Carrie and Brody are back - and things are just as messed up as ever. If you missed the season premiere of the awesome (and now Emmy-winning) Homeland, you can check it out below and then read Scott Collura's IGN review!
If you've seen Matt Fowler's IGN review of the Dexter season premiere, you know he was quite happy with it, finding it a big return to form for the series - a sentiment shared by many of here at IGN, myself included. But if you haven't seen the episode yet, what are you waiting for? You can watch Dexter: "Are You...?", right here, right now!
How I Met Your Mother’s Season 8 premiere ended with a big moment for the series – Ted and the still-unidentified Mother seen at some point “a little ways down the road” waiting at the same train station, presumably about to meet.
If you’re worried they’ll be a swerve, and she’ll walk away before Ted talks to her or some such, don't fret. HIMYM creators Craig Thomas and Carter Bays recently spoke to the press about Season 8, with Thomas firmly stating, regarding that train station, “That’s the moment we’re gonna meet the mother. We can honestly say that. That’s where it happens. We’re moments away.” Said Bays, “That moment is something we’ve been building to for a long time and we’ll see more of that moment as the series goes on.”
Bays noted that back in Season 6, Ted said, “When I met your mother, it was the day of a wedding,” and added, “We specifically at that time made it the day of a wedding, not at a wedding. I think a lot of people were a little misled by that, which I feel a little bit bad about. But it’s not actually at [Robin and Barney's] wedding, it’s at that train station.”
Said Thomas with a laugh, “We like jumping to endings and then not telling you the middle. It’s very sort of awkward storytelling when you think about it, but we enjoy it! We’re gonna fill in all of the blanks on that day for sure. That day is the biggest day in the history of the group, obviously, and that’s where the series is heading. We’re getting close now.”
Just how close is still being figured out, since it’s still not clear for sure whether Season 8 is the final one for How I Met Your Mother or if it will be renewed for Season 9. But as Carter and Bays explained, for now, they are moving forward as though this is the final year. [Click the link below for more on the unusual situation the show is in]
How I Met Your Mother Creators on the Potential for Season 9
Asked again about whether the show might bring in the mother before the very end and continue with her as a character, rather than introduce her at the very end, Thomas replied, “That’s one of the biggest questions of the series and people ask us all the time. I feel like I haven't come up with a good way to dodge it yet, so I’ll just say, 'I’m dodging that!' It’s certainly something we’ve talked about and considered. But I don’t wanna say whether we’ve committed to it. Wait and see.”
Bays and Thomas said that through the eight years of the show, their plan for how HIMYM would end hasn’t changed. Said Thomas, “It’s the same plan. It’s the same plan we’ve always had. So if you hate it when you see it, just know that we committed really early to it. We were 29!”
As for what else is to come before that ending arrives…
Right now, Ted has reunited with Victoria (Ashley Williams), Barney is engaged to Quinn (Becki Newton) and Robin has begun dating "Crush" (Michael Trucco) . But because of the way How I Met Your Mother works, we know all these relationships are doomed. Which is why the showrunners don’t mind spoiling that coming soon is what Bays joked is “the break up month!” for all those couples.
As Thomas noted, “We’ve shown you the end of all these relationships. We know that Ted doesn’t marry Victoria, we know that Barney doesn’t marry Quinn. So we’re showing you this sort of path of carnage of these relationships. I think ultimately the challenge was can all three of these breakups be completely different from each other? Can there be a funny one, can there be a dramatic one, can there be this? And I think we’ve done it. That’s the goal of breakup month – to show you three completely different disillusions of relationships. I think everyone, including the guest cast – like Michael Truco, Becki Newton – everybody got to be great in all of it. We’ve shot all of that now and we’re happy with it."
Meanwhile, “[November] sweeps will really heat up that progression of Barney and Robin getting back together and I think we’ve come up with a fun, weirdly appropriate way to reunite them in a whole new way that I hope that everyone will like. It’s a weird way to get them back together, but it’s really fun.”
Thomas Lennon popped up in the season premiere as Victoria’s fiancée, and Bays and Thomas revealed he’d be in at least one more episode. In addition, his fellow The State alum, Joe Lo Truglio will be introduced as the partner to Martin Short’s character, Garrison Cootes, at Marshall’s law firm.
As for "Crush", while he was briefly seen back in Season 6 and in the premiere, future episodes will establish that he’s what Thomas described as, “sort of a struggling, cable access chef. He’s really awful and searching for his perfect chef catchphrase.” Added Thomas, “We don’t want to give away too much away about the character, because we kind of have a little reveal about him. His relationship with Robin will delightfully implode during breakup month.”
How I Met Your Mother has had a ton of memorable guest characters over the years. So with the end in sight, might we see some more familiar faces again? Revealed Bays, “Yeah, we have a plan actually – and this might be a very expensive plan. We have a plan to bring back many, many people that we’ve had on the show. Not to completely steal their idea, but I enjoyed the Seinfeld finale, when you saw everyone that’s ever been on the show and we have a way to do that that sort of fits in with the universe of our show. So hopefully there will be a cavalcade of familiar faces going into the final episode.”
In the meantime, True Blood’s Joe Manganiello is confirmed to be returning this season as Brad, Marshall’s old friend. Said Thomas, “He went to law school with Marshall and he’ll come back as a lawyer and will feature into the trial [involving Marshall’s firm].”
Adding a baby to a long-running sitcom can be a tricky thing. So will that addition become central to Marshall and Lily’s storylines and How I Met Your Mother itself this season? Said Thomas, with a knowing laugh, “This is what I’d like to believe… We are tending to the fact that they have a baby more than some other shows have, I think, but I don’t feel like the baby takes over the show… It feels like they have a baby, but not like the show is all baby, all the time. That’s what we’re shooting for.”
Bays and Thomas noted that they were often using what Thomas described as a, “Really creepy, lifelike stunt baby. It’s the creepiest thing I’ve ever touched – and I’ve touched some creepy things! So a fun game this season is pick out the creepy, fake baby if you want to do that sort of as a drinking game at home.
As our time with Bays and Thomas was wrapping up. I had to ask the duo: If How I Met Your Mother is wrapping up soon, we have to see Robin Sparkles again, right?
Replied Bays, “That’s always hanging out there as a thing we want to go back to - I think one more time before we hang it up.”
Added Thomas, “We have an idea. The challenge is always to do it and have it be completely different than the others. I’d like to think that all three that we’ve done have been different and we have a way to do it that I think would be completely different from all the other three. So yeah, we want to do it before the series ends.”
How I Met Your Mother airs Mondays at 8pm on CBS.
We are right in the thick of the fall TV season debuts, with the premiere episodes coming at us day after day. For that reason, we're collecting all of our premiere reviews -- whether for new or returning series -- in one handy place. Check 'em out below, and bookmark this page, as more will be added in the days to come!
The Big Bang Theory: Season 6 Premiere Review
South Park: Midseason Premiere Review
Elementary: Series Premiere Review
Brickleberry: Series Premiere Review
How I Met Your Mother: Season 9 Premiere Review
The Neighbors: Series Premiere Review
Last Resort: Series Premiere Review
The Office: Season 9 Premiere Review
Parks and Recreation: Season 5 Premiere Review
Sons of Anarchy: Season 5 Premiere Review
Click Here for more Sons of Anarchy: Season 5 episode reviews!
Boardwalk Empire: Season 3 Premiere Review
Click Here for more Boardwalk Empire: Season 3 episode reviews!
Revolution: Series Premiere Review
Click Here for more Revolution episode reviews!
Doctor Who: Season 7 Premiere Review
Click Here for more Doctor Who: Season 7 episode reviews!
Guys with Kids: Series Premiere Review
The New Normal: Series Premiere Review
Ben and Kate: Series Premiere Review
The Mindy Project: Series Premiere Review
After its usual summer break, South Park is returning for the second half of Season 16 tonight - actually a couple of weeks earlier than usual.
The midseason premiere, "Sarcastaball," is a Randy-centric one, as Randy becomes concerned about safety during football games at South Park Elementary. while the new rules he brings to the game end up being adopted by the entire nation, one gifted student emerges as a star athlete in Sarcastaball.
South Park: "Sarcastaball" airs Wednesday, September 26th at 10pm on Comedy Central. Click on the image below for larger versions of images from the episode.
We are right in the thick of the fall TV season debuts, with the premiere episodes coming at us day after day. For that reason, we're collecting all of our premiere reviews -- whether for new or returning series -- in one handy place. Check 'em out below, and bookmark this page, as more will be added in the weeks to come!
The Neighbors: Series Premiere Review
Last Resort: Series Premiere Review
Parks and Recreation: Season 5 Premiere Review
Sons of Anarchy: Season 5 Premiere Review
Boardwalk Empire: Season 3 Premiere Review
Click Here for more Boardwalk Empire: Season 3 episode reviews!
Revolution: Series Premiere Review
Doctor Who: Season 7 Premiere Review
Click Here for more Doctor Who: Season 7 episode reviews!
Guys with Kids: Series Premiere Review
The New Normal: Series Premiere Review
Ben and Kate: Series Premiere Review
The Mindy Project: Series Premiere Review
Note: Full spoilers for the Sons of Anarchy: Season 5 premiere follow.
Sons of Anarchy returned with its usual complex storylines and characters intact, introduced new twists and turns, and added intriguing new recurring cast members in Jimmy Smits (Dexter) and Harold Perrineau (Lost). As SAMRCO’s reigning President, Jax Teller (Charlie Hunnam) had to deal with threats on various fronts, from the business side of things to the personal. So, in other words, just a typical day for SAMCRO.
There was plenty of plot to go around between the deal with the cartel, Roosevelt still snooping around, the battle with the Niners, home invasions in Charming and the new danger from revenge-seeking Damon Pope. Add to that all the interpersonal drama after the fallout from the power shakeup in the last season, and you’ve got a packed episode that didn’t have any trouble filling up the extra time it had for the season premier. The confrontational scenes - Jax and Opie, Gemma and Tara, Roosevelt and Juice, to name a few - were given enough time to help us keep the various threads in mind, and none bogged down the episode's momentum.
After the events of last season, Clay (Ron Perlman) appeared to be a broken man, both physically and emotionally. But if you thought that losing his position of power would make Clay less dangerous, that was a mistake. Using a trick I wouldn’t have guessed Clay had in his arsenal, he played a version of the sympathy card. Feeding the club partial truths, he managed to spill enough facts to potentially be let off several hooks. That all of this happened under Jax’s disbelieving glare from the other side of the table made for a great scene. It will be interesting to see what happens next between these two perpetually sparring opponents.
Jax is not amused.
With an introductory scene that was memorable, to say the least, Smits joined the cast as Nero Padilla, who humorously described himself as a “companionator,” rather than the more mundane term of pimp. So far, Smits was a breath of fresh air, with his smooth talk and immediate affection for Gemma. And it was somewhat amusing that on this show the pimp character was the one portrayed as carefree and (comparatively) above-the-law.
Gemma’s state of mind was troubling, especially seeing the tough former queen of the club so confused about how she ended up at Nero’s. Gemma’s behavior was paralleled nicely with Tara’s situation. Tara may appear to be dealing with things, but the quick shot of her at the end of the episode contradicted that. Both Katey Sagal and Maggie Siff continued their excellent performances of two strong women navigating the tricky waters of SAMCRO, trying to control their situations the best they can, while things continued to unravel for both of them.
With a less flashy intro than Smits, Perrineau also made his first appearance count as Damon Pope, father of the girl Tig killed last season. Pope’s quietly powerful demeanor was convincingly menacing, even before he set in motion the object lesson for Jax and SAMCRO where the new head of the Niners was murdered in front of them. His ruthlessness combined with his desire to appear to be an upstanding member of the community was a bit reminiscent of Breaking Bad’s Gus Fring, one of the more frightening villains TV has given us recently. If there was any question that Pope is a force to be reckoned with this season, the horrific scene with Tig and his daughter should put that to rest.
With all the above in play this season, I almost laughed out loud at Tara’s exasperated, “Now what?” when the phone call came in that the police were looking to arrest Jax, Chibs and Tig. She should know by now that there is always going to be something going terribly wrong with this group of guys. If previous seasons are any indication, the mess SAMCRO is in so far is just the tip of the iceberg.
