Van Milder: The Edgeless Edge of Kal Penn

It's been a busy week for Kal Penn. When not losing life on 24 he was taking it on Tuesday's Law and Order: SVU. Playing the Indian kid with daddy issues, Penn successfully executed the difficult task of overacting understated. Still, for too few legitimate reasons, touted as a film star, Penn underwhelmed TWICE this week on network prime time, doing little to strengthen the occasionally whispered argument that Van Wilder II failed because of residual imperialist attitudes of the West and not because, you know, the incredulity of Kal Penn as a hetero player.

3 quick notes to the producers of Law and Order: SVU:

1) Change your name to Order: SVU. There's no law in your story lines. There's a sex crime, an unfortunate similarity between a victim and a real person, the chase of a wrong lead, the introduction of the actual culprit as a character peripherally related to the initial suspect, the scene where "remand" is denied and bail is set at $1 million, the capture of the reprobate who actually turned out to be a flight risk, the killer rapist's confession of the crime brought about by Freudian interrogation, and, finally, an uncomfortable ending during which Elliot, Mariska or Ice T realize justice served can never undo the scars of a crime already committed.

2) On a related note, Order: SVU, plot twists and guest stars don't really go hand in hand. If you paid for Kal Penn's SAG fee then he's probably going to be the killer.

3) Order: SVU, be more like this: