TV News and Reviews

Turns out that Ugly Betty’s current season will be interrupted at the end of March, to be replaced by Samantha Who? and In the Motherhood. Ugly Betty will play out in the summer, apparently alongside canceled series Eli Stone, Dirty Sexy Money, and Pushing Daisies. Ugly Betty fans were originally panicking at the news, but TV.com reports that ABC is very close to signing the show on to a fourth season. Apparently it was a scheduling decision to run Ugly Betty in full blocks of new episodes, rather than in pieces with reruns in between. Serial dramas apparently don’t do well in reruns, and competition from the newly slotted Bones on Thursdays was making things even more dismal for Betty.

Honestly, I’m not that invested anymore. Ugly Betty has been trying my patience time and again, making Betty into too much of a caricature and butt of all jokes–to the point that she’s the least appealing character on the show. After the episode a couple of weeks ago where Betty and her sister Hilda spent most of the hour screaming at each other, I’d pretty much had it. I felt a spark of hopefulness at the end when their father stepped in and took action for himself and his household and gave his responsibility-crazed daughters a much deserved break. So what does the show do then? It makes Betty move home, because that’s just the self-sacrificing sort she is. It didn’t make any sense, but Betty can’t be happy, see? We have to ruin it for her over and over. Gah. Who needs a depressing comedy?

Maybe things improved in following episodes, but I couldn’t bring myself to watch. Maybe if I take a break from Betty, I’ll feel more inclined to give her another shot. Ugly Betty was such an innovative and empowering show, with the widest range of characters available on network TV. It’d be a shame to abandon such a colorful series. We’ll see if absence makes the heart grow fonder.

For now, Ugly Betty airs on ABC Thursdays, 8/7c.

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America Ferrera, Ugly Betty season three screencap, c2008 ABC.

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(Spoiler Warning) I have to admit I was worried at the start of tonight’s Ugly Betty. With Betty’s linebacker-shoulder-pad-inspired dress and her getting overlooked at work again, I was bracing for the worst of Charlie Brown-itis. But Ugly Betty wins again with the surprisingly endearing pairing of Betty and Amanda (America Ferrera and Becki Newton). When both girls land a team assignment to spend a day in New York spending no money, Betty gets dragged into Amanda’s world of using charm, seduction, and just plain attitude to get bags of free samples at the make-up counter, $2000 dresses to be returned later, and free champagne and dinner from handsome modern art buying Europeans.

Of course the art buyers turned out to be scam artists who stuck the girls with the dinner bill. This, however, rather than being a typical pie-in-the-face moment for Betty turned into the best and funniest moment on the show. Terrified equally of paying such an exorbitant bill or following Amanda’s Dine and Dash suggestion, Betty calls the manager over. Handing her Mode card to the woman, she sweet-talks her about writing up the restaurant in Mode and then boldly hands the restaurant bill to the woman. What follows is 2 minutes of utter suspense, as the camera careens between Amanda’s forced, near-crazy grin, the manager’s stoic, mildly suspicious expression, and then a trickle of sweat on Betty’s brow. It was perfectly timed, crazy, and brilliant. And Betty actually won, as the manager agreed to pay the bill.

The show worked both sides equally, as Amanda was finally forced to realize that she had to take responsibility sometimes and couldn’t spend her life sponging off of other people. On the flip side, Betty learned that she doesn’t have to be wracked with guilt 24 hours a day. That sometimes it’s just okay to take a free sample and run, or let some cute guys buy you dinner (when they actually do, of course).

Ugly Betty also wowed us with more Wilhelmina (Vanessa Williams) goodness, shocking by giving us a nervous, babbling Willie in front of her crush, Connor Owens (Grant Bowler). Hearing Wilhelmina say “Top o’ the morning” and “Mate!” awkwardly to Connor was hilariously out of character, and Williams played it up just right. She also won big with an earlier exclamation in a meeting, saying she hadn’t realized New York was so expensive. When Daniel chastised her for being sarcastic, she said with all sincerity that she really hadn’t noticed.  This is where the show hits these characters just right…Wilhelmina and Amanda really do live in different worlds from the rest of us, and truly have no clue what Betty’s life experience is like.

So, all in all, a good show tonight. An added bonus was I actually enjoyed Betty’s yellow swing coat. So fun, fashion, and a moral. That’s what Betty’s all about.

Watch Ugly Betty on Thursday nights at 8pm Eastern/7pm Central, on ABC.

I was pleased to hear last week that Life on Mars was getting a second chance at life on TV by being moved to the time slot after Lost in January. What I didn’t realize was that the move meant a two-month hiatus. Last night’s episode of Life on Mars leaves us on a complete cliffhanger, with Detective Sam Tyler in an abandoned house picking up the phone to receive a call from someone who knows who he is and tells him to go to the basement. Talk about ominous. I’m not sure if a two-month layover is the answer to the ratings problem, but intense curiosity could build over that time and lead up to good ratings. Here’s hoping.

It was a strong episode leading up to the cliffhanger as well, with Sam learning hard truths about his father that he had long suppressed. This show is endlessly intriguing, because each story stands on its own, but then has the added layers of multiple interpretations based on whether you think it’s all a dream, hallucination, time travel, purgatory, etc. I’m looking forward to January and seeing how Sam’s journey of discovery continues.

And okay, so I’m still annoyed by Betty’s insane wardrobe on Ugly Betty. But I keep talking about it every week, so maybe that’s all they care about? It just seems that you could make Betty quirky–say a red dress with the butterfly belt and matching butterfly beret–without making her look like an expensively attired bag lady every week.

That said, this week’s episode was a good one. There was a lot of hurt in it, as when Betty discovers she’s won entry into an editor training program only because she’s Latina, and Justin loses his best friend to peer pressure from the band of “cool kids”. But instead of Betty getting the pie in the face repeatedly, she actually gets rewarded for once when she does the right thing and gives her training spot up to arch-rival Mark. This is when I love Ugly Betty–when you take someone like Mark and show the depth behind his over-the-top preening and Wilhelmina butt-kissing. Mark and Betty sharing a moment of solidarity as two put-upon assistants who hope to make it to bigger and better things was a sterling moment–and more of the reason I started watching Ugly Betty in the first place.

It was also nice to see Daniel being Betty’s friend again, and to see Betty’s family providing their unwavering support as always. Betty’s sister Hilda once again is perfect as an over-the-top diva who devotedly loves her son just as he is.