The highest grade any episode of this show has ever gotten is a C, which happened once in the early going last year. About midway through the season it went from a consistent C- level to a string of unmatched Ds and Fs. We'll see if they can match it this year.

Just checked - I think it still holds the record. Hostages got pretty close, but managed a "C" for the second half of its finale to get a 1.22 average.

Actually, we did the math last year. At the time, the first season of this show had the worst GPA of any show in history - approaching a D average (1.16). Season 8 of Dexter was only a C- average (1.883). A show has to be a special kind of awful to sink this low without getting prematurely cancelled, let alone…

Now if only we could forget the whole thing in exchange for everything tasting purple for a second.

No, this show went screaming past "so bad it's good" territory and made it all the way through to "so bad it's awful."

Bravo. :)

Which would be a valid point of comparison if Mad Men aspired to be exciting.  It's meant to be poetic, subtly tragic, and true to life.  That's like reading Tennessee Williams and griping that it doesn't have enough car chases.

TV Tropes and Idioms says Distressed Dude.  Urban dictionary says Man Damsel.  I'd pay money to see Mike try the whole Marion Ravenwood escape plan from Raiders of the Lost Ark, including one of his captors watch him change into a long white gown by way of a mirror. ;)

This show has basically taken ever serial killer cliche it can think of, put them through a paper shredder, and then tried to weave them back together into a coherent tapestry.  Sadly, no one told the writers and show runner that tapestries aren't put together using scotch tape, rubber cement and elmer's glue.

Yes.  At this point the formula is pretty much "FBI acts ineptly, Joe revels in unearned gloating, law enforcement official is revealed to secretly be a member of Joe's cult, one or more characters whose names we barely know gets stabbed, shot or strangled by either the protagonist or antagonist, and everyone does…

That would imply that any of us have ever felt like he's been in actual danger this season.  This show is about as scary as The Rocky Horror Picture Show - only ever unintentionally, and never for the reasons it imagines. ;)

The only thing you can say for it is that the season finale can't be worse than season 1 of The Killing.  As implausible as the plotting has been, I don't think there's any possible way that the audience could feel like the show's creators were suddenly flipping them off.  They've been doing that for months already.

"This is a story about Poe."
"I don't think that's something Poe would do. What are they trying to tell us?"

Heroes had a pretty great first season that you could point to as proof that the show could be good… which kept people hooked long after the show went into the crapper.  The Following's highwater mark was probably the pilot, and even that came off as a so-so "movie of the week."

Never fear, not only are there 3 more episodes left in this season, but there's next season as well.  Who's to say they won't keep this going for years as a kind of sick joke?

But dammit, you're going to know which year you're in every time they do another pointless cheesy flashback, aren't you? :)

Yes, they've already established that driving from Virginia to Boston is the equivalent of going to the corner store for milk.  5, 10 minutes tops.

I would pay good money to see an episode where the Jabberwocky came busting through the mansion wall, broke them all into little pieces, and then sat down and cried because it couldn't remember how to make s'mores.

Yeah, the whole "I see reflections of Christianity and Islam and even Scientology" line was a hoot.  The mural looked like someone had tried to duplicate what they thought a 16-year old goth girl would paint on her bedroom wall.

He did.  It was extremely out of left field.