: Well, I'm digging up dirt on the most powerful man in the world. How dangerous could that possibly be? -- Olivia has the Ugly Cry Face down to a science. -- Cyrus and James fights are more catty than any girl fights I've ever witnessed. -- Freaked out Harrison is very unsettling. His pre-Gladiator life must have run fast and hard to have enemies that make him sweat like this even now. -- Mellie exploiting Sally's husband's wandering eye. Down and dirty. -- Oh boy. Charlie is giving Quinn shooting tips. This is going to spell bad news. Mark my words. She's already treading too close to the dark side as it is. -- I did not expect one of Cy's "people" to be the minister who squealed on Sally's intention to run against Fitz as an Independent. -- Also unexpected: that woman Jake was meeting for details on Liv's mother's flight to be there to shoot him, not provide the promised intel. Nor did I expect "mysterious man from coffee shop" to be Secret Service tailing Jake and not someone reporting back to Rowan. Keeping me on my toes, Scandal! Much more double crossing and I will start wondering if Scandal relocated to Dallas. -- OMG. Fitz didn't know, has never known, that Liv's mother was on the plane that was shot down. The plane it sure seems Fitz shot out of the sky in association with Operation Remington.

**(Once Upon a Time, S3E7 "Dark Hollow") Meanwhile, back in Storybrooke... I've been wondering what's been going on back there as our little expedition crew has been stumbling around Neverland. -- Who are those guys in the old car that managed to get into Storybrooke before Belle cast the cloaking spell?? -- Snow. Is. Mad. At. Charming. (But even when they fight and yell at each other, there's so much love evident underneath that I can sort of see how Regina has had enough time with them. -- The "power of Rumplestiltskin and Belle's love" is Chip! Nailed it! -- Neal: It's not a star map. It's what we're going to use to trap Pan's Shadow. Hook: Coconut? Are you daft? Neal: You came to Neverland on a pirate ship through a portal. You draw the line at a magic coconut? -- The mysterious guys in Storybrooke are the Darling boys and that's Wendy Darling that Pan's kept hidden in the cage?!