A brief wave of nostalgia...

I just watched the Semper Fidelis episode of Growing Pains- Boner's last episode. I hadn't seen it in probably 20 years- I forgot that it made me cry. And now it made me cry for a whole different reason. :(

I think a big reason Growing Pains went downhill after season 4 wasn't Kirk Cameron being born again and causing trouble on the set- it happened because they wrote out Andrew Koenig. Never, ever underestimate the importance of a supporting or recurring player on a long running television show! Mike and Boner was a good early example of a "bromance"- and with that team split up, some of the humor was gone.

I waited a while to watch this episode again- two weeks ago I couldn't have done it.

When I was in high school, the only two shows I would drop everything for were Family Ties (I always loved Michael J. Fox!) and Growing Pains. They're both still funny 20 years later.

My friends in school had pictures of Kirk Cameron as Mike plastered all over their lockers and bedroom walls...they thought I was insane for preferring Boner! I thought he was a sweetheart and not as smart-assed as Mike. Naturally, once he was gone, I lost interest in the show- I mainly watched the last seasons because of Carol, and even she disappeared (largely because of Tracey Gold's health problems).

I skipped Lost last night.

Oh, dear. It sounds like it was an important episode, too. Thank God for hulu!

And it's confirmed.

I watched the press conference on CNN during Nancy Grace. It was agonizing to watch Walter and Judy Koenig describing how Andrew was found, and that he had committed suicide. :(

I wouldn't normally watch Nancy Grace, but no other networks had the news. I can't stand her. She just takes too much glee in other people's misery. She's already questioning if Andrew's friends could be criminally responsible for his suicide, assuming they "missed the signs". That's crap. There were a lot of signs, but no one person in his family or circle of friends could have put them all together. Depression is like that. He may have been acting oddly one day and then absolutely normal the next. With some people, there is just no way to predict this kind of outcome. Thanks, Nancy, for making his friends feel more guilty than they already probably do. Bitch.

And a sad ending...

Andrew Koenig's body has apparently been found. Just breaking on cnn.com.

http://www.cnn.com/2010/SHOWBIZ/TV/02/25/growing.pains.actor.dead/index.html?hpt=T1

Dammit.

This does not sound good.

Former Growing Pains co-star Andrew Koenig is missing:

http://www.latimes.com/entertainment/news/la-etchi-growing-pains-actor-andrew-koenig-missing,0,7291938.story

:( I always thought he was a hoot on GP (even though I loathed Kirk Cameron). I hope he turns up okay.

His dad Walter played Chekov on Star Trek. So I'm sure all Trekkers out there will be praying for Andrew's safe return.

Another reason to stop watching SVU.

Christopher Meloni is planning to leave.

http://www.digitalspy.co.uk/ustv/news/a201729/meloni-quitting-law--order-svu.html

Not surprising, considering the continuing slide in quality, plus the writers have probably explored all there is to Dective Stabler.

Mariska Hargitay is probably staying on the show, but Benson without Stabler is like Kirk without Spock!

Lost: LA X

WOW!!! What a great start to the final season. When we last saw the Losties, Juliet had detonated the H-Bomb in 1977, in an effort to change the future. And the episode opens with a nervous Jack back on Oceanic Flight 815, along with various other Losties. The plane passes over the island with no trouble...and the island is actually underwater! So it seems that history has been changed...

But wait! After the first commercial break, we see Kate waking up on the island. She is joined by Sawyer, Hurley, Jin, Jack, Miles, and the badly hurt Sayid. They are at the Swan station...the way it was after Desmond destroyed it. And Juliet is buried in the rubble...

Next, it's back to the beach with Not!Locke, Ben, and Jacob's followers- who found out the truth about Locke too late to help Jacob.

The epsiode goes back and forth between the two island groups and the plane...which safely lands in Los Angeles.

Juliet dies. :( Sawyer begs Miles to "talk" to her...and Miles reveals that Juliet told him that "It worked." Dead!Jacob tells Hurley to take Sayid to the temple or he'll die. The Losties are captured by the Others, but a message Jacob left saves them. Sayid dies anyway.

Jacob's followers attack Not!Locke...who reveals himself to be the "Smoke" monster.

The Losties are grieving for Juliet and Sayid...but then Sayid suddenly sits up and talks!

So much stuff to digest! The big things- Juliet's "It worked" comment- apparently, they now have two timelines going. In one, everything happened the way it did before. In the second, the island is destroyed, and Oceanic Flight 815 never crashes. Alt-Locke is still paralyzed but seems content. Alt-Hurley is still a lottery winner...but he's happy and has had nothing but good luck! It's not happy for everyone- Alt-Jack's father is still dead and the corpse is lost again, Alt-Jin and Sun are unhappy, Alt-Charlie is suicidal (Jack saves him), Alt-Kate is still a fugitive. And Desmond is on the plane! Wonder what that's all about...

So Not!Locke is Jacob's Nemesis, a really evil creature/person/whatever. That much was obvious from the season finale, but the fact that he's the smoke moster threw me!

Sayid dies but suddenly comes back...could he be possessed by Jacob (in a good way)? Is this final season going to be a classic Good v. Evil story? And where are they going with the Alt-Oceanic Flight 815?

Poor Sawyer. The death of Juliet really broke him. :(

It was nice to see Charlie again...even though he seems more broken than he was in the pilot. Boone also appears on the plane, but without Shannon. We don't see Claire until Los Angeles...when she's trapped in a taxi with an armed and desperate Kate!

This was an awesome night of television, and I can't wait to see how all of this is resolved.