Year:  2011
Genre:  Comic book, Action
Country:  United States
Languages:  English
Starring:  Chris Hemsworth, Natalie Portman, Anthony Hopkins, Tom Hiddleston, Stellan Skarsgard, Kat Dennings, Ray Stevenson, Idris Elba, Colm Feore, Clark Gregg, Rene Russo
Cameo:  Samuel L. Jackson
Director:  Kenneth Branagh
Run time:  115 minutes
DVD distributor:  Paramount Home Entertainment

     Thor has as much going for it as it has working against it.  The cast is truly amazing – Natalie Portman, Anthony Hopkins, Stellan Skarsgard, Kat Dennings, Colm Feore, Rene Russo – tons of my favourites.  But without exception, every talented actor in the movie is given nothing to do.  The star, Chris Hemsworth, seems to be better at flexing than he is at acting, but then that’s really all he is asked to do.

     Thor, you see, is the god with whom we are all familiar – Norse, muscular, long blond hair and blue eyes, hammer.  He lives in Asgard with his father Odin (Anthony Hopkins), his brother/step-brother/something else Loki, and his small clique of friends.  The realm of Asgard was once menaced by some creatures who appear to be half-monster, half-popsicle.  They proved very easy to smash, being frozen and all, and Odin smashed enough of them to achieve peace.

     Now, as Odin is preparing to hand the crown of the kingdom to his eldest son Thor, these popsicle-beasts suddenly return to be smashed easily once more.  Thor, showing just how young and headstrong he is, rushes out to the Kingdom Of The Popsicle Monsters to wreak havoc and vengeance upon them.  He and his clique are almost killed in the battle, until they are saved by Odin and brought back safely to Asgard.

     Now, Odin knows that his son is too headstrong and, frankly, stupid to become king.  One would hope a wise old man would have realized this before he was mere seconds away from crowning the idiot – but some parents are just blind when it comes to their kids’ deficiencies.

     Thor is cast out of Asgard for having started a war which will lead to much bloodshed.  He ends up on Earth, of course, because otherwise how could there be a movie?  Once there, he meets a bunch of scientists – Portman, Skarsgard and Dennings.  Skarsgard and Dennings are there to sit on chairs while the action plays out, Portman is there to look pretty and eventually fall in love with Thor for no apparent reason.  This works, because he falls for her also for no apparent reason.  They’re the perfect couple!  Beautiful but vapid!

     The rest of the movie consist mainly of Thor searching for his hammer, a government agency hiding his hammer, and Thor beating up government agents in search of his hammer.  There’s a whole lot of flexing and fighting and Thor establishing his ass-kicking bona fides.  Then, of course, the big threat to humanity appears, Thor kicks its ass, and the stage is set for the big super-movie that will partner Thor with Captain America, Iron Man and the Hulk.

     I can’t wait for that super-movie.  Captain America was awful.  Thor is passable at best.  Iron Man was great, and The Hulk was pretty good, but the longer we wait for the big everyone-together movie, the more likely it is we’ll have to suffer through Iron Man 3 or something equally horrible.  Like maybe Thor 2.  Ugh.

Year:  1961
Genre:  Classic, Romance, Comedy
Country:  United States
Language:  English
Starring:  Audrey Hepburn, George Peppard, Patricia Neal, Buddy Ebsen, Mickey Rooney 
Director:  Blake Edwards
Run time:  115 minutes
DVD distributor:  Paramount Home Entertainment

     I have always felt that Breakfast At Tiffany’s is one of the most over-rated “classic” movies out there.  I still like it, of course it’s still good.  But one of the greatest movies of all time?  Hardly.  It features an unlikeable main character who does irritating things and is rewarded for it, and a pretty offensive Chinese caricature from Mickey Rooney.  Well, it was 1961.

     That being said, the new Blu-Ray version of Breakfast At Tiffany’s, out September 20th from Paramount Home Entertainment, is well worth having.  One of the great things about the film is the look.  The costumes, the fashion, and Audrey Hepburn’s smoking hotness.  All come through magnificently in high definition.

     The thing is, I’ve seen all this before.  And by “all this”, I mean the movie itself, the commentary with it, and every one of the special features.  Everything you get on this new Blu-Ray disc is identical to what you got on the Centennial Collection edition of Breakfast At Tiffany’s, released a couple of years ago by Paramount.  The same “style icon” featurettes, even the same trailers.  So although the Blu-Ray is the one to pick up if you have NO copies of Breakfast at Tiffany’s, it’s unnecessary if you already have the last edition.

Years:  2010, 2011
Genre:  TV series, Cop, Drama
Country:  United States
Language:  English
Starring:  Alex O’Loughlin, Scott Caan, Daniel Dae Kim, Grace Park
DVD distributor:  Paramount Home Entertainment

     There are very few similarities between the original Hawaii Five-O and the new one.  Only the surface of the show remains the same – cops in Hawaii, McGarrett and Danno and Chin Ho, the classic theme song.  Aside from that, the substance is markedly different.  Rather than being a calculated, clever chess master always one step ahead of the bad guys, McGarrett is a gung-ho, muscular tattooed badass killing machine demolitions expert sniper ex-Navy SEAL.  Like so many other cops on so many other shows.

     He and Danno have the standard, seen-so-often buddy cop relationship where they yell at each other and then love each other and then beat up suspects together.  And of course, because this is a show that popped up in 2010, it has to have the HOT, ass-kicking chick.  In this case Grace Park, who is an all-new character on the show.

     Much as I complain though, it’s hard not to be entertained by such a shiny, polished-until-it-gleams program.  It’s all gunfights and car chases and fighting with fists, and precious little police work, but as far as escapism goes, that’s pretty standard.  In the end, this first season felt familiar to me, and comfortable.  Not because it was anything like the original Hawaii Five-O (look to CSI: Miami for the similarities there), but because it’s just like NCIS: LA, Criminal Minds: Suspect Behaviour and every other show out there.

Years:  1978, 1979
Genre:  TV series, Cop, Drama
Country:  United States
Language:  English
Starring:  Jack Lord, James MacArthur, Kam Fong, Al Harrington
Creator:  Leonard Freeman
Run time:  19 hours, 51 minutes
DVD distributor:  Paramount Home Entertainment

     Season Eleven of Hawaii Five-O was on television when I was an embryo.  Or a zygote.  So it’s odd for me to feel intense nostalgia for something I never experienced at the time when it would have actually been nostalgic.  But I guess it takes a really silly retread of something to create that feeling – having just watched the first season of the new Hawaii Five-O, I actually DO long for a simpler time.

     A time when Wo Fat was a cartoonish evildoer, a creepy Bond-like villain.  A time when the bikini girls were just gratuitous montage shots between scenes, rather than actual members of the cast.  A time when Chin Ho was just some guy in the police station, rather than a main character with a suspect back story.  And a time when McGarrett and Danno had to worry about mafia and punks and corporate killers, instead of serial killers and terrorists.

     Most of all though, I miss the realistic banter between McGarrett and Danno – banter that came easily and naturally between two men of the law who respected and liked each other, and came only occasionally when it fit.  So much better than the forced buddy-cop love-hate banter that has become a prerequisite for all cop shows of today.  Today, McGarrett and Danno fight over food, over the radio, over their driving, over everything.  In the 70s, they just solved crimes.  Oh, the good old days.

     Thankfully, as Paramount Home Entertainment releases the first season of the NEW Hawaii Five-O on DVD today, they are also releasing the eleventh season of the old Hawaii Five-O.  I think it’s clear which one I recommend more.

Year:  2010
Genre:  Kids, Cartoon, TV series
Country:  United States
Language:  English
Starring:  Bill Fagerbakke, Carolyn Lawrence, Clancy Brown
Director:  Paul Tibbitt
DVD distributor:  Paramount Home Entertainment

     New data shows that Spongebob is bad for your kids’ brains.  At least in the short term.  Is it worse than video games?  Dunno.  The study didn’t say.  Worse than constant thumb-numbing texting?  Who knows.  All the study really said was that Spongebob is worse for kids than those PBS documentaries that they tend to watch all the time.

     Recently, I was able to tear the kids away from the Ken Burns Civil War documentary series they were watching to put in the new Spongebob DVD, Runaway Road Trip.  (Out September 20th from Paramount Home Entertainment.)  Sure, they grumbled, and complained a little, and made sure I kept the Civil War DVD out so they could go back to it and learn what became of Nathan Bedford Forrest.

     I’m a lot like my kids.  I also grumble a little when it comes time to view a new Spongebob DVD.  It’s one of those shows where I forget my love for it as soon as a week has gone by and I haven’t seen an episode.  Thankfully, a new Spongebob DVD is released once every three weeks – maybe even more often than Neil Young releases albums and compilations and DVDs.  So I don’t get too much time to become disillusioned with the show.

     Then I put on the new DVD, like Runaway Road Trip, and fall right back in love.  This one is all about vacations (a “staycation” with Patrick, a cruise with Mr. Krabs and stowaway Plankton, a trip to the Bikini Bottom mint with Mr. Krabs and Pearl, and a road trip with Patrick and Spongebob’s parents).

     Here is where I think Spongebob might actually be bad for kids.  Spongebob’s name is…well, Spongebob.  His parent’s names are Claire and Harold.  They are clearly sea sponges – all mishapen blobs that look like Mr. Potato Heads.  HE is a ready-made square, yellow kitchen sponge.  That raises a lot of questions.  Designer babies?  Genetic tampering?  Children for corporate profit?  That stuff could really mess with kids heads.

     Now, back to MY kids and Nathan Bedford Forrest.

Year:   2010, 2011
Genre:  TV series, Crime, Drama
Country:  United States
Languages:  English
Starring:  Tom Selleck, Donnie Wahlberg, Bridget Moynahan, Will Estes, Jennifer Esposito, Len Cariou, Amy Carlson, Nicholas Turturro
Creators:  Robin Green, Mitchell Burgess
DVD distributor:  Paramount Home Entertainment

     The one problem I have with Blue Bloods is how over-the-top American it is.  When the family gets together for their weekly dinner, and they discuss the subject matter of the day – which almost always relates to the case they were working on that day – it feels like a crappy episode of Crossfire or The View or one of any number of political pundit shows in the States.

     The rest of the show is uber-American too – the tough-guy, ends-justify-the-means attitude, the “rugged individualism”, the hero-cops and the flags in the background.  Sure, they try to temper that with their forced, awkward round-table discussions at dinner, but it’s pretty clear at all times just what the “right” answer is to all their debates.

     That being said, getting the negative stuff out of the way first, I do like the show.  Season One comes out September 13th from Paramount Home Entertainment, and the cast is the best thing about it.  Tom Selleck’s moustache oozes authenticity as the police commissioner.  Will Estes is excellent as his son, a new recruit to the police department and a beat cop.  Bridget Moynahan, as the New York assistant DA (and Selleck’s daughter) is lovely and perfect, and Donnie Wahlberg (the older brother, tough-guy rule-bending cop) is the best part of the show.

     Unfortunately, because this is New York City, and the show is so very American, a lot of the episodes have to deal with terrorist plots and terror cells and terrorism.  It still crackles along at a terrific pace, with just enough lulls for some Tom Selleck wisdom or some Bridget Moynahan moralizing.  And when the cases are more usual – abducted children and so forth – the show is truly excellent.

Year:  2010 
Genre:  Documentary, Sports
Country:  United States
Language:  English
Director:  Nina Gilden Seavey
Run time:  89 minutes
DVD distributor:  First Run Features

     I am a fanatic for NFL football.  I go down to the states every year for at least one game, I never miss a Sunday, I PVR all the games I might miss and I’m in about twelve pools every year.  My basement is decorated all in Packers green and gold, and my chili goes in the slow cooker every Saturday night to be ready for game time on Sunday.

     But I have nothing on millions of Americans.  For me, NFL football is just a time-consuming, much-loved hobby.  For others, it is a life-consuming religion.  And so it is for many kids who play the game.  The NFL is the ultimate dream, playing on Sunday in front of 80,000 people and millions more on television. 

     4th & Goal, out September 20th on DVD from First Run Features, follows six of these young men, all of them from the same elite school, as they try to make that dream come true.  As an NFL fanatic, I know that one of these kids DID make it.  If you’re a freak like me, you’ll know his name the second you hear it also.

     More interesting though, are the other five kids, all blessed with termendous talent of one kind or another, who don’t make it.  For one reason or another (they are mentally unprepared – they get injured – they’re just plain passed over), they are probably not going to get a real shot at the NFL.  And their coaches seem to spend a lot of time preparing them for that eventuality.

     The fact is, less than 2,000 people get to play in the NFL each year, while several million play the game at a lower level.  4th and Goal is a terrific look into this world, and fascinating to me as a football fan.  For every special teams player I see on a Sunday, there are thousands of one-time high school or college superstars who never made it. 

     One more note – my wife, who hates football and my obsession with it, loved this movie.  After watching The Blind Side, she started watching Ravens games for Michael Oher.  Now, she wants to watch the Bengals.  The Bengals!  (The one guy who made it from this film now plays for Cincy.)  This MUST be a good documentary if my football-hating WIFE is interested in the game.  If only for the next few weeks, until she discovers that Bengals games are not ever going to be shown on TV, because they’re the Bengals.

Year:  2010 
Genre:  Documentary
Countries:  United States, Mexico
Languages:  English, Spanish
Director:  Aaron Schock
Run time:  75 minutes
DVD distributor:  First Run Features

     Circo is a beautifully filmed, wonderfully scored documentary (music provided by Calexico).  It follows a traveling circus as they try to make a living and hold their family together.  It’s a sad story, a look into a really tragic sort of world, but it’s as compelling as it is visually stunning.

     The tragedy lies mostly with the children, I think.  They have been groomed from birth to be circus performers, no more and certainly no less.  They are mostly illiterate, they have zero skills outside the tightrope or contortionist arenas, and they know nothing else.  Watching a grandfather berate a toddler until she cries while attempting to do gymnastics moves is heartbreaking.

     I guess for these people, in this situation, it’s a lot like the overbearing hockey parents here in Canada.  Except that it’s a little more than that, because at least hockey parents have a bonkers, unrealistic goal of a child making millions of dollars and becoming famous.  These parents, on the other hand, have the goal of turning their kids into faceless, penniless circus performers with no other life skills at all.

     Watching Circo, in many ways, reminded me a lot of watching The Wrestler with Mickey Rourke.  Both are stories about people who know only one thing in their whole lives, and don’t know how, or want to learn how, to do anything else.  The only real difference is that one is fictional.  Circo is a documentary about real people, a real circus, and real family problems.

     Those family problems are at the heart of the story – the Ponce family has been doing this for years.  Packing up their acrobats and animals and moving from town to town.  Clearly a hardscrabble existence, with some shows making money and some not, the family begins to come apart at the seams.

     There’s a father who knows nothing but the circus, like his own father and his father before him.  There is his wife, who came from the city and is therefore not accepted by everyone in the traveling troupe.  And their kids, torn between mom’s desire for a stable life and financial security and dad’s single-minded determination to cling to a lifestyle that appears to be dying or, maybe, already dead.

     All of this is fascinating, but it’s the camera that is the real star of this movie.  Capturing the family’s difficult, hard-working existence in the middle of a wonderful Mexican countryside.  The beauty of the land between towns as they pass by contrasted with the dirty conditions and poverty they encounter in the towns themselves is stark.  It all works.

Year:   2010, 2011
Genre:  TV series, Lawyer, Drama
Country:  United States
Languages:  English
Starring:  Julianna Margulies, Archie Panjabi, Chris Noth, Matt Czuchry, Christine Baranski, Graham Phillips, Makenzie Vega, Josh Charles
Guest stars:  Alan Cumming, Titus Welliver, Sarah Silverman, Miranda Cosgrove, Michael J. Fox, Ken Leung, Jerry Stiller, Rita Wilson, America Ferrera, Lou Dobbs (as himself – of course), Fred Thompson 
Eye candy:  Margulies, Panjabi, Wilson, Silverman
Creators:  Robert King, Michelle King
Producers:  Tony Scott, Ridley Scott
DVD distributor:  Paramount Home Entertainment

     I said of Season One of The Good Wife that it was a legal drama pretending to be something else.  In that case, I meant it pretended to be about this woman (Julianna Margulies) and her strained relationship with her philandering politician husband (Chris Noth), when in reality it was a good, solid, compelling legal drama.  The rest was just window dressing.

     In the second season, out September 13th from Paramount Home Entertainment, I am of a different opinion.  In the second season, the show is more about the relationship, Peter’s re-election bid, and the office politics than it is about the actual courtroom.

     Kalinda (Archie Panjabi) is relegated to a secondary, (fairly tedious) game of one-upmanship with the firm’s new investigator.  She is involved in a bombshell later in the season – although when you think about this “bombshell”, it should likely NOT have been as big a deal as it was…

     The season is kind of all over the place – the kids get involved with dad’s campaign and screw things up.  The firm is going to split, then they’re not, then they are.  Alicia is getting along better with her husband, then she isn’t, then the bombshell.  His campaign right-hand man is screwing things up for her and Will, who still may or may not get together.

     And in the middle of all this, some court cases.  Miranda Cosgrove (iCarly) shows up as a young music superstar accused of attempted murder, much like Miranda Cosgrove in real life.  Except for the attempted murder.  Michael J. Fox shows up as a cut-throat lawyer and steals the show every time he’s on screen, he’s fabulous.  Other great guest stars include Sarah Silverman, Ken Leung, and Lou Dobbs as himself sowing discord between the partners (especially the left-leaning Christine Baranski).

     In the end, it’s actually the guest stars who carry the bulk of the second season.  They’re good enough to keep it rolling nicely.  Well, Michael J. Fox, Fred Thompson, Miranda Cosgrove and Julianna Margulies who is as magnificent as ever.  I still like The Good Wife a lot, even though it’s quite a bit different for me than it was in Season One.  But just like that first season, I sat down and watched the entire DVD.  As I recommend you do too.

Year:  2011
Genre:  TV series, Crime, Drama
Country:  United States
Languages:  English
Starring:  Kristen Vangsness, Forest Whitaker, Janeane Garofalo, Michael Kelly, Beau Garrett, Matt Ryan
DVD distributor:  Paramount Home Entertainment

     CBS really has no one to blame but themselves for the cancellation of Criminal Minds: Suspect Behavior.  The only reason this show was canceled was that…it was created in the first place.  There was nowhere to go but down from there.  First off, they didn’t really bother creating a cool new title for the show.  Suspect Behavior is, after all, what Criminal Minds is all about.  They’re basically calling the show Criminal Minds: Criminal Minds.  Not that NCIS: LA or CSI: NY or CSI: Miami are that much more inventive, but at least they aren’t redundant.

     The thing is, I LIKE Suspect Behavior.  Yes, it’s exactly like all the other police procedurals out there, exactly like the original Criminal Minds.  But with Forest Whitaker, Janeane Garofalo and a very cool cast, it actually manages to be better at doing the exact same thing.  I think.

     Then again, it’s a moot point.  After all, the show WAS canceled, and all we will ever have is this one DVD volume that ends with Garofalo being kidnapped and Forest Whitaker about to blow some guy away.  I would call this a cliffhanger, but does anyone really think something crazy was going to happen?  They did plan to make a second season, which is why they would end with a cliffhanger.  So for the uber-fan(s) of this show, know this – Garofalo would have been saved, Whitaker would not have shot the guy, and Episode 2 would have been right back into more of the same.

     That, really, is the only real problem with Criminal Minds: Criminal Minds (aside from the title).  It’s more of the same.  In the second-last episode of the season, the team deals with a case of a murdered marine.  I found myself thinking – wait, that’s a marine!  He’s a navy guy!  Shouldn’t…NCIS be handling this?  Or, failing that, if they needed anti-terrorism experts and more explosions, NCIS: LA?

     And there it is.  CBS (formerly Columbia Broadcasting System) found they had a major hit with CSI (Crime Scene Investigation).  So they decided to spin it off into CSI: Miami (Crime Scene Investigation: Miami).  THAT show was an even BIGGER hit, so they spun off again into CSI: NY (Crime Scene Investigation: New York).  All this spawned a ton of video games, board games, action figures, backpacks, lunchboxes and CSI-themed children’s birthday parties.

     Of course, it was the acronym that was making these shows successful, so they moved on to NCIS (Naval Criminal Investigative Service).  Soon, that one was a hit as well, so the spin-off had to come.  NCIS: LA (Naval Criminal Investigative Service: Los Angeles).  Soon, CBS may run out of cities.  Perhaps they already have, not wanting to brand their new spin-off Criminal Minds: Spokane.

     But that’s it – they have achieved critical mass.  The already-bloated prime time police procedural drama slate could not handle even one more spin-off, whether it was good or not.  Blue Bloods is out there too, taking up a little bit of CBS real estate with another cop show (but a new one, with a new idea, that amazingly doesn’t cover the exact same ground as all the others).  But once you’ve hit the limit – there it is.  CBS should have been tipped off when they couldn’t think of another city to put after the colon in the show’s title.

     So it’s done, and we have the one season, which I DID really like.  And it’s on DVD now from Paramount Home Entertainment, and that is where it will stay forever, consigned to the dustbin of Failed Spinoff Prime Time Police Investigative Procedurals.  Something tells me that dustbin will be very full, very soon.

Year:  2011 
Genre:  Documentary
Country:  United States
Language:  English
Featuring:  Morgan Spurlock, Peter Berg, Quentin Tarantino, Noam Chomsky, Ralph Nader, OK Go, Brett Ratner, Donald Trump
Director:  Morgan Spurlock
Run time:  90 minutes

     I once went to a museum – I think it was in Prescott.  2/3 of the museum was dedicated to displays that depicted…the building of that very museum.  I thought that was a really bizarre sort of layered…historic anomaly?  I don’t even know how one would describe that.  Much as Morgan Spurlock’s new documentary The Greatest Movie Ever Sold defies description for me.  The biggest difference between the two is that unlike the museum, Spurlock’s film really entertained me.

     Now, the film is easy to describe.  Spurlock is making a movie about product placement in movies, and wants to fund his product-placement movie entirely by means of selling product placements IN that movie.  The movie consists almost entirely of him pitching various companies, hoping that they will be willing to cut a check and take the plunge, sponsoring the movie.  Got it?

     Okay.  That means that everything that follows is advertising.  Everyone who watches it, talks about it, tweets about it, passes a billboard for it.  This is a review I am writing because I receieved a free copy of the DVD.  The review in itself adds to the “impressions” the movie receives online.  (Spurlock had to get 600,000,000 “impressions” to fulfill his contract with the title sponsor, Pom Wonderful, which he achieved in the first two weeks.)  If I recommend the film (and I do) then it might make you, the reader, go out and purchase it.

     Once you DO purchase the movie, you will be assailed by advertising beginning to end.  Pom Wonderful presents…The Greatest Movie Ever Sold.  Brought to you by Ban deoderant, Mane & Tail shampoo, the Hyatt, Jet Blue, some American gas station chain, some shoe company, some clothing companies, and so on and so forth.

     While being assailed by these commercials, the process by which they got into the film in the first place will be laid out for you.  The concept here is a little mind bending, so I’m not going to try to describe it any further.  I’ll just say it really is a fascinating look at the advertising industry, specifically the product-placement side of it, but also raises serious ethical questions about, among other things, advertising in schools.  If a school board is so cash-strapped that they can no longer offer adequate programs for their students, is it OK for them to sell ad space in the school, and take five minutes out of every school day so the kids can be advertised AT, in order to fund a lunch program?

     There are those who believe that all advertising, no matter what context, is insidious and by nature untruthful.  (Ralph Nader makes an appearance in the film.)  Others think that any place that can squeeze ads in, anywhere, should do so (many references are made to NASCAR, and Donald Trump makes an appearance as well).

     Then there is the ethical question surrounding the movie itself.  By selling out to all these companies, is Spurlock compromising his artistic vision – even IF that artistic vision IS to sell out to as many companies as possible?

     Spurlock provides no answers to these questions, but then there ARE no easy answers to any of them.  The only thing that he DOES provide is an entertaining movie  and a few fascinating discussion topics.  And it’s enough.  Seeing the inner workings of the product placement industry is interesting.  But seeing a movie based entirely on advertising, comprised almost entirely of advertising, and watching commercials as we’re being told that they are commercials is mind-bending.  And far more honest than I could have imagined it would be.

Years:  2010, 2011
Genre:  TV series, Crime, Drama
Country:  United States
Languages:  English, French (dubbing of course)
Starring:  Thomas Gibson, Joe Mantegna, Matthew Gray Gubler, Shemar Moore, Kristen Vangsness, Paget Brewster, AJ Cook, Rachel Nichols, Jane Lynch
Creator:  Jeff Davis
DVD distributor:  Paramount Home Entertainment

     I have only one complaint with Criminal Minds in this, the sixth season.  And that is “unsubs”.  First, they assume we’ve been watching the show forever, and therefore we understand the term.  Like CSI assuming we understand all about epitheleals and so forth.  Were I to just jump into the sixth season, this would annoy me. 

     Now, I am a veteran of a few seasons of Criminal Minds, so I DO know that an “unsub” is an “unkown subject” – the bad guy (or girl) they are chasing.  But I am still annoyed.  Because it’s such an overused word on the show, they continue to call the suspect an “unsub”, very often, even after they have figured out who it is, what their name is, and have put out an APB.  If it’s Jim Henson of Delaware, it’s no longer an “unsub”, right?

     OK.  Done with the complaints.  Otherwise, Criminal Minds is still a totally engrossing show that I can watch endlessly without getting tired of it.  The calm coolness of Thomas Gibson running the show, the I-can’t-quite-put-my-finger-on-it sexiness of Paget Brewster, the charmingly naive genius of Matthew Gray Gubler, the credible gravitas of Joe Mantegna, the wide-eyed hot-tempered earnestness of Shemar Moore, the silly wardrobe of Kristen Vangsness, and the badly underused (at least in Season 6) smoking hotness that is AJ Cook.  And yeah yeah, I get she was pregnant or something and will be back full-time for Season Seven.

     Filling in the hotness gap for Cook, however, is actress Rachel Nichols, who appears as the daughter of a serial killer who has now been added to the team.  I suspect that once Cook returns, there will be no more need for this much Hot though, and Nichols will be let go to return to movies (like all the sequels sure to come for Conan The Barbarian).

     I’m always impressed by how often the writers of shows like these can keep coming up with something new.  The old serial killer with alzheimer’s, the pedophile living in the mountains off the Appalachian Trail, the guy who burns his victims alive on Hallowe’en, it all works, and it all seems fresh.  That, to me, is the most remarkable thing about the sixth season of Criminal Minds, on DVD September 6th from Paramount Home Entertainment.