On Monday night's Gossip Girl, Olivia (Hilary Duff) decided to show Dan's parents that she really is the shallow Hollywood starlet she believes they think her to be (yeah, lots of lies this ep), so she rolls up to the Freshmen Parents Dinner/Toast/Impossible Social Situation in a skin tight, peach Hervé Léger.

Over on Monday night's Castle, Beckett (Stana Katic) needs to remind everyone that she is a hottie in addition to a bitchin' detective, so she rolls up to Castle's book launch party in a skin tight, blue Hervé Léger.

On Gossip Girl, this sort of thing is expected. Also, TV has long conditioned me to accept that people on inside the tube wear clothes, live in houses, and drive cars far beyond their salary range, so I'm okay with Beckett's choice. But twice in one night on two different networks? What's next? Will Quinn be in tears on Glee tonight when her Herve Leger no longer fits? Will Jonathan have to solve the case of the stolen Herve Leger on Sunday's Bored to Death? Remember: twice is a coincidence; three makes a rule.

After last week's dispiriting entry, I thought I might have to let Bored to Death go. In the series' third episode, things have started looking up. Jonathan doesn't take any cases but his own when he loses the script Jim Jarmusch has invited him to rewrite, and he spends the rest of the episode trying to track it down.

It's a simple plot, but paring things down helped the show immensely. George (Ted Danson) and Ray (Zack Galifianakis) are both drawn into Jonathan's plot instead of people he repeats bits of exposition to, which is great for the audience because both Danson and Galifianakis get to show off their comedic chops this time out. Galifianakis's laundry list of the things he wanted to do to cheer himself up after therapy was a particular highlight. 

More importantly, Jonathan seemed to come alive this episode. Making out with a sixteen year-old and the possibility of working with Jarmusch did much for his character. Oh, and his hair cut. That also helped.

I don't want to go as far as to say that I was bored to death, literally or figuratively, by last night's première of Bored to Death, the new HBO sitcom starring under-appreciated hottie Jason Schwartzman. But it was kind of boring.

Perhaps it's just a little too low key. My last unlicensed PI show was, after all, Pushing Daisies, starring under-appreciated hottie Lee Pace. In it, a pie maker could wake the dead. This time around, a writer needs something to do to break himself out of what appears to be a white wine/pot-induced writer's block (or is it the other way around?). Actually, that too much white wine and pot thing is pretty funny. But it's not laugh out loud funny like I want it to be.

The pilot stuck to establishing characters and relationships, so the actual case  Jonathan Ames (a name so fake sounding I was surprised to learn it's real) took on was so run of the mill that I could have solved it while making a profit (Jonathan forgot about expenses).