What was on TV? Thurs, Jan 13, 2005

20 years ago, a shopping all exploded in Illinois. It made national news. Let's see what was on TV!

8:00 The OC on Fox

2x08 "The Power of Love"

Available on Hulu and Max

The OC wasn't like other teen dramas. Some of this was the indie aesthetic and soundtrack. But it was also the parents. There were great adult characters on teen dramas before The OC. But they were mostly confined to critical favorites like Freaks and Geeks and My So-Called Life, not buzzy sensations like 90210 and Dawson's Creek. And the parents on shows like Freaks and Geeks, My So-Called Life, and even Buffy the Vampire the Slayer were squares, they weren't involved in the soapy shenanigans. But on The OC, the parents got to be sexy stars who anchored their own dramatic storylines. It was a real innovation. And what's even more impressive is that the show pulled this off without ever truly threatening the show's OTP parents, Sandy and Kristen.

So it's nice to see Sandy and Kristen get the A-plot this week. Sandy forgets their 20-year anniversary, there's a bunch of drama with Ryan, Seth, Lindsey, and Alex, and at the end of the episode everyone gathers at the Bait Shop to celebrate this loving, stable, and sexy couple. And we get to hear Peter Gallagher sing! Fun all around.

10:00 ER on NBC

11x10 "Skin"

Available on Hulu and Max

This was a big episode for Maura Tierney, as she is abducted by people involved in some kind of gang fight and forced to do performative useless surgery on a man with internal injuries at gunpoint. It's very melodramatic, and not in the good way. Maura Tierney regularly spins straw into gold on this show, but this is a little much even for her.

The Maura Tierney plot received all the promotion and press coverage. But tucked inside this episode is a major television milestone: a trans performer playing a trans character. There was even a piece about this development in industry magazine TV Week. The producers weren't looking for a trans actress, but when Alexandra Billings' agent submitted her for the role, they figured, why not?

Billings plays Ms. Mitchell, and of course she is repeatedly misgendered, which would be standard for far too long after this. But honestly, the episode isn't bad. They do the whole "she's not pregnant, she has cancer" twist. But thankfully it doesn't play into the wretched "her hormones are killing her" trope (this is what happened when Billings appeared on Grey's Anatomy a few years later). When it's revealed that she has testicular cancer, she quips that she was getting rid of them anyway.

The bulk of her storyline concerns her relationship with Doctor Shane West. After their initial consultation, she asks for a different doctor. Shane West of course takes it personally, but when replacement doctor Susan Lewis is called into a trauma, he delivers her diagnosis and asks why he was taken off the case. She tells him that she senses defensiveness and self-loathing in it. She's had a lot of personal experience with those emotions and she doesn't want to be around them anymore.

Ms. Mitchell doesn't even get a first name, and she appears in only a handful of scenes. But she's not a demon and she's not a saint. She has a personality and a history. She has a sense of humor and she's a shrewd judge of character. Some of this is in the writing, but a lot is in Billings' performance. See what can happen when you hire a trans actress?

Late Night

The highlight of tonight's Conan is the interview with Nia Long. They flirt and she gives some detailed kissing advice that hopefully landed with Conan's audience of dorky college stoners.

What Else Was On

• The WB Thursday movie was one of my all-time favorites, Love and Basketball.
• ESPN had recently cancelled the well-reviewed Football drama Playmakers after the NFL made a fuss. The show featured closeted players, steroids, drug use, domestic abuse, and other topics the NFL wanted to keep quiet. ESPN's next original series was Tilt, a drama set in the world of professional poker. Vegas was a huge setting in this era, and poker was experiencing a boom, so it was a solid choice. And Vegas and poker weren't going to get to upset if you made them look scandalous and dangerous. That's just good advertising!

TiVo Status

The first part of Masterpiece Theater's He Knew He Was Right, one episode of Carnivale, one episode of Law and Order, and the three-hour Masterpiece Theater miniseries The Lost Prince. 7 hours total.