"Castle:" Why You Should Be Watching

Nathan Fillion and Molly C. Quinn in Castle

Now, usually when I tell people to watch a show it's because it's a cult favorite that pushes boundaries and is in imminent danger of cancellation. Anyone who read my column in the Swarthmore Phoenix will remember the way I shamelessly begged people to watch Fringe for weeks and weeks (and weeks). In my defense, Fringe was renewed for a fourth season, yet another piece of evidence that executives and showrunners at FOX read my musings on a regular basis. (If you need more proof, this was published on February 3, one month and eight days before FOX aired the Glee episode "Sexy," which addressed the many, many problems I had with Brittany and Santana's relationship. Some might say this was a coincidence, but I suspect that the more accurate explanation is that Ryan Murphy reads my writing."

However, today I'm here to suggest you watch ABC's Castle, which is in no danger of getting canceled, having been renewed waaaay back in January, and which is far from a cult show, despite the fact that star Nathan Fillion played Mal Reynolds in Firefly, a cult show if there ever was one. And since Castle is fairly popular and no danger, I'm not going to beg; instead, I'm simply going to suggest that you devote an hour of your time on Mondays to watching this fun, witty police procedural.

I know that "fun" and "witty" are words that don't often appear in the same clause as "police procedural," unless they happen to be separated by a string of negative polarity items. (For a definition of negative polarity items, look here.) However, Castle takes what is often a dour, humorless drama - as the sexual assault of the week on Law & Order: SVU demonstrates as well as anything - and makes it into a show so lighthearted, so full of witty one-liners and sharp comedy, that you almost forget there are murders taking place every week.

A large part of the humor on Castle comes from its irascible leading man, best-selling author Richard Castle, brought to life by Fillion. Anyone who has seen Fillion in anything - Firefly, Doctor Horrible's Singalong Blog, or Two Guys, A Girl, and a Pizza Place - knows that the man had an undeniable, rouge-ish charm about him, one that permits him to say truly disgusting things and still come across as cute. (Example: his immortal line from Doctor Horrible, also know as the best line in the history of anything, which can be found here. I'm not going to repeat it, because this is a family site, and by family site I mean that my parents read it.) Fillion's natural charm makes the shallow, cocky Castle seem lovable rather than awful, and makes his readings of lines such as "I really am ruggedly handsome, aren't I?" come across as cute while also being impossibly vain.

At first glance, it might seem that it is only Fillion's charm and admittedly rugged good looks (despite the weight he has gained since his Firefly days) that keep the show from running into the ground. After all, it is a fairly formulaic procedural based on a laughable premise. In short, Castle is called by the NYPD when a murder is committed that resembles a crime in one of his books, and stays to shadow Detective Beckett (Stana Katic) because he is friends with the mayor. Apparently his friendship with the mayor extends so far that he is allowed in interrogations, on stakeouts, even in raids. Sometimes he even fires a gun, not that he's had any sort of police training or anything. Because that would be totally cool with the trained law enforcement officials he endangers with his lack of skill on a regular basis. But back to the show...

The reason that the premise occasionally seems to make sense is Castle's chemistry with his costars, in particular with Beckett. I'm getting a little tired of the will-they-or-won't-they plot that's been dragging on for two seasons now, but such is the curse of detective procedurals; you have great chemistry between your two leads, but if they actually get together the momentum of the whole thing just collapses. Just ask Moonlighting. Or don't, because it got canceled a mere one season after the two leads hooked up. However, despite the laggardly pace of the Castle-Beckett romance (or lack thereof), it can't be denied that the leads have excellent chemistry, and their scenes are always entertaining.

The show's best scenes, however, are those that involve Castle and his teenage daughter, Alexis (Molly C. Quinn). They may not have the most realistic parent-child relationship on TV - either that, or there's a lot of yelling and door-slamming that happens off screen - but their storylines distill the nice moments from the stew of angst that is being a teenager in a lovely, funny and often touching way. I would take their relationship over Beckett and Castle's any day, and not just because scenes that involve Castle and Alexis also tend to involve Susan Sullivan as Castle's mother Martha, and she's just great. She's like a nicer, more supportive Lucille Bluth, and while I love me some Lucille, after watching so much Arrested Development and Archer, it's nice to see a parent occasionally support their child.

Castle is far from groundbreaking television, but it's a sharp, quick-witted take on the usually bogged-down procedural genre, with a charming male lead who is matched by the supporting cast. In addition to Beckett, Alexis and Martha, Seamus Dever and Jon Huertas are great as the interracial cop duo Ryan and Esposito. They always seem to have popped in from their own buddy cop movie - one of the good ones, not Cop Out or Rush Hour 3. Some people like the episodes where Castle goes darker, like this season's two-parter in which Castle and Beckett foil a terrorist attack in New York that had undertones of 9/11, but for me the best episodes are the one in which the quips are constant and the good time are rollin'. Sometimes the bullets fly too, but that's all part of the fun.

"Doctor Who" and Neil Gaiman: A Match Made in the Universe's Junkyard

Matt Smith and Suranne Jones in "The Doctors Wife." Photo courtesy of www.screenrant.com.

I know that this week is Pencils Down, Pass the Remote's Finale-Stravaganza, and that "The Doctor's Wife," the fourth episode in the sixth season of Doctor Who, is not a finale. However, I loved this episode so much that I couldn't wait to write about it, and I suspect (given the amount of traffic my previous Doctor Who post has been getting) that some of my readers feel the same. So today I will be taking a short break from my finale reviews and writing a little about why "The Doctor's Wife" was such a stand-out episode. The break won't be too long, I promise; if you come back later today, you might just find a review of the Fringe finale. Clearly, I'm in a sci-fi sort of a mood today.

I had extremely high hopes for this episode of Doctor Who, as it was written by one of my favorite authors, the incomparable Neil Gaiman. The great thing about this episode was the way that Gaiman made his influence felt throughout the hour while not distracting from the snappy pace. Gaiman's influence was evident in the episode's setting, a conscious planet named "House" (voiced by an exceptionally creepy Michael Sheen) that exists outside the universe, sort of like a small bubble clinging to the outside of a larger bubble, only not really. The Victorian junkyard look of House and it's patchwork inhabitants - a woman named Auntie, a man named Uncle, and an Ood known as Nephew - was straight out of Gaiman's novel Neverwhere, and boy was it a creepy place. And the ouroboros, or snake eating its own tail, is a fertile trope that has appeared in science fiction stories from Lost to Red Dwarf.

The best element of the hour, however, was Suranne Jone's portrayal of the personified Tardis, trapped in the body of a woman named Idris by House. Gaiman's dialogue for the Tardis was spot-on, her confusion of tenses showing both his quick-witted sensibilities and drawing a connection to Douglas Adam's novel The Restaurant at the End of the Universe. (Adams, by the way, is another former Doctor Who writer). The conceit of having the Doctor finally be able to talk to the Tardis, to explore their long and complicated relationship, was great fun in addition to being extremely illuminating. After all, the Doctor's relationship with the Tardis is by far the longest, deepest one in his life, and it was lovely to see him able to interact with her for the first time.

The dichotomy between the Tardis, the good, wise living matrix, and House, the twisted, evil sentient planet, is a fairly simple one, but it's powerful nonetheless. The scenes in which House tortures Amy and Rory as they run through seemingly endless corridors are, for my money, some of the creepiest in the rebooted series' run. The moment in which Amy stumbled upon a corridor, covered in graffiti that repeats "hate Amy," "kill Amy," and "die Amy," before finding the dessicated skeleton of Rory, ranks right up there with the Weeping Angels in terms of sheer terror. I've mentioned before that I often find the Rory-is-going-to-die moments a fairly cheap grab for emotional resonance on the part of the show's writers, but this scene was so terrifying, and so completely organic to the episode and the character of House, that I believed it completely. Karen Gillan's performance in these moments was perfect, and her grief over Rory's seeming death and hatred of her sold the moment. She also provided a nice counterpoint when, while giving the telepathic password to the Tardis' control room, she summoned "delight" by thinking about her wedding.

The character of House made for an excellent villain, one who I wouldn't mind seeing again at some point (although how he would be brought back I have no idea). The way that he cannibalizes both Time Lords and Tardises - brought home in the moments when the Doctor sees that another Time Lord's arm has been grafted to Auntie, and the human Tardis' grief at seeing the broken corpses of her sisters - is a perfect device for highlighting the Doctor's ultimate loneliness and bringing him closer to the Tardis. One of the great truths about the Doctor is his ultimate loneliness, brought to the forefront here when he discovers that the lost Time Lords he's been hoping to find are nothing more than old messages, constantly playing on repeat.

House, however, was more than just a plot device. His level of sadistic cruelty toward Amy and Rory was disturbing, and the way he made them watch each other die was a nice reminder of the fact that these two companions are constantly haunted by the specter of the Doctor's death. House's pure hatred of these life forms was reminiscent of Harlan Ellison short story, "I Have No Mouth, and I Must Scream" (thanks to Ben Yelsey for the reference!). This story tells the tale of the last five humans left on earth, who are forced by a cruel supercomputer to live underground, who are kept from death by the computer purely so he can torture them. The character of House is so frightening because of the way he enjoys Amy and Rory's suffering. In that way, he shares similarities with John Simm's incarnation of the Master, who laughs and dances to the screams of the dying population of Earth.

The main thrust of the episode, however, was the Doctor's relationship with the Tardis that he so often takes for granted. I liked the way that the episode's title perfectly fit the hour's happenings, even though some might have been given the wrong impression. (I for one assumed that the episode would be about the Doctor's relationship with River Song.) It was the perfect title because, no matter River's or Amy's or even Rose Tyler's relationship with the Doctor, it can never approach the depth of his relationship with his Tardis. He is, after all, a madman with a blue box. The Tardis is part of his identity, and he finally got to talk to her, to tell her how much he loves her and how important she is. His heartbreak at her death was so genuine, and so well played by Matt Smith, that I could understand his grief despite the knowledge that she had returned to her own body. The final moment, when he spoke to her and she responded by moving the levers and sending him to wherever he needed to be, was one of the best of the season so far.

A few stray notes:

• I made this episode sound really dark. It wasn't, and some of the funniest scenes came from the Doctor bickering with the Tardis like they were an old married couple.
• Also loved the way that the Tardis offers her side of the story: she stole the Doctor, and she decides where he needs to go.
• Amy and Rory requesting that their new bedroom not have bunk beds, and the Doctor replying that "bunk beds are cool!"
• The return of the old control room! It was nice to see it again.
• In the old series, the other rooms of the Tardis were explored. Are we ever going to see anything but the control room? I personally want to get a look at the oft-mentioned swimming pool.

"Community" Finale: There Will Be Paintball

Donald Glover, Danny Pudi and Alison Brie in "For a Few Paintballs More." Cougartown actress Busy Philipps can be seen in the background.

The epic game of paintball has now concluded, and I feel that I can safely say that this year's two-part finale managed to top "Modern Warfare" in terms of both scope and laughs. There was even a nice, emotional coda at the end that wrapped up the season-long arc of Pierce's villainy and alienation, while leaving the study group reeling. This move promises good things for next season, and exemplifies one of the best features of Community: the show's ability to have major character growth even amidst the paint-splattered craziness. (Note: SPOILERS. All sorts of spoilers. Seriously, stop reading if you haven't finished the season.)

I realize that this is almost the same thing I said in yesterday's review of the Vampire Diaries finale, and that's probably not a coincidence. (In fact, it's definitely not a coincidence.) I appreciate The Vampire Diaries' go-for-broke pacing as much as I appreciate Community's absurd wackiness, but those features would certainly ring hollow without the character building moments that both shows are so good at. This is one reason that I prefer these two shows to something like Glee, which has all the wackiness of Community but without the underlying character stability. (Todd VanDerWerff of the AV Club makes this point excellently in his otherwise questionable article about why Community and Glee are basically the same show.) The show's character relationships ground the general insanity, and the finale was a perfect example of that.

But you didn't come here because you want to hear me pontificate about Community (if you did, leave a note in the comments and I'll be happy to write more pontificating posts for you); you came because you want to Talk. About. Paintball. And so do I. I have a lot of thoughts on "A Fistful of Paintballs" and "For a Few Paintballs More," and I can't wait to share them with you. So, here goes.

One of my favorite things about the finale is the way that it tied in references to previous episodes of the show. In my profile of Alison Brie, she mentioned that all the recurring characters would make appearances and that conflicts from throughout the season would come to a head, and the episodes lived up to that promise. I was a particular fan of the way that Troy's plumbing expertise, revealed in the Season 1 episode "English as a Second Language," was put to good use when he rigged the library sprinklers with paint. The final conspiracy theory, which revealed that Greendale rivals City College were behind the paintball war, was also a nice nod to the ongoing rivalry explored in "Basic Rocket Science."

There were other, less direct references as well. One of the most intriguing and revealing moments came when Annie, impressed by Abed's Han Solo-esque rebellious persona, began to fall for Abed, and ended up kissing him in the (paint) rain. This was both a nice throwback to the kiss between Jeff and Annie that closed out last year's season finale and an insight into Annie's character. Annie is the romantic of the study group, someone who spent part of the first season hopelessly in love with Troy and was crushed when she found out about Jeff's affair with Britta. Annie's vulnerability was on full display here, and Brie played the moment when Abed drops character and leaves with a detached "Cool," beautifully, showing us Annie's devastation and her disbelief that she ever could have considered a relationship with Abed.

The episodes were also impressive for the deft tonal shift that took place between the first and second parts. The Western motif in the first half was very funny, especially Josh Holloway's mysterious gunslinger and the saloon culture in Pierce's hideout. (Vicki's table dancing was a great detail in that scene, and Garrett's put the whole thing hilariously over the top.) The Star Wars vibe in "For a Few Paintballs More" was also great, even though it was fairly understated; despite Abed's Han Solo impression and the paintball players dressed as stormtroopers, the second half followed a fairly straightforward action plot rather than a specific Star Wars plot. I really like that the show didn't feel the need to stick too closely to Star Wars; if the Family Guy parodies have taught us anything, it's that reenacting the entire movie is not actually funny. Like, not funny at all.

I also really enjoyed Troy's power struggle with Jeff, as it highlighted some nice tension from the season as a whole. Even though Jeff is generally called upon to be the leader of the group, Troy is the one who has to step up when no one else wants to, a fact that was nicely demonstrated in one of my favorite episodes of the season, "Mixology Certification." It was really nice to see Troy assert his independence, and even better to see Jeff acknowledge Troy's value in the finale scene. The Troy and Jeff pairing is not a particularly common one on the show, particularly since Troy and Abed's relationship is so strong, but I like to see Troy insist on his own importance on occasion, particularly since the character is my personal favorite. (It doesn't hurt that he's played by Donald Glover, who is just hilarious all the time. Warning: the first and third link are fairly NSFW.)

I also liked the role that Shirley played in the finale. Shirley is often the group's voice of reason, and she kept up that role nicely here by reminding the other characters, through lines about wanting to go home and see her children and missing CSI, that this was a paintball war rather than an actual war. Shirley's nun costume was a great nod toward the character's roots as a stereotypical Black Christian woman as well as a nod to how far she's come. I also really liked that Shirley and Britta were the two members of the study group who made it to the final moments of the paintball war, and the scene in which they rode in on a golf cart, guns blazing, was both funny and triumphant. Even though I really like the final scene with Pierce, and the way that his win (and subsequent donation of the money to Greendale) set up Pierce's relationship to both the school and the study group, I really wanted Britta and Shirley to win.

Speaking of that final scene, it was a great way to humanize Pierce and redeem him, at least partially, for all the nasty things he has done this season. It was also a great set-up for some major conflict next season, as the group comes to terms with their treatment of Pierce and, presumably, tries to woo him back. The final scene was sadder than I expected the end of the PaintStravaganza to be, but it was appropriate to the tone of the season as a whole. Plus, the tag before the credits both brought back the funny and acknowledged the people upon whom the real burden of the paintball war fell: the Greendale janitors. Funny and classy, the tag was a great way to end the season and lighten the mood a bit after Pierce's sobering exit from the study group.

A few stray lines and moments that I enjoyed, but didn't have time to fit into the review proper:

• Leonard telling Jeff that he was once a Little Rascal
• The slow-motion shot of Annie's boobs (the anatomical parts, not the monkey) bouncing as she ran away from Holloway's character
• Troy's anguished howl at Magnitude's sacrifice: "Pop what?!"
• The cameo by Cougartown stars Busy Philipps and Dan Byrd
• Annie's rejection of Abed's vest, because it smells like Starburns
• Holloway's "Sonuvabitch!" (yay Lost reference!)
• Vicki's final charge into battle
• The return of Quendra with a QU
• Speaking of recurring characters, where were Rich and Slater? I would have liked to see them at some point.
• Pierce's two fake heart attacks were hilarious, and a great paintball strategy!

"Vampire Diaries" Finale: Damon is Saved, Stefan gets Awesome!

Ian Somerhalder and Nina Dobrev in "As I Lay Dying," the second-season finale of the CW's The Vampire Diaries

I don't think there is any other show on TV that could produce what was basically a three-episode finale that was so packed with twists, turns and emotional moments and still managed to flow as beautifully as The Vampire Diaries did with "The Last Day," "The Sun Also Rises," and "As I Lay Dying." When a show with worse pacing (which, at this point, is pretty much every other show on TV) tries for the same thing, we end up with the final episodes of the third season of True Blood, and nobody wants that. Even Fringe only managed a two-part finale, and Fringe is just packed with awesomeness.

One of the things I love most about The Vampire Diaries - besides the continually jaw-dropping pacing - is the way that, even in the midst of action-packed episodes like this season's final few hours, the writers always make room for some nice, character-driven moments. (You've probably figured this out by now, but there are major SPOILERS ahead if you haven't finished the season.) This is one of the many, many reasons that The Vampire Diaries is so much better than that other, much more sexually explicit vampire show; the plot twists, no matter how shocking, are always organic to the characters, and we the audience are always given character moments that make those twists plausible.

One excellent example from the final episode comes when Stefan, always the nobler of the Salvatore brothers, agrees to go on a decade-long blood bender with Klaus in exchange for a cure for his brother. This moment works because the groundwork has been laid for it throughout the three-part finale, as well as the previous two seasons of the show. We've seen that, despite Stefan's tempestuous relationship with Damon, he loves his brother deeply, a conflict that was beautifully articulated in a conversation between Damon and Elijah in "The Sun Also Rises." Stefan, wanting to make sure that Elijah was going to go through with their plan and actually kill Klaus, explained that he had wanted to kill Damon a thousand times, but never had. That one line summed up the relationship between Stefan and Damon perfectly, and set up the kind of sacrifice that Stefan would be willing to make for his brother.

Stefan's sacrifice, however, had been set up much earlier than that. Starting in the Season 1 episode "Under Control," we've been shown scenes of what happens to Stefan when he's drinking blood, and we can guess that, despite his attempts to get himself used to drinking blood by taking small sips from Elena, the dozen or so blood bags that Klaus forces on him are going to get the better of him. By the end of the episode, when the look in Stefan's eyes crosses the boundary into pleasure as he feeds off an innocent girl provided for him by Klaus, it's become obvious that Stefan has given himself over to the blood. This development promises an interesting role reversal between Damon and Stefan next season, one that none other than Stefan Salvatore himself, Paul Wesley, is excited about. According to an interview with producer Julie Plec, "Probably Paul Wesley's happiest day on set was getting to dive back into that side of Stefan."

To me, the biggest, most emotional arc in the final three episodes was that of Damon's werewolf bite and Stefan's determination to save his brother. However, since much of the season had been building to Klaus' sacrifice and transformation into a werewolf-vampire hybrid, that storyline took up most of "The Last Day" and "The Sun Also Rises," and it was also a good one. The best element of the sacrifice, to my mind, was Joseph Morgan's performance as Klaus. Morgan played the big, bad vampire as a charming psychopath, who used Jenna as his sacrifice vampire purely because he wanted to torture Elena, and who let Elena think, just for a moment, that she would have to choose which vampire would be sacrificed: Stefan or Jenna.

One of the nicest character moments in this storyline was Jenna's death. Elena, knowing as much as she does about vampires, told her terrified aunt to "turn off" her emotions, allowing Jenna to die without fear. Nina Dobrev's performance in this scene was terrific, as was Sara Canning's; both actresses did a stellar job selling the scene, which just made the whole thing more moving. I didn't want Jenna to die, but the scene was played perfectly, and her death will hopefully give Alaric a nice character arc next season, so I've come to terms with it. (I have not, however, come to terms with Elijah's death yet, because I love Daniel Gillies' performance and hair. However, I probably don't need to, as he has already been killed and brought back to life, and we know where his body is located, along with the rest of the Originals. I'm looking forward to some Original storylines next season.)

In terms of characters who are being set up for good arcs next season, Jeremy Gilbert is second on the list, right after the adventures of Klaus and Evil Stefan. After being killed by Sheriff Forbes and brought back to life by Bonnie and some reluctant dead witches, he ended the episode face-to-face with his two dead girlfriends, Anna and Vicky. Jeremy, while smokin' hot, has been given little to do this season other than date Bonnie, and his new abilities (whatever they entail) are extremely promising for his role in the third season.

All in all, the second season finale of The Vampire Diaries kept up the unflagging pace and the dramatic plot twists that the show is known for, while also providing for some lovely character moments. I didn't even manage to touch on the scene between Elena and Damon in which he finally tells her that he loves her and she gives him a sweet, platonic kiss. It was a lovely moment in their relationship, and it gave the friendship between Damon and Elena some needed forward momentum. Their new closeness is promising for next season as well; while I'm not a Damon/Elena 'shipper, I can't wait to see how their relationship develops while they try to rescue Stefan from Klaus, which I assume they will. The final three episodes of The Vampire Diaries did an excellent job of setting up the next season while wrapping up this season's major storylines. We even got to see Klaus shirtless. Really, what more can you ask for in a finale?

Finale Season Is Upon Us

Clockwise from top left: Joel McHale, Alison Brie and Danny Pudi of Community; Joshua Jackson of Fringe; Nina Dobrev and Ian Somerhalder of The Vampire Diaries; Lea Michele, Heather Morris, Jenna Ushkowitz and Dianna Agron of Glee

It's that time of year again, folks, the time when our favorite major network shows begin ramping up the twists, the suspense, the general balls-to-the-wall awesomeness of their episodes in preparation for one thing, and one thing only: the finale. Some choose to leave us with a cliffhanger to build up our anticipation over the long, empty summer months, while some would rather wrap up the season in a nice bow, with everyone happy and working through their drama (at least until September rolls around). And some just want to leave us laughing.

For the next week, Pencils Down, Pass the Remote is going to be finale central. I'll be offering my thoughts on the season-ending episodes of Community, Fringe, The Vampire Diaries, Glee and more! Plus, I'll be providing flashbacks to finales past with a list of the best and worst season and series finales of all time! (When I say all time, I mean the ones that I've seen.) I'll even be providing some predictions of where my favorite shows will go next season, purely because, as I've mentioned before, I know that network executives and showrunners read my commentary.

So, stay tuned today for my thoughts on the finales of Community and The Vampire Diaries, and keep checking back throughout the week for more of the Pencils Down, Pass the Remote Finale-stravaganza! Tell your friends.

P.S. For reasons that I do not fully understand, my recent post about ABC's Castle has vanished from the site. That'll be going back up as soon as I have a chance to rewrite it. (This will possibly teach me not to compose my posts in Blogger, but rather to write them elsewhere. Live and learn.)

Romance and SciFi: When is Enough Enough?

Anna Torv and Joshua Jackson share a tender moment

Warning: SPOILERS ahead for those who haven't seen the most recent episodes of Fringe or Doctor Who.

The first three episodes of the new Doctor Who season have been heavy on the romance; in fact, there's more romance in this season than there was even in season two, when Billie Piper's Rose spent most of the season mooning over David Tennant's Doctor. In a mere three episodes we've seen not only sexy (some would say inappropriate for a family show) interactions between the Doctor's current companion Amy (Karen Gillan) and her husband Rory (Arthur Darvill), but some serious flirtation between Alex Kingston's mysterious River Song and the Doctor (Matt Smith). The relationship between Amy and Rory in particular has been milked for plot fodder, via a Rory-is-dying storyline, a few too many times.

Of course, Doctor Who is hardly the only science fiction show that makes time for romantic plotlines in between the time travel and telekinesis. Everyone who watches Fringe knows that, for the past season, much of the time that wasn't spend on possible world-ending cataclysms was spent on a love triangle between Joshua Jackson's Peter, Olivia and alternate-universe Olivia (both played by Anna Torv). Even though I would be terribly upset by Fringe without Peter after he blinked out of existence at the end of the finale (!), it might be nice to have a few episodes where we don't have to worry about whether alt-Olivia's new baby will throw a wrench into Peter and Olivia's relationship. (Also, it's possible that the baby blinked out of existence with Peter, which would serve the same purpose.)

While I certainly like to see some relationships on even my sci-fi shows, and while I enjoy rooting for both Peter and Olivia and Amy and Rory, sometimes it's a little too much. On the most recent episode of Doctor Who, a thoroughly entertaining romp involving pirates and a siren who was actually a medical program, an unnecessary emotional climax was added when Amy had to perform CPR on an unconscious Rory. This moment played extremely over-the-top, to the point where it was reminiscent of the moment in the first season of Lost when Jack pounded Charlie's chest in the rain, while Kate looked on crying, for what seemed like five minutes.

Additionally, while the build-up to the Fringe finale was certainly epic and while I loved all the twists and turns, I was extremely happy when the idea that the home of whichever Olivia Peter chose would be saved, while the other universe would perish. I had a hard time believing that the destruction of a universe could hinge on something so... well, silly, and I didn't like the way that the rather tired love triangle was forced into the main story arc.

So, here's my question for you; when it comes to science fiction, how much romance is too much?

Alison Brie Talks "Community," "Mad Men" and Paintball

Brie as Annie Edison in Part 1 of the upcoming Community finale, "A Fistful of Paintballs"

It’s always a little risky to talk to an artist you truly admire. They could be just as kind, gracious and funny as you thought, or they could turn out to be uncooperative or narcissistic. Recently, I had the opportunity to talk to Community’s Annie Edison herself, Alison Brie, and I’m happy to report that this charming, funny and talented young actress falls into the former category; she’s just as sweet and bubbly as you would expect from the actress who brings Annie to life. She covered a wide range of topics, including her work on both Community and Mad Men, sharing a scene with Josh Holloway, and her desire for a mermaid-themed episode of Community.

If all of you are excited as I am about the upcoming, sure to be epic Community finale, you’ll be excited to hear Brie’s thoughts on the two-part sequel to last year’s beloved paintball episode. Brie said that getting the script for the second part of the paintball episode contained some of the most shocking twists she had seen in a Community script. “The second part of the finale, there just are twists and turns that I didn’t see coming at all,” said Brie. “There are moments when you’ll read something and look at the writers and say, ‘really? Is this just a joke for the table read?’” Brie even compares the twists in this episode to Jeff and Annie’s unexpected kiss at the very end of last year’s finale, saying “This is two years in a row now that my biggest shock of the season has been the very last episode.”

Brie also teased Annie’s role in the paintball battle, which promises to be much greater than her role in last year’s episode. “Annie got taken out pretty early when we did the original paintball episode, and this time I really have a lot more to do,” said Brie, adding, “She’s practiced since she got taken out so early last year. She doesn’t like to lose.” 

Brie was especially excited about the scenes that Annie shares with Josh Holloway’s mysterious stranger. “He plays a bit of a mysterious character, and I got to do some action scenes with him.” She also got to flirt a bit with the man best known as Lost’s heartthrob Sawyer, and apparently shared quite a bit of chemistry with the guest star. “As we were doing the scene, our writer and director said ‘We’ve got to milk this chemistry’… and I was like, ‘Yes, chemistry with Josh Holloway, nailed it!’” An episode of Community wouldn’t be complete without a few pop-culture references, and having Sawyer himself on the set provided the writers with some opportunities for the meta. “There’s going to be a Sawyer line,” she promised, “so we’ll see if the Lost fan’s pick up on it. I’m sure they will.”

Of course, viewers who have invested two years in Community also want to see what the rest of the study group is going through, particularly given the internal tensions that have threatened the group this season. Brie promises that we’ll see plenty of developments in the group’s relationships. Recently, certain people in the group have been having trouble with other people, and “those feuds really come to a head in a major way in these last two episodes … there is a lot of really emotional stuff going on.” We’ll also see some of the recurring characters make an appearance. “There’s a lot of cute nods to the peripheral characters,” said Brie, “these people that you’ve seen every so often on the show.”

The final two episodes, however, are also action-packed, and the actors were worn out from all the paintball fights. “I clean [my ears] every time I shower, and I still had paint coming out of my ears a week later. It grossed me out!” laughed Brie, who had already suffered a paintball-related injury filming last year’s episode. "Last year I got shot in the boob, and it hurt!" said Brie. "I had a bruise."

Brie was also happy to talk about her hopes for the future of Community and Annie Edison. For all the ‘shippers out there wondering who Annie will end up with, Brie says, “I go back and forth between Troy [Donald Glover] and Jeff.” Like so many of us out here who love the chemistry between Brie and Joel McHale, “a lot of the time Jeff and Annie make sense to me, because Annie has a way of being a voice of reason for Jeff.” However, she also thinks that the pairing of Annie and Troy is a possibility: “They went to school together, they grew up together, they’re the same age, and there was really something in that.” Brie also has some ideas for the show’s third season. “A mermaid episode,” said Brie, “a Splash episode where Annie just shows up naked on a beach, and you realize, “Oh god, she’s a mermaid … I’m going to pitch this.”

While Brie is best known for her work on Community, she also plays a recurring character on a very different critically acclaimed show: Mad Men’s Trudy Campbell. Although Brie admits that she identifies with Annie more because of Annie’s “nerdy sense of humor,” and the fact that Annie is contemporary, while Trudy is a period character, she says there are similarities between herself and Trudy. “It’s very easy for me to connect with the ambitious side of Trudy, her striving for perfection. It’s just that what Trudy values are not the things I value.” She also has some insight into Trudy’s relationship with Vincent Kartheiser’s Pete, one of the show’s more unlikeable characters. “What’s fun about playing Trudy is that she doesn’t bear witness to a lot of Pete’s horrible deeds. She just loves him and wants to be an amazing wife to him, which makes her a quirky character,” said Brie.

Brie is currently in Ann Arbor, Michigan filming the movie Five-Year Engagement, which costars Emily Blunt. Brie said that being in a college town like Ann Arbor has put her more in touch with Community’s fan base. “I just adore our fans. They’re amazing,” said Brie. “They pick up on things right away. They’re so intelligent and they get so excited about the show, and it’s been really cool to be here in Ann Arbor and be able to witness them firsthand more than usual.”

I said earlier that it can be risky to talk to an artist you admire, because you never know what they’re really like. It is equally worrisome to hear about the behind-the-scenes dynamics of an ensemble show like Community, because you never want to hear about tension between cast members. “One of the best things about working on the show has been making some of my best friends,” said Brie, adding, “I’m texting them every day, and they’ve been texting … We love each other.”

Despite the cast’s tight bond, Brie was willing to dish on one hot topic – the question of who was the show’s best paintball player. “I feel like I have to say Joel [McHale], so I don’t get in trouble” laughed Brie, but went on to add, “I have to say that Danny Pudi is very agile … He’s like a jungle cat, so he’s a good stealth man, but Joel is, you know, all muscle.”

Even though most of the talk centered on the upcoming finale, Brie was happy to talk about other episodes – in particular “Paradigms of Human Memory,” the recent clip show that showed viewers glimpses of a number of adventures that didn’t make it on screen. I asked Alison what clip she would like to see expanded into a full episode. “It would definitely be the St. Patrick’s Day adventure,” said Brie. “Especially Abed’s line, because Danny’s such a pro, and the way he delivered that line, ‘The mysterious events that surrounded the exciting conclusion of our St. Patrick’s Day adventure.’” However, after thinking for a moment, Brie added that another favorite clip was “our trip to Mexico where Pierce almost gets shot.”