What was on TV? Tues, March 1, 2005

20 years ago, Martha Stewart was released from prison. Let's see what was on TV!

8:00 American Idol on Fox

4x15 "Top 10 Women Perform"

American Idol was the biggest show of its era, and it wasn't close. Almost 27 million people watched this episode! You'd think a show that big would have a ginormous presence on streaming. But I watch these episodes on a YouTube channel called "Old Idol USA." Most of the episodes from this season have between 3,000 and 10,000 views.

That's quite a fall. Other reality shows from this era, like Survivor, Project Runway, and America's Next Top Model have a presence on streaming. Why not Idol? Part of it is that there's just too much of it. At its peak, Idol was generating over 40 hours of programming per season, and a lot of that was bloat (the results show is the definition of "this episode of TV could have been a press release"). Some of that is that the appeal of Idol is lost when you can't vote for your favorites and chat about it at work the next day. And now we don't have to tune into Idol to see decent singers, we can open TikTok or YouTube. And if we want to see those same singers get torn apart, all we have to do is look at the comments. Idol is mostly interesting as a cultural artifact, which is why I enjoy watching it for this project.

9:00 Frontline on PBS

"The Soldier's Heart"

This documentary profiles soldiers freshly returned from Iraq, and explores their experiences with Post Traumatic Stress Disorder. The documentary's strongest argument is that the military's institutional culture makes it impossible for these men to get better and process their trauma. But the argument for why the military should change its culture and prioritize mental health is "you can't win a war when all your soldiers have PTSD." It's a reminder that public opinion hadn't fully turned against the war in 2005, and that we still thought we could win it.

10:00 Monk (recorded)

3x15 "Mr. Monk and the Election"

Monk doesn't seem like a political show. So I thought that an episode called "Mr. Monk and the Election" in which Natalie runs for the school board would take the easy way out and avoid politics altogether. And indeed, it is eventually revealed that what looked like an assassination attempt had less to do with the school board and more to do with the office copy machine. But that doesn't mean the show avoids politics! There is a debate scene, and the show makes its feelings plain: Natalie wants a good education for her daughter and her neighbors, her opponent wants to cut costs at any cost. And the actual voting scene is awesome. Of course, Monk has claustrophobia in the voting booth and has anxiety about his long ballot. The scene really captures how overwhelming and confusing voting can be, especially in the Bay Area where ballots can be as long as a third-grade level chapter book. The politics of this episode were smarter and deeper than I expected.

Also smarter and deeper than I expected? Natalie's backstory. We see her staring at the picture of her dead husband, and he's in his military uniform. I thought I knew where this was going, especially given that this episode was produced at the height of the Iraq war: the fallen hero who inspires his widow. But the show goes another way. Turns out her husband wasn't a hero, before he died he ran off with a bunch of supplies, leaving his comrades and the people he was rescuing in the lurch. Natalie has heard contradictory stories and this is all a secret and she doesn't know how to handle it. And I think that those mixed emotions are more reflective of the experience of actual military wives and widows. This was even explored in the Frontline documentary I reviewed tonight: the need to see the military as strong and without flaws is destructive and it harms everybody.

But what Natalie takes away from the story is that she needs to show her daughter what bravery looks like, so she'll have something to hold on to when she learns the full story of how her father died. And that's why she keeps running for school board even in the face of weird volunteers, long odds, and even an assassination attempt. And I find that truly moving, which is not something I expected on this fun mystery show.

But of course, this is still a fun episode of a fun mystery show. We get a great action-comedy sequence when Monk has to dispose of a grenade. And a pre-Parks & Rec Nick Offerman guest stars. I've seen him sitting next to Megan Mullally at awards shows in this era, but now I've seen him act too. He's still waiting for his big break, but it will come. I'm sure he made lots of gorgeous furniture in the meantime.

Late Night

There's a segment on tonight's Conan in which they present a seemingly unrelated series of things and people and then reveal that they are increasingly more likely to...whatever. If it sounds confusing, it is. All the jokes are the usual lazy and ugly nonsense: she's fat! she's slutty! he's gay! But the whole thing is incredibly strange, it feels less like a series of jokes and more like a series of LSAT questions.

The interviews are better. I was surprised to find that Tyra Banks makes a great Conan guest, but of course Tyra slots perfectly into Conan's zany world. Meanwhile, I was not at all surprised to find that a young Jesse Eisenberg makes a great Conan guest. My favorite part of the interview involved Jesse confessing that he always reads the comments, and Conan saying he bails the minute someone calls him ugly. A generational divide, right there.

What Else Was On

• Tonight marked the end of an era: the trailblazing, cursing, butt-showing NYPD Blue ended after 12 seasons.
• Just a year earlier, The Amazing Race was a critical darling in danger of cancellation. Now, it was about to air its third season premiere in nine months, and it had established itself as a massive hit and a pillar of CBS' schedule.
• UPN was gearing up for the return of America's Next Top Model. Toccara, a fan-favorite from the previous season, guest starred on All of Us, and Yaya DaCosta guested on Eve in what would prove to be the star of a very successful acting career. That was followed by a reunion special catching up with all the girls from cycle 3.
• Tonight's special sweeps guest stars: recording star Mya on NCIS, Matthew Modine on Law and Order: SVU, Fantasia Barrino on All of Us, and Heather Graham, returning to Scrubs.

TiVo Status

The Masterpiece Theater miniseries The Lost Prince, a Frontline documentary, the TV movies Sucker Free City, Lackawanna Blues, School of Life, and Ladies Night, tw0 episodes of Miracle's Boys, and one episode of Without a Trace. 16 hours total.

Figure Skating, 20 years ago

Yuna Kim vs. Mao Asada is one of the greatest sports rivalries of all time. These two women were born 20 days apart, and their arrival on the figure skating scene was an absolute earthquake. 20 years ago, they both competed at their first-ever Junior Worlds.

Mao Asada showed her poise right away, as she found an issue with her boot after her first jumping pass and went to the referee so she could fix it. She then floated through the rest of her Wizard of Oz short program. Everything looks so easy. At one point people applaud as she does nothing more than skate around the corner. But that skating was appluase-worthy, the way this tiny person generates speed without effort is breathtaking.

Meanwhile, Yuna Kim had a bad day at the office. She made an error on her jump combination and then fell on her next jump. Yuna was so composed throughout her career, so it is shocking to see her punch the boards in frustration when she falls. But she puts all that behind her right away, already a born competitor, and delivers the rest of the program beautifully. I've always loved this program (choreographed by Swedish champion Catarina Lindgren), and she picks up every accent of the music and sails through her spins, footwork, and a lovely double axel with an arm variation at the end (catnip to me personally).