Becker: The Complete Third Season
Paramount
Available Now

I wasn't a fan of this comedy about a curmudgeonly doctor when it originally aired, but since star Ted Danson has had a career resurgence with roles in the HBO comedies Curb Your Enthusiasm and Bored To Death, I felt the show deserved a second look.

Essentially a comic version of House, Becker hates the world with a passion and fumbles to deal with society in his own cantankerous way. He's constantly at odds with the ladies in his office - head nurse (Hattie Winston) and her ditzy assistant played by Summer School's Shawnee Smith - and with the patrons of the grungy diner he frequents.

Along the way, Becker is able to let his guard down, and viewers are able to identify with the character. It's a tough tightrope to walk, and Danson manages it with ease. Unfortunately, the whole show can't survive on Danson's inherent charisma alone; one particularly horrid episode has Becker stuck on the floor of a department store after tripping over a Christmas display and throwing out his back. After he spends all day in pain, being covered by falling fake snow, the manager comes around to say that he hasn't called the paramedics because of his hatred for the ill mannered doctor. It's a ludicrous premise that even the most farfetched Curb Your Enthusiasm episodes wouldn't touch. Even the talent of Matthew Weiner, the creator of Mad Men who penned several episodes of this season, can't improve this very average sitcom.

Little Ashes
E1
Available Now

This British drama about the Spanish poet Federico Garcia Lorca's university days received most of its press for its casting of Twilight heartthrob Robert Pattison as Lorca's object of lust, Salvador Dali, who filmed the role before he achieved stardom as a vampire.

Unlike Harry Potter's Daniel Radcliffe, who proved himself as an accomplished actor with an acclaimed stage production of Equus, Pattison's Dali is a crazed, cartoon-like entity with a penchant for puffy shirts, and of course, that infamous curved mustache. It's a bit of miscasting, as Pattison doesn't have the range to fully portray the homoerotic longing for Lorca, played by appealing Spanish actor Javier Beltrán.

The film only comes to life when Luis Buñuel (Matthew McNulty) jumps into the mix. Portrayed as an egotistical homophobe, Buñuel makes life hard for the sensitive Lorca, and the interaction between that creative duo is much more interesting than the main attraction.

Upcoming releases
Feb. 9 - A Serious Man; Couples Retreat; The Stepfather; I Hate Valentine's Day; J.A.G.: The Final Season.

Amanda Stefaniuk is a freelance writer who literally grew up in a video store.