Reaper - The Home Stretch - Dead Series Walking

This episode or Reaper, at it's core, was about competition, and that's what has essentially squashed all hope of it returning for another season. Long before the season premiere, the series was moved into the line of fire, a sacrificial lamb led to Idol slaughter. Which is why the news that the series is essentially dead, just burning it's remaining episodes (whistling through the graveyard, ala above pic from the episode,) shouldn't come as any surprise. Yet, it stung just the same.

Those working on the series saw the writing on the wall pretty early. A few weeks ago Tyler Labine signed on to star in the FOX pilot Sons of Tucson, and shortly thereafter creators/writers Tara Butters and Michelle Fazekas signed a 2-year deal with 20th Century Fox, cementing the notion that the series was done for.

Back to competition, The CW essentially sent Reaper into it's Tuesday night battles armed with a fire extinguisher, much like Morgan did to his half-bro Sam. The introduction of a sibling rivalry was an interesting idea in theory, but so far it's mostly fallen flat, and actually takes time away from Ray Wise's Satan. It's a sibling story, though, that's made more sense than the Sock/Step-sister storyline that went nowhere and may never be brought up again.

The other competition in the episode relates to this season's over-arching plot involving the escaped/emancipated soul Alan and his trick for beating the Devil: A good old fashioned duel with the devil. Might I suggest this 'easy' way to beat the Devil?



Playlist: Reaper - Episodes 2.08
1. "Walking on Sunshine" - Katrina and the Waves
2. "Black Hole" - Aqualung
3. "Got It Bad" - The Broken West

Previously: Follow the White Rabbit (Episode 2.02)

Skins: Now that's an ending

"Then came the day Osama blew us away"

Is it too soon to laugh at a musical about 9/11? It probably is still for quite a few here in the US (and especially New York,) as the BBC America boards (sort of) lit up after the airing of this episode, which is really the only place to find a reaction, as the blogs seemed to go silent. The episode hasn't even made it to iTunes, and we're entering our fourth day since it aired. (Here's scenes from the musical in video below:)


I found the episode to be pretty funny, the musical to some extent, but especially Chris' reaction to everything ("now that's an ending!") I knew that would be my headline, and thankfully, the real ending was also special. Anwar using the filmography of Hugh Grant in an attempt to 'keep him in the game longer' was pretty funny, and found myself disappointed they didn't get to a certain film that also starred one Nicholas Hoult (Tony). So after some delay, when Anwar announced he "never gets as far as About a Boy," I ended up waking my wife with hysterical laughter.

This is probably the first episode I've seen where the replacement music they used in a scene was actually better than the original. The first creepy scene with Sketch at the beginning originally used Aqualung's "Good Times Gonna Come," but what ended up playing here was much cooler. The same snippet of song was used when Anwar climaxes as he repeats "Bridget Jones" a second time. I still would've liked to hear "North American Scum" at the drama teacher's party, since he confesses to solidarity with his New York bretheren, and the original placement of "Addicted to Love" would've worked wonders when dancing inappropriately with Michelle.

Playlist: Skins - Episode 2.02
1. "Good Times Gonna Come" - Aqualung
2. "North American Scum" - LCD Soundsystem
3. "Addicted To Love" - Robert Palmer
4. "Bees" - Laura Cantrell
5. "Spread Your Love" - Black Rebel Motorcycle Club
6. "Fuck the People" - The Kills
7. "All Arounder" - Oneida
8. "Today" - featuring Maxxie, from Osama The Musical by Julian Ronnie (download)
9. "Boogie Woogie Bagel Boy" from Osama The Musical (download)
10. "Then Came the Day" - Osama The Musical (download)
11. "Hate" - Cat Power