Love him or hate him, Russell Hantz has been the face of CBS' "Survivor" for the past two seasons.

 

Bullying, occasionally abusive, diabolically manipulative and bizarrely adroit at finding poorly hidden Immunity Idols, Russell has bulldozed his way to the final jury on two occasions and left angrily without the million dollars on both occasions.

 

To some fans, Russell is one of the game's legendary players, an example of how even the most repellent personality can dominate the game with guile, intensity and force-of-will. To other fans, Russell is a beneficiary of the over-saturation of Immunity Idols on "Survivor" and the perfect example of a player who understands one part of the game -- lasting 39 days -- flawlessly, but remains utterly clueless about the second part of the game -- successfully convincing nine people you voted out to name you Sole Survivor. Enough people fall into the first camp that Russell won an online vote for the most popular player in "Survivor: Heroes vs. Villains," giving him $100,000 and some solace after getting shut out in the jury vote.

 

HitFix caught up with a still-bitter Russell the morning after the "Heroes vs. Villains" finale to discuss his season, his disappointment and the under-the-radar strategy he never got to employ.

 

Click through...

 

Happy Wednesday and welcome to this week's special Upfronts Supersized Firewall & Iceberg Podcast.

 

For only the second time in our podcasting history, Firewall & Iceberg crossed the hour mark this week, but with four networks worth of upfronts discussion, we really didn't have much of a choice. Heck, we even skipped over "American Idol" entirely. But we couldn't skip "Lost" and we didn't want to ignore the premiere of FOX's "Good Guys," so the time was necessary.

 

Here's this week's slate:

 

Network Upfronts -- NBC, FOX, ABC and then CBS -- 01:45 - 43:45

FOX's "The Good Guys" -- 43:45 - 49:40

ABC's "Lost" -- 49:40 - 01:01:45 

 

 

As always, you can subscribe to The Firewall & Iceberg Podcast over at the iTunes Store, where you can also rate us and comment on us. [Or you can always follow our RSS Feed.]

 

And here's this week's podcast...

In the second season of "Survivor," Jerri Manthey wasn't a very nice woman. She was, in fact, rather evil. 

 

Jerri earned the nickname The Black Widow, but she also earned only an eighth place finish. Brought back for the first "Survivor" All-Stars season, she seemed to revel in being hated, but it led only to a 10th place finish.

 

It wasn't surprising that Jerri was categorized as a Villain for "Survivor: Heroes vs. Villains," but instead of living up to that moniker, a different Jerri emerged. She was quieter and less confrontational and although it seemed as if she was wishy-washy and waffling, she also kept finding herself as the swing vote in one circumstance after another.

 

This new Jerri wasn't necessarily as TV-friendly as The Black Widow. Instead, she made no enemies and, probably as a result, she stuck around until the finale. Jerri finished an impressive fourth after Russell decided to stick with Parvati in the Top Three.

 

HitFix caught up with Jerri and discussed her change in demeanor, her relationship with Russell and why she'd have won if she'd made it to the jury.

 

Click through...

It doesn't happen often, but occasionally an appendage can hijack an entire panel at the Television Critics Association press tour. 

 

At our last panel for "Hung," euphemisms flew fast and furious as a room of respectable reporters tried to avoid accosting the stars of an HBO pseudo-comedy with the word "penis."

 

Nobody needed to be that coy at January's panel for FOX's "The Good Guys." We hadn't seen the show and most of us hadn't read the script furnished by the network. We had little sense of the show's style or substance, so we discussed what we had in front of us and by that I'm referring to Bradley Whitford's mustache. 

 

I can't help but feel like our obsession with Whitford's facial hair led directly to FOX's decision to make the mustache into an equally billed third co-star in much of the "Good Guys" advertising. 

 

Premiering on Wednesday (May 19) in a slightly weird audition episode *before* "American Idol" (rather than the post-"Idol" strategy FOX employed to launch "Glee" last spring), "Good Guys" feels a little raw and unformed in its pilot incarnation, but it doesn't lack for charm and wit. 

 

[More of a review of "Good Guys" after the break...]

In the show's second season, Colby Donaldson had one of the classic complete "Survivor" performances, combining psychical domination with universal likability and remaining so true to his word that he essentially handed the million dollars to Tina Wesson.

 

In "Survivor: Heroes vs. Villains," on the other hand, Colby looked tired and apathetic. He made an early alliance with Tom Westman and Stephenie LaGrossa, but watched his friends get picked off one after another. Not only was he failing in challenges, but he was so weak that somehow one Hero after another was perceived as a greater threat and was voted off first. It looked like an embarrassing turn for the Hero, but if the name of the game in "Survivor" is, well, surviving, Colby implausibly kept his torch lit.

 

As a result, Colby entered Sunday's (May 16) "Survivor" finale knowing that if he could somehow grab an Immunity or two, he'd be facing a jury made up largely of his former tribemates and, after losing his perfect season, he'd somehow be triumphant in this most imperfect season.

 

It didn't happen.

 

Colby lost a tight Immunity challenge and was voted out, becoming the season-to-last member of the season's jury. As he told viewers after his snuffing, maybe a "Survivor" win just isn't his destiny.

 

The day after the finale, HitFix caught up with Colby and learned how much of his weakness was strategy, why he came to respect Sandra and why he's unlikely to come to respect Russell.

 

Click through for the full interview...

When it comes to episodic television, few tropes are more resilient than the "When Our Heroes First Met" flashback episode. If your favorite show lasts long enough, odds are that when some sweeps period rolls around, you'll see the stars wearing bad hairpieces and period-semi-appropriate costuming to show the meet-cute circumstances that brought them all together.

 

Sometimes it works out well. "Bones" just celebrated its 100th episode with a fine version of the genre, temporarily teasing the show's fans with the Booth-on-Bones intimacy they'd been craving for much of the previous 99 hours. 

 

Sometimes it doesn't work at all. I loved almost every moment of my marathon series viewing of "The Shield" (full blog post coming after the TV season peters out), but the Season Two flashback episode "Co-Pilot" is a continuity and character nightmare.

 

Writers and actors love it, because it's almost like they're working with new and different characters and new and different dynamics.

 

Audiences love it because of the schadenfreude of seeing TV stars wearing fake mullets.

 

It took 60 episodes for CBS' "The Big Bang Theory" to get around to a flashback, but Monday's (May 17) episode shows how Sheldon and Leonard became roommates and also answers the timeless question: So what happened to their building's elevator anyway?

 

A few thoughts on the episode -- not real spoilers, but you definitely may want to read it after watching the episode -- after the break...

 

Sepinwall already has his reactions, but here are a few swiftly jotted thoughts on FOX's 2010-2011 primetime schedule before seeing a second of FOX teaser footage.

 

Click through...

I awoke on this Sunday morning to find that NBC had already decided to leak its 2010-2011 fall primetime schedule to the trades six or seven hours ahead of when the network was already supposed to leak the schedule ahead of its upfront presentation on Monday.

 

That wasn't really fair, NBC. All I ask is one morning of sleep per week and you have to go and mess that up? Sigh.

 

In that spirit, somewhat grouchy and not fully caffeinated, here are a few initial thoughts I had looking over NBC's schedule. Sepinwall will have more exhaustive analysis, including quotes from the evening NBC press conference, later...

 

[Click through for said thoughts...]

Bearded, gravel-voiced, gregarious and reliably festooned in tie-dyes, Rupert Boneham was the right man at the right time for the pirate-themed "Survivor: Pearl Islands."

 

Rupert didn't win "Pearl Islands," but he was so popular that the show turned him right around for the subsequent "All-Stars" season. He didn't win that one either, but he did capture a fan vote that confirmed his status as one of the most popular "Survivor" contestants ever and earned him a million dollars.

 

The game drew Rupert back in for a third time in this "Heroes vs. Villains" installment, but for a good while, the shoe-stealing, challenge-dominating Goliath was missing-in-action. This season's Rupert was quieter, grumpier and less of a physical threat. Perhaps that had more than a little to do with the toes he broke in the season's very first challenge.

 

But in the past couple weeks, with his back against the wall, the Rupert fans adored returned. Facing a first inevitable elimination, Rupert turned an ordinary rock into the threat of an Immunity Idol and bluffed Candice out of the game. Facing a second inevitable elimination, Rupert worked to stir up discontent amongst the Villains and pushed Russell to turn on his allies and vote Danielle out. This Thursday (May 13), alas, time ran out for Rupert and he was unable to avoid having his torch snuffed at the last Tribal Council before the finale.

 

HitFix caught up with Rupert to discuss his injured feet, his disappointment with Sandra and why he was willing to try to align with Russell.

 

Click through for the full interview...

 

 

This week, Alan Sepinwall and I spent the first half of the podcast talking about three comedies we like -- "Cougar Town," "Modern Family" and "Parks and Recreation" -- and then the last 20 minutes arguing about Tuesday's "Lost," which Alan quite liked and which irked me. Oh well. It happens.

 

As we note at the beginning of the podcast, things may be irregular next week due to network upfronts. We will definitely still podcast, but no promises on when that podcasting will occur. It's possible we may even try for a double-podcast next week as we have to look over schedules for the full new slates for all four-ish (Sorry, The CW) networks.

 

Here's the time breakdown for this week's podcast:

 

"American Idol" -- 02:10 - 04:00

"Cougar Town" -- 04:15 - 12:10

"Modern Family" -- 12:15 - 19:35

"Parks and Recreation" -- 19:45 - 26:00

"The Pacific" -- 26:00 - 29:00

"Lost" -- 29:10 - 48:15

 

 

As always, you can subscribe to The Firewall & Iceberg Podcast over at the iTunes Store, where you can also rate us and comment on us. [Or you can always follow our RSS Feed.]

 

And here's this week's podcast...