Sunday Night Notes: "The West Wing," "Desperate Housewives" & "So Notorious"

Now, because I’ve just gotten hooked on “The West Wing,” I haven’t rooted for Josh and Donna as long as true fans. But even I felt cheated by their long-awaited hookup last night.

It seems that the stresses of Election Day lead to interesting couplings, so Josh and Donna joined that phenomenon so as not to be left out. But of course we know there are real feelings there; and I hope that before the show ends, they’ll actually deal with them. It would be really disappointing if this was it.

I actually felt a little cheated by the whole episode. I guess I was hoping the writers would make number crunching seem a little more exciting. I did, however, enjoy the interplay between Will and his girlfriend Kate (the National Security Adviser) as they contemplate their future after the Bartlett presidency, and Will’s horror that Kate voted for Vinick, the Republican.

But was there anyone who didn’t get chills when Annabeth walked into Leo’s room and screamed for help? I can only imagine how hard that must have been for her portrayer, Kristin Chenoweth. I already miss John Spencer terribly, so these next few episodes (especially the April 16th memorial) will be pretty tough. And NBC’s overly dramatic promos aren’t helping…

So, what to say about “Desperate Housewives”? This season has definitely had its ups and downs and I would rate last night’s episode as a down. It just seemed like none of the reveals came off right—Edie’s discovery of Karl and Susan’s marriage, Felicia outing Paul as a murderer, everything surrounding Gabi and Carlos’ baby. The only thing that did work was Lynette’s trickery with Andrew, but even that ended too abruptly. There needed to be some follow up between Bree and Lynette…

The best thing I watched last night was “So Notorious,” the new VH1 show starring Tori Spelling as herself. Instead of turning to a reality show to make a comeback, Tori has chosen a sitcom mocking her own life. Her mother sells her old clothes on eBay, her father (who we only hear, a la “Charlie’s Angels”) tries to cast her in more of his shows and men only want to go out with her because of her dad, or because they have a “90210” Donna Martin fantasy. Everything and everyone are fair game. I loved the parody of Kabbalah in the second episode as Tori pursued “Wholeness” to impress a guy.

You have to give Tori props for playing to her strengths. And the show is actually funny—which is a real rarity on TV these days. You can see “So Notorious” Sundays at 10 p.m. on VH1.

So yes, I missed “Grey’s Anatomy,” but I taped it and will catch up later.