THIS TOWN IS A PRISON, WITH ITS FOUR WALLS CLOSING IN

- This week's Lost was some pretty serious business (in contrast to the relative silliness of the last episode) and it was also probably my favourite episode of Season 5 so far. Really, it's pretty simple: they added lots of background to flesh out a character who's already one of the more interesting members of the cast, they provided some new information (Widmore is Faraday's dad!), they ended with a big cliffhanger that makes you immediately anxious for next week and, most importantly, everything moved at a very snappy pace. In fact, Season 5 just might be the fastest-paced season in the show's history; it's practically warp-speed compared to Seasons 2 & 3, anyway. As much as Lost does sometimes need the side-stories or slower-paced character episodes, it's great to see lots of action and forward momentum as we're heading towards the season finale. And, yeah, that twist at the end was a pretty big shocker.

- Together Through Life is a good Bob Dylan album but it's nowhere near as good as his last few ones. I think that the fact that he co-wrote a lot of the lyrics with Roger Avary has had somewhat of a tone-down effect; there's not nearly as much clever wordplay here and there's a lot of (to be fair, deliberate) use of lyrical love cliches. Not that it's innately a problem to have Dylan make an album of love or break-up songs (and I do dig that the kind of love talked about here is of a distinctly adult variety, rather than the teenage yearning/lust present in most popular music) but I wish there was a bit more of his signature wit at work here. The best song on here is "Forgetful Heart", which brims with an old-school Dylan cynicism but also a bluesman woundedness, and has a smokey, deliberate groove. The addition of accordion to the musical arrangements adds a nice Latin flavour to some of the tunes but it also points to a big problem with later-day Dylan records in general and this one in specific. Namely he won't let the songs change musical shape over time, and that's a real problem when the songs are as long as they are here. "This Dream Of You", for example, rides the exact same violin-led vamp for all of its six-minute run time and it gets a little tiresome. Sometimes, that's a positive, though, as in "Shake Shake Mama" which grinds its rudimentary blues riffs to hypnotic effect (it's also the album's shortest song, which may have something to do with its relative quality). However, the album sounds tired to the point of somnambulance at times; the cumulative effect of these sleepy, whiskey-drenched love songs becoming simply boring rather than calming. The problem, as I see it, is that Dylan doesn't have a unifying thought for this record (well, other than "love" but that's so broad and done to death, it hardly counts). Time Out of Mind, his best album past the 60's, had a dark mortality as its underlying message and all the forms that takes (anger, resignation bitterness, etc.) but Together just sort of drifts without an anchor. You can really tell that it was cut quickly, in a burst of inspiration. Not to say its bad, though. The musicianship is generally excellent and the accordion and additional guitar (courtesy of the Heartbreakers' Mike Campbell) often provide lots of musical spark. And, again, there are very good songs here ("Beyond Here Lies Nothing" and the aforementioned "Forgetful Heart" chief among them) and it's actually better to take the album in bits and pieces rather than as a long form work because its overall slowness isn't as much of a factor that way. So, overall, it's good but a bit disappointing, coming from someone as usually awesome as Dylan, especially given his "recent" hot streak. Also, even though every reviewer had mentioned this, I really feel the need to note that "My Wife's Hometown" is just "I Just Wanna Make Love To You" with different (and, to be fair, much better and funnier) lyrics. It's fine that 'ol Bob Wants to pay tribute to the blues greats but I don't think that ripping their songs off wholesale and not giving them credit is the right way to do it, just saying.

AND I WILL STRUM MY MERRY WAY

- I have mixed feelings about this week's 24: On the one hand, it was sort-of boring and not a whole lot really happened. On the other, I actually had a genuine emotional connection to what was going on which I don't think I've really felt about 24 since probably season 4. Jack's inability to help due to his sickness crushes him and that's kind of profound. Jack might be the world's foremost badass but he's also a broken, lonely man who's lost everyone important to him in his relentless quest to project his country. You get the sense that the only thing that defines his existence anymore is his ability to keep fighting and, when that's taken away, there's nothing left, no purpose for him to go on. Sure, there was still some ridiculous shit going on (Starkwell rolls up with friggin' armoured Humvees on a group of federal agents, for one) and the for-the-ladies Jack taking his clothes off bit was, um, odd but this episode actually worked as good drama not as the insane action-thriller piece that 24 usually is. Still, one does have to wonder how the writers will write themselves out of this corner, I hope it's not just a "you weren't infected after all!"-type thing, but that or Jon Voight having an antidote in a vial are the only options I can think of right now.

- Lost gets a "meh" from me this week, which I kind of thought it would going in. I don't really like any of the series' Kate-centric episodes and this was no different. Her flashbacks just filled in bits that we already sort-of knew and her on-island action just seemed well-worn. That said, there were bits I enjoyed: Jack's refusal to operate on Ben mirrors Sayid's shooting of him in that both of them, in trying to destroy Ben, unwittingly contribute to creating him. Hurley and Miles' conversation about time travel was good info-dump. But, in spite of the attempts at emotional resonance peppered throughout the story, I viewed this episode rather academically. That said, next week's episode looks awesome. If this preview doesn't get you pumped then I don't know what to say.

- I'm really surprised at this new Bob Dylan song. It's got kind of a Latin groove to it but it still fits in with the earthy blues tones of his last couple albums. And his voice is closer to that restrained Time Out of Mind mumble than the scratchy attempted-croon of Modern Times, that's a very good thing in my book. I hope the whole Together Through Life album keeps up this level of quality.

If you're following my other blog (and, really, why wouldn't you?) I have read over 150 pages of Twilight but I'm holding off on a post for a couple days to collect my thoughts proper and avoid going off-the-cuff with stuff that'll immediately be contradicted by later parts of the book. But, if you'd like a couple first impressions:

- Meyer really devotes a lot of words to describing how handsome Edward is, huh?
- I don't know if the names sounding Victorian (and it might just be me but Bella Swan and Edward Cullen just sound like names more appropriate to a knight and his fair maiden than anything modernist) is an intentional call-back to Jane Austin-style romances or it's just coincidence, but it's kinda odd either way.
- Hey, here's an odd thought: We know from all those testimonials on twilightguy.com that guys do read Twilight, so, why's there no "I [heart] Bella Swan" (or, uh, one of the girl vampires) thing as a contrast to all those "Team Edward" and "Team Jacob" things?
- I may have just thought that last thing because, as much as it pains me to admit this in a public forum, Bella is totally my kind of gal. So, uh, if she ever wants to drop her vampire, I'll be here.
-If you're curious as to which character I relate the most to: It's totally Mike, he's just tries so hard to be nice. He's also sort of clingy and a bit creepy, but, whatever.
- Tonally, it's not nearly as mordant or gothic as I had expected, there's a good bit of levity and petty teen drama to it. Also, Meyer seems to be in love with using really long adjectives, it can be a bit much at times.

That's all from me for now.