This Week in Chuck

Be prepared - major picspam coming your way because "Gossip Girl" made me seriously happy last week!!!

Winner #1: (From "It's a Wonderful Lie") No Contest - Sparkle tux! Sparkle tux! Sparkle tux!


Winner #2: (From "O Brother, Where Bart Thou?") He was in mourning all episode (lots of black suits, black overcoats, etc.) so I'm giving the win to the artfully disheveled hair! May not look like much, but for a character who lives and dies by the amount of brillo cream in his carefully slicked hair, this represents an entire character arc. (Psst - it clues us in to his grief - get it?)


In all honesty, I absolutely loved this episode. Yes, Chuck looks like a maniac, but the performance was great (a very Chuck reaction to grief), it featured some progress on the Chuck and Blair front, made me hate Serena and Dan a little less and a little more, simultaneously, and revealed that Rufus and Lily have a secret love child out their somewhere! Can't wait to see what happens next. (Jacob at TWoP wrote a great recap of the episode if you want to read it here.)

It also gave me these beautiful moments:

Blair looking radiantly happy at her mom's wedding

Blair and Nate coming together to help Chuck (we seriously need more scenes of the three of them together - Nate has been isolated all season so far - not good!)

Blair finally says "I love you" and Chuck looks terrified

The hug heard round the world - about damn time!

And Eric - just because he's the most awesome character on the show!

Now onto more pressing matters - SERENA'S WARDROBE:

I know Blake Lively is hot, and has one of the most magically, naturally beautiful bodies to come around in quite some time. She's vivacious, tall, curvy, has quite the chest and ass, and looks like she eats and is healthy. Kudos! But practically every costume over the season has made it a point to showcase either her bust or her legs, and more often than not, both. Yes, Serena Van der Woodsen is a free-spirited dish, but she's starting to dress a tad trashy and I'd like it to stop.

The evidence:

This is her go-to top design.

She was actually trying to piss off her step-father here, but still...

This is the top and bottom of the dress she wore to her boyfriend's father's wedding. A tad too short, do we think?


Again with the too much cleavage.


Actually a lovely top and jacket, but I think the plunging neckline is a little inappropriate for her Yale interview with the Dean.


Thanksgiving in a skirt short enough to see her peek-achoo.

And this was the dress deemed fitting for her step-father's funeral. At least she wore a coat most of the time.

So what do you say - am I overreacting?

My Favorite Actresses

This is another of those lists making the blog rounds, so of course I had to do one as well. The topic: Your 20 Favorite Film Actresses. This was actually pretty hard and I'm not sure this is the definitive list, but it's the best I could do in 20 minutes (which is all the time I allowed myself to obsess). Not all of these actresses are the best of the best, but they've managed to win me over. I realized that for an actress to be a favorite of mine, I have to like her, not just her acting. Some of these are greats, others just had one amazing role I've never forgotten. So here they are, in alphabetical order, as well as my favorite part they've plaved.


Amy Adams: Junebug
Loved her in this, and if you haven't seen it you must!

Juliette Binoche: Dan in Real Life or The English Patient
Has a very warm quality, always seems intelligent and thoughtful in her characters and I love the way her voice sounds.

Cate Blanchett: (I can't pick)
She's seriously fantastic in everything. I love Notes on a Scandal best as a film (in which Blanchett plays a weak teacher having an affair with a student) but just take a look at her strength and versatility in Elizabeth, Bandits, The Gift, The Aviator and I'm Not There. Amazing actress.

Toni Collette: Muriel's Wedding
Has a goofy smile and makes me cry at the end of The Sixth Sense.

Claire Danes: Shopgirl
So she's here because of "My So-Called Life" which, I know, is a TV show. Danes has all the potential in the world but hasn't seemed to find a film career that matches the flickers of talent we saw then. That said, love her in Little Women and Stage Beauty and she was very good in 2005's Shopgirl.

Maggie Gyllenhaal: Secretary (though I love her in Stranger Than Fiction too)
One of my absolute faves, Maggie is stunningly vulnerable in Secretary, but contrast that with her strength and ferocity in Stranger Than Fiction and Sherrybaby to get some idea of her range. I also dig the way she looks, all gawky angles and chipmunk cheeks. So cute.

Anne Hathaway: Ella Enchanted
She's just innately likable. I'm looking forward to seeing Rachel Getting Married, which looks to be her breakout role as an actress to be taken seriously.

Bryce Dallas Howard: The Village
Haven't really seen her in anything else, but her portrayal of Ivy in The Village blows me away. That girl is freakin' incredible.

Keira Knightley: Pride and Prejudice
Just now beginning to stretch herself, I love that she looks resplendent in period garb and has that great clipped British accent, and P & P and Atonement are two of my favorite films. She's radiant in both.

Juliette Lewis: What's Eating Gilbert Grape?
She played Becky, one of my favorite characters of all time, and wins a spot here just for that. Even though she fronts a band now and is mostly cast in forgettable sidekick roles, she has proven her abilities in Cape Fear, Natural Born Killers, and Kalifornia.

Mary Stuart Masterson: Some Kind of Wonderful
Not conventionally the most attractive, there's something in her awkward body shape and tomboy speech that I really love. Watts is probably her most well-known character, but she's also really good in Benny & Joon, and Fried Green Tomatoes.

Rachel McAdams: The Notebook
Another actress with all the potential in the world, we're all just waiting for her to take it somewhere amazing. Love her passionate portrayal in The Notebook, as well as her ability to be both bitchy (Mean Girls, The Family Stone) and extremely likable (Wedding Crashers).

Natalie Portman: Beautiful Girls
Apparently I'm not the only one in love with her character in Beautiful Girls. Definitely one of her greatest performances. Portman has the ability to garner our sympathy, but sometimes chooses roles where she's somewhat off-putting and distant and I like that she plays against her innate charm with a coolness.

Susan Sarandon: Bull Durham
Annie Savoy is just a great character and Sarandon imbues her with a sultry, smart sexiness. I love her in Moonlight Mile and Anywhere But Here (also good for Portman) and I can only pray to look that good when I'm almost 60.

Elizabeth Taylor: Cat on a Hot Tin Roof
Maggie the Cat is a shallow bitch, but Taylor makes me love her. Very strong-willed characters.

Kristin Scott Thomas: The English Patient
At first I thought I only liked her in this film, but then remembered how she made me root for her in The Horse Whisperer despite being a career-obsessed control freak, and that she was the elusive and tart-tongued Fiona in Four Weddings and a Funeral.

Emma Thompson: Wit
Thompson is great in everything, my favorite actually being her high-spirited Beatrice in Much Ado About Nothing, but she's fantastic in Wit, a widely unappreciated film. Often plays drama, but is a first rate comedian, and try not to cry in her big scene in Love, Actually.

Uma Thurman: Kill Bill
She's cool as a cucumber in Pulp Fiction, stunning in Gattaca, fierce and combustable in Kill Bill, and a sweet doofus in The Truth About Cats and Dogs. Really is an underrated actress.

Dianne Wiest: Hannah and Her Sisters
Her characters in Hannah and Parenthood are among my favorites, plus she has a cheery, stable quality to her in films like Dan in Real Life, The Horse Whisperer and Edward Scissorhands.

Kate Winslet: Titanic
It's funny that she's last because she is most definitely #1 in my book. Never turns in a shaby performance, she's just radiant. Her best acting is probably in Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind, but Titanic is where I fell in love, and her parts in Sense and Sensibility, Heavenly Creatures, Hamlet, Hideous Kinky, Enigma, and Quills are all amazing.


Just Missed the List: Meryl Streep, Jodi Foster, Winona Rider, Reese Witherspoon, Joan Allen and Emily Blunt.

Christmas Oddity

The computer is finally fixed! Yay! It was actually good to go last Thursday, but I had a hella busy weekend and have only now gotten around to posting anything.

To begin with, it's Christmas time. For me this means two things: All Things Christmas (watching our large assortment of holiday themed films, decorating the house within an inch of it's capacity and wrapping all presents myself with a variety of ribbons and paper) and Awards Season.

Strangely I am not particularly into either of these events this year.

I did help decorate the tree and spent my last two days off wrapping all the presents (that felt good), but have left most of the house decorating to my mom (I just haven't really cared, very uncharacteristic of me) and haven't watched a single holiday movie - no cartoons, no Miracle on 34th Street or Elf, and I'm not really all that sad about it. I don't know what's up with that.

Anyone ever seen the TV show "Roswell"? Kinda crap, honestly, but I was obsessed with it my first two years of college. Katherine Heigl (before she was famous) played a character (also ironically named Isabel/Izzie - crazy!) who was a teen alien that psychotically loved Christmas. Her nickname in the Christmas episodes was "The Christmas Nazi." I wouldn't go as far as to call myself that (I'm not involved with Senior Home gift drives or caroling or Christmas Pageants), but I have been known in years past to take the decoration of my home a little too seriously (I have a collection of fruit ornaments that will someday take over their very own tree - meaning I'll have two trees and one will be filled with fruit), I've made timetables for the watching of Christmas films in order to ensure everyone's tastes and schedules are satisfied, and I've maintained pretty high standards for the kinds of wrapping paper used and demanded a variety of types of ribbon be made available (for example, no one in my family has two presents wrapped in the same pattern of paper - that would be wrong). But other than a little anal retentiveness in the wrapping portion of the season, my other Christmas fetishes have been largely overlooked.

The other oddity has been my lack of interest in Awards Season buzz. Last week alone, the Broadcast Film Critics announced their nominees, as did the Golden Globes, and the National Board of Review, L.A. Film Critics and New York Critics circles all named their choices for Best Film, Actor and Actress of the Year. Normally this would mean a great deal of squeeing and speculation on my part, but other than being stoked that WALL*E was named Best Film (by the L.A. Critics), I am not particularly excited. (Wait, I lied: Kate Winslet's up for a slew of awards, as well as Best Actress and Supporting Actress honors at the Golden Globes and the fact that she doesn't yet have an Academy Award is one of the few quatifiably wrong things in the universe, so I am rooting for her, of course!) I guess my interest in the Awards Season will probably change once I've seen some of the nominated films (post-Christmas: Milk, Revolutionary Road, The Curious Case of Benjamin Button, Doubt, Gran Torino, Frost/Nixon and Slumdog Millionaire, here I come) so I hope the New Year brings me some renewed vigor cause an Allison that doesn't obsess over Academy Awards nominations is just not an Allison you'd recognize (plus, that would be some hard evidence that I am actually suffering from depression - we don't want that!).

My Computer Blows Chunks

I know I promised a "Things I Missed" post a week ago, which is incredibly ironic as I've now missed so much more that that post is most likely irrelevant. In the boonies of good ol' Sweet Home, our computer has up and quit connecting to the Internet, so this is the first chance I've had to check anything online in about a week. Sorry 'bout that. (I'm actually using the computer at my friend's house in Eugene right now.) We're taking the computer in to get fixed tomorrow, and hopefully we'll get it back before the week is out so that I can actually post all the things I've been working on.

As for now, tonight is Gossip Girl and it looks like Bart Bass has died, so I am of course super excited about Chuck's imminent meltdown! Seriously, I want that boy screaming and crying and tearing his hair out (from the previews, it's already 50% more unkempt than usual) because I want to see this actor effing lose it! Can't wait, but I won't be able to weigh in until later. Boo-hoo.

Hopefully I'll be talking to you by week's end. In the meantime, came across this great song while I was watching shipper videos on youtube. It's called "HeartBeat" by Scouting for Girls and I put it on repeat while getting ready this morning. Love!

Two Weeks Ago in Chuck...

For at least the third time I am late, really really late, with my Chuck's Wardrobe post. I thought about including this in my 'Things I Missed" post (coming tomorrow) but that post is already nearing epic lengths and I can just bang this out right now.

Winner #1: From the episode "Bonfire of the Vanity" 3 weeks ago. It may not look like much but blow it up and pay attention to the detail. The matching blue pocket square. The fine stitching of the plaid jacket. The deep blue sweater vest beneath. And I know you can't see them, but the elbows are furnished with dark brown patches. Nice.




Winner #2: Neither of Chuck's outfits in "The Magnificent Archibald" were all that spectacular; just your usual tie (red), vest (tan), and geisha-like smoking jacket (navy). So let's focus on the scene surrounding this bathrobe, shall we? Yes, that's Chuck having a martini-toast with the woman who has just shaved his face in his own private barber shop. Jacob's recap says it all:

"Eric's mind is so fucking blown that it propels him up the stairs and into Chuck's room, where he's delighted to see Chuck is home. And here's what Chuck's up to right now: getting a shave and facial from a silent woman in a French maid costume, while they drink martinis together, wearing a smoking jacket. "My plans for the evening got held up at Customs," he smarms, but I think these "plans" are imaginary as I often do, because he's got an image to protect. Eric must not know that he is impotent, because he loves Eric the most of anybody besides Nate, who I guess also must not know about the mechanical errors, so: "plans." Eric's like, "YOUR DAD TOTALLY JUST BLEW MY WHOLE MIND" and Chuck's like, "You know I have a PI on retainer -- you think Bart wouldn't?" He clinks martinis with the French maid lady at this point. He is like twice as Chuck Bass right now as usual, it's awesome. Eric's like, "Isn't that totally fucking fucked up, though? Am I wrong here?" Chuck, because why would he know better, is like, "I don't even know what fucked up means. It's what we do. Remind me to tell you about the time I found these amazing surveillance photos of Gina, my hot Italian au pair who later molested me and contributed to the insane mess I am!" Eric takes a pass on that one, and Chuck offers him the keys to the vault. And because it's Gossip Girl, yes: there is literally a vault, with literal bars of gold in it."