YAY, TERRY O'QUINN!!
Okay, I hate the Emmys, y'all know that, but I get sucked in like every other TV viewer, still hoping against hope that someone I like from a show I watch might actually win an award. I didn't actually watch the Emmys until the very very end, so I missed most of them, and only found out about the highlights in the paper this morning (or while googling last night while my husband watched The Usual Suspects on MPIX for the tenth time... actually the much better viewing choice). So imagine my surprise to find out that Locke had actually won the Emmy! (And is it just me, or does it look like a price tag is stuck to the bottom of his award in this pic?) And of course, I'm still going to complain -- I wish Michael Emerson had won, because this was his year -- but that said, just think of O'Quinn's performance at the end of "The Man from Tallahassee," where in the flashback we see him get plopped into that wheelchair for the first time and he sees the rest of his life in those four wheels and breaks down, and you know this man deserves an award.

I love Entourage, I love Jeremy Piven, I adore Ari, but I wish Rainn Wilson had taken it.

James Spader over James Gandolfini? Does ANYONE watch Boston Legal? Anyone?? (How sucky that they both have the same first name; I said to my husband, I bet Gandolfini was almost getting out of his chair until the person said, "Spader.") And what happened to James Spader?? He used to be SO hot. Now he's puffy and looks like he's been having donut-eating competitions with Shatner. Yikes.

30 Rock winning best comedy! I was rooting for The Office, but considering they were rock bottom in the ratings last year, I hope this helps. Then again, it didn't help Arrested Development, but we can still dream. I love 30 Rock.

The Sopranos won best drama over Heroes, and it comes as no surprise. But I think it was actually the right choice, too. Over all those other shows, The Sopranos changed the face of television and what we watch, how we watch it, etc. It's caused shows like 24 and Lost to experiment with January to May uninterrupted runs. It's allowed more profanity, violence, and nudity into prime-time shows (and I don't mean that as a bad thing). It's improved the soundtracks of most dramas. But most of all, it's shown us that television writing can be as compelling, daring, and groundbreaking as film writing. It deserved that award more than any show in the past year (with the exception of The Wire, but I'm not going to go there again... let me repeat: best season of ANY series, EVER).

By most accounts, the highlight was the lyric faceoff between Kanye and Rainn, and I watched it on YouTube and it was hilarious. Kanye West is an immensely talented performer, but a WHINER. He whines that he was robbed at the Grammys. He bitches when he doesn't get an AMA. He declares racism when he's beat out at the VMAs (by Rihanna, no less... uh... what?) But at the end of the day, he can still laugh at himself. So here's a competition that he should absolutely win... and he doesn't. I love it.