TV: 24, South Park

24 has continued to hold my interest this year. I got frustrated with it in the second season, and gave up on it in the third, due to its increasingly implausible (and yet, still predictable) plot twists, its lack of focus during the midway point, and, yes, primarily because of Kim, the dumbest character in the history of television. In this fourth season, Kim's gone, though the ridiculous twists remain -- how likely is it that Paul Raines would go from Kiefer's torture victim to his crime-solving partner in one hour? And all that crap with Erin Driscoll's daughter was ridiculous. Good riddance to the both of them, I say. (Though I suspect we'll be seeing more of Erin; there seem to be strong suggestions that her daughter's death was not a suicide.)

But it still does action better than any show on the major networks. As crazy and over-the-top as it gets, it still has me on the edge of my seat.

I do have one major complaint: the changes in volume. I have to crank up the volume for most of the show to catch all the whispered exchanges at CTU, then as we go to commercial, the booming bass sound effects for the ticking clock nearly blow the windows out of my house. Criminy! Turn it down a notch, would ya?

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South Park's season premiere was last night, and I'll tell you what: I did not need to see that. We got to see Mr. Garrison getting a sex change operation, and intercut with the cartoon were actual, close-up, live-action film sequences of a sex change operation being performed. I can not believe Comedy Central allowed that to be aired. I'm always glad when boundaries are pushed and censorship is defied -- but dude, that was frickin' gross. Keep the surgical footage out of my cartoons, please. What's next, Patrick Star gets liposuction? (Film provided courtesy of Carnie Wilson.) Kim Possible gets breast implants? (Courtesy of Pam Anderson.) Barney Gumble gets a liver transplant? (Courtesy of Larry Hagman.) No, no, no!

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It took an hour and a half to publish this update (assuming it ever does get published), which has become an increasingly common problem. Blogger sucks.