We missed you, Sun!

New shows! Is there anything better
than new shows to fill all those empty summer television hours? ...Just
me, then? Okay. So, Mistresses premiered this week, and I'm sad to say
that it's off to a pretty boring start. Lost's beloved Yunjin Kim
(seriously could not be happier to see her on TV again) plays Karen Kim,
a psychologist and one of four women (or is it four MISTRESSES?) who
get caught up in supposedly sexy adventures.

Karen was stuck
with a decidedly weird storyline, as she fell for a married patient who
was also very ill. They began an affair, and when the guy died, Karen
sat with his widow and son at the funeral (it's weird to have the
therapist of the deceased sit in the front row, right? Even the affair
stuff aside?). Then it turned out that the son, Sam, knew his father had
had an affair, and came to Karen to find out who the other woman was.
Awkward! Instead of being like, "Get outta here, kid," Karen took pity
on Sam, who immediately fell in love with her. Eww, this is a
little too weird for me. Who stalks his dead dad's psychologist to get
info, then starts bringing her flowers and getting kissy-kissy? The show
is off to a weird (and yet oddly uncompelling...) start,
but we'll give it a chance, right guys?

Please don't get with that guy's son. Ick.

Also premiering
this week was The Hero, a competition reality show hosted by The Rock in
which they're looking for...a hero, I guess? The show is strangely
complicated with unclear goals; screen time is pretty evenly split
between competitive action and in-house bickering, and there are too many
stages to the first episode -- different numbers of people
participating in different challenges with the
possibility of someone secretly taking the cash and bolting. It's a bit of a mess.

But
we're here to talk about Charles, a 39-year-old police officer and SWAT
team member from Los Angeles who clearly wanted to establish himself as
a big personality by doing a forward roll into the condo for his
initial entrance, showily greeting the other contestants as they
arrived, and introducing himself as The Rock to a confused woman.
Thankfully, Charles is more than just talk, and he proved himself in a
challenge where pairs of contestants had to rappel down the side of a
building and swing into each other until they could clasp hands. Charles
showed no fear at the height or swinging wildly in the air, and though
he got into a bit of a spat with another contestant (at least half of
these people appear to require some kind of medication they don't seem
to be getting, by the way), so far he's a steady and collected contender for the
title. Or for stealing the money. Or something. I'll get back to you
after a couple more episodes.

Charles is like, "I just wanted to climb stuff"

This week also saw the
premiere of the second season of Push Girls, and our pal Angela was
dealing with heavy issues right off the bat. In finalizing her divorce
with Dustin, Angela had to decide whether or not to stay in the house
that she bought with her ex. In addition, her full-time caretaker and
aunt, Judy, is no longer at a point where she's financially able to spend
all her time taking care of Angela, a quadriplegic who needs constant
aid and attention.

Angela decided to keep the house and
hire a nurse, which led to a series of interviews with various women who
didn't seem to quite click. Of course, Aunt Judy is family, and she has
a special bond with her niece, so the task quickly seemed an impossible
one. After we saw one particularly difficult night during which Angela
called out for Judy every half an hour because of pains she was
experiencing, it appeared that no one would be able to fill Judy's
place. But of course, in the end they did find a lovely nurse named
Nguette who seems not only a capable nurse, cook, and dancer(!), but was
also attuned to the goofiness that Angela and Judy share. "They're very
silly like my own family. I can be myself around them," Nguette
explained. Nice! Hope your return to the masseuse world was great, Aunt
Judy!

Hopefully Nguette will help lessen these tough scenes

Finally, we got to know someone awesome on So You
Think You Can Dance! Shanshan Qiao-Rothlisberger is 25, from
Albuquerque, New Mexico, and performed a Mongolian bowl dance (I
didn't catch the name of the dance -- please enlighten me in the
comments if you know) that was just gorgeous and, as far as I know, the
first of its kind on the show. After some discussion of "horse milk"
versus "whore's milk" (always with the accent mockery, those guys), the
judges got down to business with a standing ovation.

Nigel told
Shanshan, "You have this beautiful, tranquil quality about your
work...just calming to watch." Mary added, "Your arm movements in the
beginning, oh my god. It kind of reminded me of [season 5 popper]
Phillip Chbeeb as far as how liquid and soft and elegant and beautiful
they were. You're stunning to watch." Of course, it's difficult to tell
from a dance like hers whether she could cut it in the competition, so
Shanshan was sent to choreography, where she made it to the Vegas round.
See you next week, Shanshan!

On The Big Brain Theory,
Andrew was a team leader for the first time when the judges chose
his panini maker as the runner up idea in the mechanized food challenge.
The teams had to build a machine that would feed delicious meals to a
crowd of people with no human involvement. Andrew has a complex but
impressive plan to line up bread, meat, and cheese in a circle on a huge
slicer, allowing the sliced ingredients to gall down a chute and onto a
grill. Teammate Alison thought the concept was too complicated, and she
was partially right when the chute proved problematic
in allowing the food to fall onto the grills. In the end, Andrew joined
Alison in the eliminated group, though they still have a chance to win
some money if they show themselves to be super extra deserving.

Things
finally came to a head between Ming and Becca on Awkward. when Becca
grabbed Ming and told her, "Your beard has been shaved," then kissed
Ming on the mouth and repeated, "You broke my trust" in Mandarin twice.
It was the kiss of death, of course, and Fred confirmed the seriousness
of the situation when he met Ming in the sanctuary. "I knew the bitch
had power, I just didn't know it was so far reaching," Fred muttered
before explaining that he'd been framed in a cheating scandal at his
school and was being sent to Idaho. When he asked Ming to come with him,
she was understandably reluctant. So that's the end of their romance, I
guess? Bummer.

You don't want the kiss of death

Ming confronted Becca, who mocked
her for always being five steps behind. Ming countered: "I'm not Asian,
I'm white. And you know how a white bitch deals with an Asian bitch?
She gets in her face" (a callback to Ming's misguided attempt to get bitch tips from Sadie two weeks ago), Ming then punched Becca in the face, sending her
down with a "Goodbye, Kitty" (get it?). The girls were called to guidance counselor/vice principal Val's office, where Becca claimed that
the attack was unprovoked. "I'm a quiet girl from a nice Asian family. I
don't even own a pair of high heels or a cellular phone." In the end,
no one was buying the act. Val had 32 signed affidavits swearing that
Becca walked into a door. All was explained when Ming left the office to
a line of Asian American students bowing to her in the hallway. Is Ming
the new Becca? Let's hope she rules with a just hand.

All hail the new queen?