Turns out the 8 dollar investment I made purhasing second season of Psych is paying off great dividends in giggles and outright gaffaws. All our cast are back. James Roday, Dule Hill, Corbin Bernsen, Maggie Lawson, Timothy Omundson and Kristen Nelson. There were 16 episodes in the season that was broadcast from July 2007 to Feb 2008. The dvd came out that same summer. I'm sure it was more than 8 bucks, huh. James, playing Shaun the fake psychic, has solved quite a number of cases for the Santa Barbara Police Department, so they keep hiring him back. Kristen plays the Chief and she gets a credit in the open titles. Tim and Maggie are the detectives. Tim's Detective Lassiter, or Lassie as Shaun calls him, is not so happy with Shaun most of the time. Maggie and Shaun get along together most of the time. There's always that chance they will hook up and the scripts play to that theme a bit. In real life Maggie and James hook up but in the series they don't start dating this season. The first show starts off with Tim 
Curry guesting as the judge on an American Idol like talent show which has come to the area looking for new talent. Did one of those spurned talents think Tim deserved to die for his nasty ways. Someone's been trying but they've failed so far. The Chief asks Shaun and Gus to help keep someone from succeeding. Gina Gershon also appears in the episode. Was she someone? The second episode has a dead guy turn up with weird slashes on his body and Shaun, in full psychic mode, draws the killer on a large pad of paper. Damn, it's a T-Rex! No one believes him, he's scorned, still he's right. How's that work then? You'll have to catch the episode if you want to find out. Lou Diamond Phillips guests in an episode where he plays an FBI agent. He has an FBI psychic along with him. She's a hottie and Shaun falls for her. Somehow I don't think she'll still want to go out with him after he's had her arrested. John Amos appears as a visiting Uncle. Kevin Sorbo appears in an episode as a Dawg style bounty hunter. Corbin has 
always looked down at the profession but Shaun and Gus were impressed with the guy 20 years ago. They've got a different attitude after they go up against him. They're all after an escaped prisoner played by W. Earl Brown. Phylicia Rashad and Ernie Hudson play Gus's parents and both of them are suspects in a murder case. Shaun helps Gus deal with that over the Christmas holidays. Shaun becomes a tv star on a locally produced Spanish Language tv soap opera. He was there to investigate a murder and things just fall into place. Amanda Pays, Corbin's real life wife, plays his blind date in an episode. The cast is fun and the scripts have funny things for them to do. All the characters have subplots that work around the main theme of the episode. Some of them are pretty silly and that's one of the things that I like about the show. 
It's not serious and there are goofy things that happen. From the flashbacks to the interesting effects shots it all works well. It's not over the top like Pushing Daisies but it's stylish enough to create a nice look. Flashy graphics and camera tricks won't make up for a sad script lacking laughs. I found them to be filled with yuks. Yay, for me! The show continues to feature a pineapple in each episode. John Landis and John Badham both directed episodes this season. The shows are still being shot in Canada. That's where the studio work is done and for the outdoor locations BC fills in for Santa Barbara well enough. They don't seem to worry when a bus goes by with a Canadian flag on it or that Gus drives a car only available in Canada. Oh well, that setting is less important than the characters, the murders are really subservient to the character development. Not that there's much growth, Shaun still runs wild, people still let him get away with plenty. I'm still enjoying his antics and will enjoy visiting with him and Gus when I get around to season 3 and 4. The dvd's have a few extras like commentaries on some episodes. There were a couple of featurettes. Some were fairly entertaining.
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