Sgt. Angle reporting for duty!

Smoke Monster if you got ‘im.

Today should’ve been the air-date for the series finale of LOST, but for reasons understood by anyone who ever followed the show, it aired on Sunday night, May 23. I won’t go into plot details or a discussion of what happened, what I wish would’ve happened, or how I would’ve wrapped things up. Instead, I’ll tell you what you should be watching this summer, and then next season, in place of this glorious show.

This summer: Catch up on Breaking Bad’s domino effect of unfolding events and consequences, Mad Men’s hypnotic period drama, and the archived episodes of Futurama, Family Guy and Robot Chicken on Adult Swim. Take a trip down Starz’ original programming and Party Down with the hilarity of Party Down, perhaps one of the funniest shows NOT seen on television. You can stream it or rent it on Netflix.com NOW! Do so! That is an order.

Next season, you won’t be able to get caught up in the episodic crime and punishment of the original, 21-season-long Law & Order — NBC has FINALLY canceled the original — but you can still simmer over the cases in L & O SVU, Criminal Intent, and Los Angeles. Yikes! So much crime!

On Fox, please get yourself deeply involved in Fringe, a great show that faltered a bit in season two but hit the finale with such an impactful story and cliffhanger, it’s as good as anything the Bad Robot team as made since Locke blew the door from the hatch on that fateful island, way back when. Plus, Fringe has the added advantage of Lt. Daniels himself, Lance Reddick.

All of me is watching you.

Friday Night Lights will end next season, though you can currently catch season four on NBC. I have raved about this show, and others, many times before — but that’s only because these shows are good. I wouldn’t lie to you, my soldiers.

This is the part of the programming when I tell you about NEW shows premiering next season. Let me know what you’re most looking forward to in the comments below. I can put up the results next week.

ABC — The Whole Truth: Jerry Bruckheimer produced series that shows criminal cases from all perspectives. My Generation: Mockumentary following a group of former high-school classmates. How much you wanna bet that one of the lead females will have a Pixie haircut? Mr. Sunshine: Matthew Perry as a sports stadium manager. And it’s a comedy. AND it co-stars Allison Janney and the pilot is directed by fellow West Wing veteran Thomas Schlamme. Finally, for ABC, we’ll have the adorable Happy Endings starring Elisha Cuthbert as one of a “group of friends navigating romance.” SOOOOOO original. ABC can do better (see: Modern Family).

NBC (NO MORE HEROES!!!!!) — Nothing much exciting on NBC, other than the cancellation of Law & Order, the shifting of some time slots, and, of course, J.J. Abrams directs his first TV Pilot with Undercovers, about a pair of spies who retired after falling in love, and are drawn back into espionage, which rekindles their marriage. Right. But you should come back to NBC anyhow, if only for 30 Rock and the glorious Community.

CW — We don’t care. You shouldn’t, either, unless you’re under 18 and female. However, in honor of the Superman himself coming to an end with a final season of Smallville next year, here’s a tribute video:

FOX – Thanks to American Idol pulling back it’s results show to a half-hour next season, the network of ups (Fringe) and downs (ahem, American Idol) has more room for half-hour comedies. No word yet on what those shows might be. No word, either, on what date we’ll get to meet Steven Spielberg’s television contribution, Terra Nova, “a dino-drama about a family from 100 years in the future that travels back in time 150 million years.”

In the meantime, you’re stuck with Glee running the entire season, with a small hiatus mid-season followed by the post-Superbowl slot. However, you should probably check out The Good Guys, starring Colin Hanks and Bradley Whitford a.k.a. Josh Lyman of The West Wing fame. Here, Lyman plays a veteran cop with a rugged, old-fashioned way of solving crimes — much to the disdain of his by-the-book young partner in the petty crimes division.

Keep all of the above when choosing your next “relationship with a show.” Also note that the director of many great LOST episodes, as well as the divisive finale, Jack Bender, will direct the pilot to SyFy’s Alphas, about a group of people with unique mental abilities. Syfy’s original programming is getting pretty great, silly TV movies aside. In a few weeks, I’ll give you a debriefing on why you should look forward to SyFy for all of your future viewing pleasure.

For now, I will leave you with a clip from the pretty good pilot from The Good Guys (moustache!).

You are dismissed!

Sgt. Angle

A few years ago I was injured while fighting a bear.  I killed the bear, but not without a price — I sprained my ankle.  Yes, I know it’s hard to believe that I could have suffered injury at the hands of so small a beast, but it is true.  I was out of “work” for a few weeks and I asked my friends and family to give me ideas for things to do while bedridden for a while (it was a very serious sprain).  One of my friends offered me his collection of a show called Smallville, maybe you’ve heard of it?  Well, as someone who loves a good comic book and an on-again, off-again fan of the man of steel, I took up this well-intentioned gift and finished (what was) the entire show in a few weeks.  I was in no way enamored or in love, but it was entertaining enough to pass the time and he gave me the whole collection at once so, there you have it.

If the power rangers were from Kansas…

Now from what I understand  the show is still on after 50 or 60 seasons now and Clark has yet to don his iconic dress and Mr. Luthor left the show — meh.  Normally I wouldn’t care enough about a megacorporation raping established cannon like this, but I heard something the other day that rattled my geeky cage; a young boy was with his mother inside of a Target, begging her for one of the seasons on DVD.  The mother denied him and he went on to say, “But I need to know if Clark and Chloe get together.”  I couldn’t help myself and butted in, “You know Lois and Clark end up together in the end, right?”  The child looked at me like I punched his mother and replied, “Maybe in the comics, but Smallville isn’t like the comics, it’s actually good!”  I then punched the child.  His mother took offense so I punched her as well.  Then I grabbed all of the Smallville DVDs, stole them, and burned them in my backyard as a sacrifice to the continuity gods.

If you didn’t know this before, I’m going to fill you in on a little secret now: Smallville is a piece of sh*t.  It’s not a piece of sh*t the way a person who sleeps with your girlfriend is a piece of sh*t, scheming and conniving.  Smallville is a piece of sh*t the way Ryan Leaf is a piece of sh*t, promising, but stingy and too self-involved.

The show started with a great idea: Bruce Wayne before he becomes Batman — Great!  Wait, huh?  That’s right Smallville was originally going to be Gotham and to be honest, I’m thankful they didn’t.  Who knows how greed-rape would’ve ruined the caped crusader for me…  Anyways, after Batman’s story got axed, Alfred Gough (Shanghai Noon, Shanghai Knights, Spider-Man 2, Herbie: Fully Loaded, and The Mummy: Tomb of the Dragon Emperor) and Miles Millar (who partners with Gough on many of the previous titles, but also celebrates success with The Hannah Montana Movie) came up with the same formula for Superman — Clark in Smallville.  In and of itself a great idea!

While season one was freak-of-the-week, the following seasons have revolved around greater story arcs involving several DC characters, heroes and villains.  Okay.  Fine.  So what’s the problem?

The problem is that Smallville the TV show isn’t Smallville from the comics.  I know a lot of people defend the show saying, “Smallville is its own continuity,” but to me, that’s horse sh*t.  Why would you make a show about a younger version of the most famous superhero ever, if you’re not going to stick to the details?  It’s the details that make him great!  I can understand a few changes in the name of interpretation, but some of the stuff the CW has done is just bad (I’ll get to details in a second).

A show with this doesn’t need good writing.

And if you absolutely must change things around, do it for a good reason; if the word money comes up in the conversation, it’s not a good reason.  When I say “good” I mean “of moral fortitude,” in other words, if you’re going to have Lex Luthor live in Smallville (for much longer than he should’ve) there better be a good reason behind it.  What you’re doing at that point is changing cannon, not reinterpreting it.  A reinterpretation would be something like, changing the design of Supe’s suit, or making Lois a blonde, but creating a character named Chloe who will exist as one of the most significant characters in Clark Kent’s life is going to change his future, that’s something that’s hard for me to take.  Now, Ready for the list?

Lex don’t love dem hoes.

1.  Lex Luthor.  This guy should never have been in the show, well, at least not until Clark moved to Metropolis, or at least just for a brief stint according to cannon.  If you needed him to be in the show in order to give Clark a nemesis, than maybe a show about Superman before he was Superman wasn’t such a good idea in the first place!  What you’ve done instead is taken a series of events and moved them back in time.  That’s not really impressive…  We know Clark and Lex become enemies, I thought Smallville took place before all that.

Cute, but unnecessary, like munchkins.

2.  Chloe Sullivan.  The idea of Chloe is fine: a high-strung, headstrong reporter who will stop at nothing to “get the story.”  Are you f*cking kidding me?  I have an idea, let’s do a show about Superman before he was Superman and all we really have to do is write about superman with all the people he knows when he is superman, but make them teenagers and give them different names — SHENANIGANS!  We didn’t need Lois Lane in this show yet!  I THOUGHT IT WAS SUPPOSED TO BE BEFORE ALL THAT!  This was a cheap way to create a relationship that wasn’t supposed to happen to Clark yet…  Chloe Sullivan did not exist in the comics-proper.  I understand the need for more supporting characters in Smallville, sure you can even make some up, but do they have to be copies of people we already know and love?  PS: Allison Mack is cute.

Ginger or no, let Jimmy be.

3.  Jimmy Olsen.  You killed Jimmy Olsen?!  Clark Kent isn’t even Superman yet and you killed Jimmy Olsen?  Are you f*cking kidding me?  I know, I know:  He wasn’t really Jimmy Olsen, but Jimmy Olsen’s younger brother Jimmy Olsen.  Oh, okay.  Let me bend Ms. Continuity over a bit so it hurts less when you f*ck her!

I see: Heroes. CW sees: $$

4.  Flash, Cyborg and every other mucked up ancillary character…  Cyborg was too old, (that) Flash was too young, Aquaman, well he just sucked, Oliver Queen should’ve been the same age as Superman, Papa Kent didn’t run for Senator, and Lionel Luthor didn’t exist…  You’ve destroyed the fictional reality of Superman, please leave the rest of DC alone.

Look, I’m fine with reimaginings, I think it’s neat to see what different people do with different materials.  All I’m asking for here is a bit of discretion when referring to the “greatness” of Smallville.  If you really love the Superman mythology, go support the comic community and buy a book!  Otherwise just admit that you like the Gilmore-Girl-like writing, typical WB/CW teenage angst drama, and keep your nose out of Superman all together.  You can play with Superman, just don’t f*ck with him.

Two good things to come from Smallville?  Kreuk and Durance.  Especially Durance.

Until next time,

Mr. Wolff

**UPDATE: This video is awesome.  Thanks to broken for the heads up!