The Boob Tubers

Quick blupdate

2009-06-02T11:43:00.002-04:00

Just a few thoughts on TV I've watched recently...

The MTV Movie Awards: Why was this so awkward? Robert Pattinson requiring a note to remind him to thank the cast and crew of Twilight? Kiefer Sutherland fake-crying for like thirty minutes? Bruno teabagging Eminem? OK, that last one was great. But otherwise, everyone seemed vaguely uncomfortable and/or high and Andy Samberg was wasted--WASTED I TELL YOU--as host. The show also made me wonder when exactly MTV switched their target demographic. When I was a kid, and too young to be watching MTV but watching it nevertheless (thanks Mom and Dad!) the programming was skewed more toward twenty- and thirty-somethings. Today, it's tween paradise. That's the only explanation for the fact that Zac Efron and Robert "surprisingly zero charisma" Pattinson won EVERYTHING.

The House finale: Obvs I'm way late to this, but I'd love to hear theories about what's up in the good doctor's brain. I doubt he's actually suffering from something schizo-related--how could the show continue with a legitimately crazy House? Maybe the format will switch to House puttering around a padded cell doing differential diagnoses of imaginary patients with like, a muppet, the ghost of Kumar, and a talking banana. Which actually sounds amazing.

No, but it's got to be either the aftermath of his head injury from the previous season--which also hardly works because symptoms should have manifested earlier--or just way too much Vicodin, which is kind of banal but the only realistic solution.

Also, why did the psychiatric facility he ended up at look like a Victorian asylum?? Is his roommate the Marquis de Sade? I mean seriously--are there really any facilities left in the country with like, fucking ivy-covered brick and ominous signage? Aren't they all just sanitized hospital wards? Is House going to face off against Nurse Ratched?

Grandma! That was NOT NICE of you to try and assassinate Ford!

2009-05-28T09:59:00.000-04:00

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New Shows for 09

2009-05-21T15:04:00.002-04:00

Blah blah blah upfronts blah blah blah. Look here for a sneak preview of all new shows. What do you think?!?!

Jon and Kate Plus Alimony

2009-05-19T16:57:00.003-04:00

Alanna and I have written the following letter to Jon and Kate in light of their recent marital troubles and the allegations thrown their way by America's favorite bitchster in law, Aunt Jodi! You should comment in order to informally sign our petition so that we get the cutest of the Gosselins for our very own.

Dear Jon and Kate,

Below please find the main reasons you should give custody of Aadan and Hannah to Alanna and Jeanette while you both work your bizarre marital difficulties out.

1) Aaden is clearly a burgeoning intellectual, and we think he'd feel more at home in Alanna's apartment, where she and her boyfriend are atheist teachers with graduate degrees who will encourage him to pursue his cerebral leanings much better than two cuckolded Christians living in rural Pennsylvania for whom eating kimchi is an exotic experience.

2) Hannah, although young, has already taken on the characteristics of a nurturing, maternal caregiver. Adorable, we're sure it's really convenient for you that she is there to kiss Joel's booboos while you're off schtooping the Silver Fox security guard, but girl needs some sense knocked into her before she ends up barefoot and pregnant with penttuplets at sixteen. So clearly, she should live with Jeanette.

3) We won't give them evil things like gum and M and Ms. We're no Aunt Jodi. (Note: this is a lie. M and Ms are a crucial part of childhood.)

4) They won't be filmed 24/7, thus giving them a better shot at not ending up having their privates photographed as they climb out of a limo to go snort coke off Jaden Federline's belly at Bungalow 8.

5) We have a weird obsession with qaud and octa ethnicitied children. Having quadrasian babies leads to the inevitable octrasian grandkids. You do not deserve this awesome privilege.

In conclusion, with only 6 children remaining, you will no longer need to buy HALF A FRIGGIN' ORGANIC COW to feed your family. Good God.

Love,
Alanna and Jeanette

Fightin' Irish

2009-05-18T12:45:00.002-04:00

Have you guys caught Obama's speech at the Notre Dame commencement from this weekend? After making some vague comments inviting pro-lifer's to give their stance some consideration, Obama was heckled by some in-audience protestors.

Here's why this is hilarious. With this new administration, we TOTALLY have to have, like, a gestalt switch, when it comes to our mental image of protestors. Throughout the Bush administration, it's been your typical neo hippy looking liberal.

But THESE guys that yell out at Obama totally look like, well, my dad. Or, in other words, a Kennedy before he goes to the fat/detox camp they all hit up before a bout on the campaign trail. Or a Kennedy that is enough of an incumbent that he is able to let himself go again.

Watch the speech below to see what I mean. Sorry for it being Fox news, but, you know, they seem to be the ones paying this the most attention. Check out the guys around 2:46 and 4:47. The second one is practically waving his shalaly in anger. HA.

What Alex Trebek Would Call A True Potpourri

2009-05-14T16:53:00.003-04:00

1. So I am WAY behind on my HOUSE viewing. Either I have been really busy for the past few months or just slipping into comas for long periods of time and not realizing it. If its the latter, I hope that we can make a HOUSE episode about it where it turns out the only cure for me is having sex with House...and his cane. Wait, what? Anyway, just the other night I watched the episode from 3/30/09 in which Mos Def plays the victim of trapped in syndrome and we see House and his team from a Mos Def's ailing POV. I have subsequently dubbed this episode THE DIVING HOUSE AND THE VICODIN FLY. I think when I get to the episode where Kutner kills himself, I will blog it as if I watched it in a completely timely fashion.

2. Reason 1,435 I have no soul. This kid--not even remotely adorable to me. Back me up, he's kind of an asshole, no?

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3. My two worlds of fandom are colliding, as Neil Patrick Harris is set to host the Tony's on June 7th. I should liveblog it and show you how dorky I can be. We certainly would not have the same obstacle we had last time we tried to live blog (that being an overhwelming hetero male presence).

Lost Finale Tonight!

2009-05-13T11:15:00.003-04:00

I am pleased to announce that Lost showrunners Carlton Cuse and Damon Lindelof talk exactly like Jeanette and I, if this excerpt from a Washington Post interview with them is any indication:

You're going to love these true-false questions [about tonight's finale]. The first question --

Carlton: Wait, wait. Before you ask them, there's true and false and then "what's the correct evasive response."

The correct evasive response is "We decline to comment."

Damon: Or, I'd like to invent "fru."

Will we know who Jacob is before this season's finale is over?

Damon: That depends what you mean by "is."

Carlton: You'll have more information, definitely.

Damon: Let's say you'll finally be able to put up a picture of Jacob in your locker.

Will we know whether the characters on the show can change their fates, and therefore their futures, before the finale is over?

Damon: That's not even a true-or-false question.

Carlton: Basically, that's a fru.

A major character will die in the finale: true or false?

Damon and Carlton: Fru.

This is going nowhere.

Here at the Boob Tubers, we LOVE making up fake compound words and phrases. For instance, Jeanette and I often attend "double freetures"--that is, we go to Union Square and pay for one movie and then sneak into another immediately afterward. This makes for an especially good day if both films are "talkers," by which we mean entertaining crap we can mock aloud for two hours.

So I'm thrilled that two other complete dorks who think their made-up words are hilarious, to the point of repeating them over and over to no one else's amusement, are doing so well. This gives me hope that Jeanette and I will soon have a breakthrough with our own magnum opus, the eminent play This Show Bites.

This blog has nothing to do with Sawyer but I'll put a photo of him here anyway in honor of the dream I had last night in which I was rehearsing a sex scene with him. Miles watched.

So in the dream I was pretty much Kate here.

Lostie in Trouble

2009-04-28T16:54:00.003-04:00

Henry Ian Cusick, who plays Desmond on Lost, is being sued by a former ABC employee for sexual harassment.

According to the employee, Cusick "allegedly squeezed and placed his face on the plaintiff's breasts, kissed her on the mouth, and caressed the back of her body while making moaning sounds."

Lovely! I assume he gave a muffled shout from betwixt the victim's decolletage that "I'M DOING IT FOR MY HONOR, PENNAY!"

But seriously folks, it's well-known that Michelle Rodriguez and Cynthia Watros were both booted from the show some seasons ago because they were arrested for drunk driving. If Lost has such a stringent zero-tolerance policy, I hope they apply it to Cusick as well. I admit this is mostly because I find his character extremely irritating and unnecessary, not because I have a soul.

In fact, just to illustrate how awful I am, here's a GChat I had with Jeanette about this:

me: is it wrong that i find the description of the harassment kind of hilarious
Jeanette: ummm anyone who does anything like that without anything that can be construed as consent
is the man
me: hahahah seriously
like just shoving his face in her boobs
hilar
Jeanette: boobs are so great, I get it
me: i think so too
ive had the urge many times to burrow into yours without your consent
wait what
Jeanette: DO IT
me: NEXT TIME I SEE YOU
ITS BOOB SCUBA

What You're Doing Tonight at Midnight

2009-04-23T09:31:00.005-04:00

Or at least what your DVR is doing.

Friend of The Boob Tubers Kara Klenk is making her cable television debut in the Spike TV series MoCap, LLC. Kudos to the gang for making the transition from webseries to real TV. What that means is now maybe their grandparents will actually understand how to watch them. If you've also ever wanted to see Kara and the rest of the hilarious cast as cartoons, go here. check out a preview below, then check out the show. Word.

My, our little Kara has come a long way since the days of the Streetwalkers, eh...?

I am gay for The Wire

2009-04-21T14:05:00.004-04:00

So, obvs I'm way behind on this, but I've been watching The Wire, and it really is pee-your-pants good. I'm so absorbed in the show that last night I had this weird meta-dream in which I was telling Jimmy McNulty that he should really start watching The Wire. Hokay!

I realize that drooling in this way just makes me even more of a bourgeois whitey cliche than ever, but SO BE IT.

To that end, I'm recommending that admirers of charismatic gay thugs AND those who have no idea what I'm talking about all watch Bill Moyers' interview with showrunner David Simon for a healthy dose of satisfyingly blunt social criticism and unchecked earnestness. And also, please keep in mind that it's all in the game.

Hey, this looks fun! Come to this party! A good time + networking/job opportunities in entertainment + a good cause = BE THERE

2009-04-16T10:20:00.001-04:00

CE OH NO!

2009-04-07T18:10:00.006-04:00

I feel like I haven't watched television in EIGHT YEARS. What's wrong with me?

In this economy (TM)*, perhaps no public figure has been more ubiquitous than the now equally dreaded/pitied CEO. Ed Liddy gives out tax payer, bailout money as bonuses to AIG big wigs. For Shame. Obama asks Rick Wagoner to step down as chairman and CEO of General Motors. For double shame!

Enough finger wagging at Ed and Rick, though. I'm calling out someone else who has put himself in the public eye: Domino's CEO David Brandon. If you've ever been in the position of wanting to order a pizza in my presence any time past midnight in a city that is not New York, you've heard it before: every slice saves a fetus. While Domino's never went on the record with this slogan, it was the truth at least for as long as founder and CEO Tom Monaghan was in charge. Monaghan's blatant ties to the Catholic Church and his subsequent biases were a disturbing part of his business model post his late eighties "religious awakening," and jaw dropping amounts of Domino's profits were donated to pro-life causes. For the best account I have ever seen as to how creepy this shiznit really is, check out this New Yorker article from two years ago. HE BUILT A SEGREGATED CATHOLIC TOWN for Christ's sake--little to no pun intended.

While David Brandon may be in charge now, this choice in successor has done little to change the company's politics; the red phone with the direct line to the Vatican may not be in the CEO office anymore, but the Republican party ties certainly are. Which is why it's kind of gross to see this, what I am assuming is merely an abused platform for Brandon's expected 2010 gubernatorial run:

So as to not be a total downer, I will balance this criticism with a president/CEO who was adorably capable of speaking for his company. Jim Perdue, of Perdue Chicken, has that Benjamin Button charm to him, and also is the spitting image of Shermie, the imaginary friend I had for the first three years of my life. What a rapscallion!

*Seriously, someone must have gotten the rights to this phrase by now. It is UNAVOIDABLE.

House 5x20: "Simple Explanation"

2009-04-07T10:27:00.005-04:00

Don't read any further if you didn't watch yet and don't want to be spoiled. I say this as though there are tons of people reading this blog, ha!

The previews had me thinking that last night's House was going to be a Very Special Episode™, so I was only half paying attention during the first several minutes, which made Foreman and 13's discovery all the more abrupt and unsettling.

I certainly didn't expect Kutner to die, and upon learning he had, I certainly didn't expect it to be from a suicide. I think the most deft and sort of meta aspect of this episode was that viewers' reactions mirrored the characters': utter confusion and denial.

From reading some message boards at Television Without Pity, I found that many viewers were extremely angry and disgusted with the way Kutner's death was handled. There were many pronouncements of "Fuck you, show" and "I'm not watching anymore," which, that level of vitriol directed at a television show when there are all sorts of outrageous things happening out here in real life--kind of absurd. But others made the critique that Kutner's suicide was a contrived way to pull the heartstrings and make an Emmy bid.

I'm sure the spectre of a possible Emmy win is always looming over showrunners, but I disagree that this was a contrivance. This was possibly the biggest infusion of reality that an often bordering-on-sci-fi show has ever had, which is perhaps what made it so jarring: it's not just realistic, it is real. Can we ever really understand why someone has made a decision to end his or her life? Sometimes there are what we think of as "signs," sometimes there aren't, but it's always incomprehensible to those left behind.

13 mentioned that with 25% of suicides, there are no outward signs. House disagreed: for 25%, their so-called friends and loved ones were simply too self-absorbed to notice what was going on. House, of course, would say this: his reliance on rationality and logic has a near-religious intensity. The show has emphasized, over and over, that pretty much the one thing keeping House from succumbing to his own misery is his passion--and singular talent--for solving puzzles. Perhaps the saddest aspect of the episode for me was House's insistence that Kutner had been murdered, since there was no explanation for why he'd kill himself; this was a childlike denial of not only Kutner's tragic death, but the truth that we are all essentially mysteries to each other. Human beings ultimately can't be puzzled out. It will be interesting to see how this realization resonates for House throughout the rest of the season.

And if you're interested, check out this interview with actor Kal Penn: apparently his reason for leaving the show is that he's going to work for Obama! Kudos to him for leaving an extremely profitable job to dedicate himself to public service--seems like quite an unusual decision.

Guest Blog: Jonathan on The Bad Girls Club

2009-03-31T19:08:00.003-04:00

Please give a warm welcome to Jonathan, my partner in aspiring writerdom (and in bed). -Alanna

Watching the Oxygen Network’s “Bad Girls Club” the other night I had a minor epiphany.

All season I’ve found myself wondering what Tiffany is doing in the house with the other girls––each of the rest of whom regularly (glibly, defiantly –– it would almost seem proudly) seizes upon pretty much every opportunity to manifest her own variety of Bad—while Tiffany comes across as sort of decent.

Granted, as advertised (and emphasized excessively in promotional spots), she does have a bit of a temper, and evinces a general disinclination to suffer fools gladly or otherwise. But the critical distinction seems to be that, unlike her housemates, when Tiffany gets angry it’s not simply because she isn’t getting what she momentarily happens to want. She doesn’t seem to be governed exclusively by her passions.

Or maybe what I mean to say—since I doubt she has any sort of superhuman control over the source of her emotions—is that her behaviors don’t fluctuate straightforwardly with her moods; her actions aren’t stark translations of whatever she happens to be feeling. She thinks before she acts.

And maybe even this rational component to her behavior isn’t what I’m really interested in (after all, most of the other girls use their solo interviews to develop strident rational justifications for the parts they’ve played in a given episode’s mayhem) so much as the way she appears to think things through—the ideological or moral framework within which she seems consistently willing to assess her own position.

Not only is Tiffany the sole resident of the Bad Girl house apparently able to conceive of herself as a single moving part in a whole interpersonal network of variously competing passions and wants (rather than as the imperial nexus at its center), but she’s one of very few people I can think of off the top of my head who seem to give a genuine shit about anyone other than themselves.

Tiffany has a capacity—or maybe it’s an ingrained mechanism she can’t escape; in practice, though, does this really make a difference?—for genuine other-orientedness. She’s somehow able to resist the ubiquitous initial impulse in the face of a thwarted desire to find somebody to blame, to convert the tension that will inevitably arise between people who happen to want different things into a melodramatic saga of Good vs. Evil, with the latter category stretching to encompass anyone who fails to see things precisely my way, or, worse, stands between me and whatever it is I happen to want.

I.e. she’s apparently the only Bad Girl willing to step outside of a moral framework that essentially amounts to “Fuck them other bitches”—even when it means taking honest stock of her own behaviors. Time and again I’ve watched Tiffany withdraw from a heated (typically profanity-laden and variously-shatter-prone-Household-article-flying) Bad Girl interchange to attempt a disinterested assessment of the internal forces that might be motivating her initial response. And if she doesn’t like what she sees, she attempts to change the way she’s behaving—sometimes going so far as to apologize for an action she’s come to regret.

Is this just manipulative editing intended to add an intriguingly incongruous ethical layer to an otherwise unrelenting parade of vapidity? Could be. And of course I’m aware that the moral feature I’ve kind of laboriously pointed out here is the sort of vintage Do-unto-others-as-you-would-&c. stuff of Sunday School sessions that everyone has had hammered repeatedly (albeit ineffectually) into him/her at some point, sure.

But how often do you see people genuinely trying to think about what someone else might be thinking/feeling/wishing/wanting/&c.—particularly if this honest accounting might lead to wounded pride or inconvenience or real discomfort or some other form of unpleasantness for them?

Probably my biggest problem as an aspiring human, or at least the one I’m thinking of as I write this, is that I’ve never really outgrown a childish yearning for a moral cosmos that’s pretty much directly antithetical to the way humans actually behave. I like to imagine a world in which at the very least a few scattered heroes can act in Atticus Finchian accordance with principles that reach farther than the borders of their immediate self-interest. And if I’m able to catch even a glimpse of such a world in the Grand Guignol of Post-Millennial American Reality TV, then, well, I don’t know:
maybe there’s cause for a little hope.

Vampire High!

2009-03-26T16:29:00.002-04:00

Apparently it was necessary for officials at the Latin School in Boston to come forward and explain the fancy-pants school is not, in fact, experiencing a vampire infestation. As a Gawker commenter wisely observed, this is what happens when teenagers get their hands on all seven seasons of Buffy.

Next thing you know, students will be reporting classmates becoming invisible, devil dogs invading prom, and their graduation speaker turning into a giant snake. I can't wait to see the naysaying press release for each of those. The explanation will probably entail gangs on PCP.

Obama's Predix

2009-03-18T13:55:00.003-04:00

I am rather tickled that Obama took the time to complete his own bracket for the NCAA tournament. Hey President Hope, how the whole economy thing going?

Lost 5x8: "LaFleur"

2009-03-05T11:26:00.003-05:00

I found last night's episode of Lost particularly delicious because it was heavy on the Sawyer. But it was also an interesting experiment in several ways: a deviation from the show's recently action-y, time travel-y, format in which everyone is completely miserable and suffers from intermittent nose bleeds.

Brief recap: The episode begins with Locke disappearing into the well. There's a flash and a glimpse of a huge statue that some viewers think closely resembles Horus. That, coupled with the hieroglypics that would pop up back in the old button-pushing days, and Richard's apparent agelessness, makes me wonder if there's some kind of Egyptian mythology at work here.

There's one final flash, and our intrepid time travellers realize that that was the last one: Locke has succeeded. And where did the flash take them to? Why, the time of delightful muttonchop sideburns, giant collars, and groovy records: the 70s!

With Jack and Locke gone, Sawyer can finally run shit. He ably insinuates his crew in with the Dharma Initiative and even negotiates a difficult truce-breaking situation with Other Leader Richard, AKA Guyliner, AKA possibly the Egyptian god Ra. (My dumb theory.) Three years go by, in which Sawyer becomes Jim LaFleur, head of Dharma Security, all-around nice guy, and extremely schmoopy for Juliet, with whom he now lives. They seem like a really functional, happy couple, which means that as soon as they're reunited with the Oceanic 6 (which begins to happen at the episode's very end) Kate "Life Ruiner" Austen will promptly ruin their lives.

What intrigued me most about this episode was what it reveals about a philosophy that seems highlighted often on Lost: the power that comes with the possession of information; namely, the possession of MORE information than the other guy. Having hopped, skipped, and jumped through time, Sawyer & Co. have been privy to myriad aspects of the island's history that, to the folks comfortably settled in a linear time frame, they couldn't POSSIBLY know without some kind of amazing god-like abilities. Sawyer blows Richard's mind when he mentions the bomb they buried and Locke's appearance 20 years before, and by doing so diverts the Others and the Dharma Initiative from an all-out battle. It was a neat role reversal to see the Losties fucking with the Others' heads, instead of vice versa. And it also brings up interesting questions about where the Others got all their information that they used to torment the Losties with frequently throughout seasons 1-3.

Another nice touch: Sawyer names himself LaFleur, and the flower he gives Juliet after she successfully delivers a Dharma woman's baby seems emblematic of key personality changes: would he ever think to demonstrate respect and congratulations for something Kate did? No, they would just gripe at each other and be in a stupid love triangle with Jack. I don't think I will enjoy her return.

Oops, Racism! / T.I.

2009-02-16T10:54:00.004-05:00

Happy President's Day! In honor of the holiday, I'm going to deviate briefly from the topic of television. (Really, more like, in honor of the hilarious racism I just noticed while reading the Times this morning.)

So, this article by Jonathan "Stereotypey" Miles is about a speakeasy-style bar that just opened in Harlem. The tiredness of speakeasy-style bars aside, Mr. Jones commits what I consider a major gaffe when he explains the type of cocktails made by the general manager, Kali Irwin:

In a neighborhood more inclined toward Hypnotiq and Hennessy drinks, Ms. Irwin has laid down a classical gauntlet: old-fashioneds, a Pisco Sour, a Sazerac and puckish riffs on other pre-Prohibition cocktails.

Phew! Thank God that this wondrous little bar, despite its awful location, has managed to resist the urge of hip hop culture in its drink concoctions!

Oy. I mean, really Miles: are we to believe you've even ventured inside most Harlem bars?

And while we're on the subject of hip hop culture, I just want to mention my complex feelings toward MTV's show T.I.'s Road to Redemption. How absurd that we're supposed to believe T.I. is truly seeking redemption for his purchase of illegal machine guns through filmed hours of community service. As though he's not like, "Hey, maybe I can avoid jail AND be on TV! Win-win!" No, he probably doesn't talk like that.

Anyway, the complexity comes in for me because I also find T.I. completely adorable:

WHAAAAAAAAAAAAAA? T.I., do community service for me! Like, I'm sure if you volunteer to be my personal trainer at the gym or whatever, it totally counts.

What Could Have Been

2009-02-05T17:43:00.006-05:00

I have known for some time now that, other than Paul, the best man for me would be my high school English teacher. He made no effort to hide his favoritism for me throughout senior year, and now that my opportunity to take advantage has come and gone, I sit here reading what he wrote in my yearbook. To me, it pretty much reads jump my bones. What do you think? Humor me.

Dear Satan Cake,

I enjoyed having you in class and reading better than any student. Some of them grew tired of your voice but what can I say about dopes. You are a wonderful person--intelligent, funny and talented. Hope you enjoy [insert name of college attended] and please return to the pit to visit me next year so we can make fun of your college professors.

Take care,
[insert name of most awesome man alive]

P.S. I'm also glad that you have strong ideas and you are not reluctant to slam people with them.

See?! Calls me a pet name (based on the fact that I read Milton's PARADISE LOST out loud to the class, at his request). And look at that P.S. He LOVES that I am a huge bitch.

I half want to post his name. I'm sure he googles himself, and I'm doubly sure that once he knows I LURVE him he will call. Or comment.

To keep things on topic, enjoy this hilarious parody of the NY Times weekender commercials, which he would love, brought to you by the genius minds of Stella:

Lack of Discipline Tubers

2009-02-02T15:37:00.003-05:00

Well, ya got us, liveblogging. It was hard to keep up with background noise and masculine pheromones being emitted. We stopped once we saw that we were writing about things that had NOTHING to do with football or commercials. So what'd you miss? Someone actually used the word alacrity in football commentary, I ordered the Roethlis Burger at least once every twenty minutes, and one of those teams won.

In summation, this commercial was good:

This commercial was offensive:

And this commercial features character actor and buddy of mine, Joe Narciso, so let's give him the obvious career boost that exposing him to our readers will grant:

Super Bowl Liveblogging

2009-02-01T18:44:00.014-05:00

6:45 PM: Soooo I guess liveblogging is going to be difficult because there are dudes who actually care about sports here who are blocking the television right now. Also. please attribute the delay to our cooking of buffalo wings to feed said men. Yay feminism!!!

6:46 PM: (Jeanette) Whenever I see defensive football players with long hair or dreds running down the field, I think they look like orcs from Lord of the Rings. I hope that doesn't make me racists. since most of these guys are black.

6:51 PM: Wow this Conan Bud Light commercial looks really funny, but all we got out of it was what we could see, which is to drink responsibly. We can't hear ANYTHING!

6:53 PM: Maybe we would hear the commercials if the guys were not talking about how it is every girl's fantasy to be raped. Apparently it was in the NY Times magazine next week.

6:56 PM: I guess you don't need to be able to hear what's going on to wager on whether or not John Madden is going to have a coronary throughout the course of this game.

6:57 PM: Apparently when given the choice, one should use an Atlantic Monthly to roll a joint over Harper"s.

6:59: (Jeanette) Earlier, Josh posed the question of how many restaurants in the Pittsburgh area did we think would be offering Rothels Burgers on their menus. At least once every twenty minutes since, I have said, "I'll have the Rothels Burger, please."

7:01: (Alanna) I just asked Jeanette what Rothels is, so clearly I am vastly unqualified to write about football. I can vaguely hear commercials in the background, but mostly I am concerned with what's being rolled over the Atlantic Monthly.

7:02: Apparently it was a car commercial because now the guys are talking about how women can't drive. I DON'T LIKE BEING OUTNUMBERED BY PENISES. More vagina, less penis.

7:03: What would happened if we put the Puppy Bowl on RIGHT NOW?!

7:10 PM: Why horses for Budweiser commercials? According to Josh, horses like shitty beer.

7:12 PM: Damn, that unruly bearded Cardinals player looks like an animal. Again, according to Josh, this is product placement from Geico, where they are getting players that look like cavemen. Maybe Josh should be doing this blog.

7:19: NO ONE IS WATCHING FOOTBALL. Everyone is waiting to see if Catticus is going to eat her visitor, Tami and Marisa's 13 year old cat. THIS IS THE REAL COMPETITION.

7:23: Due to the fact that no one cares anyway and that it's too loud to hear anything, how about we just post commercials tomorrow. We'll be back for the kitten half time show. Maybe.

VAGINA SHAPED GOAL POSTS

2009-01-29T18:10:00.004-05:00

That is something that would make it a more feminine super bowl. Or...

How about Alanna and me liveblogging it!

Tune in this Sunday as we bring you a play by play of every...commercial.

We'll try to incorperate some of the sporting action, too, but sorry if we don't speak penis too well. Our frustration might make the coverage morph into full time coverage of the 5th annual PUPPY BOWL! on Animal Planet, complete with kitten half time show.

This advertisement brought to you by the enforcement of gender stereotypes.

Shitznit to Watch Tonight and a Fun Fact

2009-01-27T14:38:00.006-05:00

At 9 PM EST on ABC, some of Sesame Street's finest muppets will be visiting the cast of SCRUBS. I wonder if they will be the ones to break it to Zack that he massacres the "Show, don't tell" rule of screenwriting with everything he does. I think Oscar has it in him.

Also at 9 PM EST on TLC, the Duggars embark on season two of 17 KIDS & COUNTING. I think if you taped baby lynching and put it on the air for an hour, it would come across more ethically than this family's appreciation for women. Those poor teen girls have no choices other than staying home and taking care of the shit ton of kids that their PARENTS chose to have. And did you HEAR Jim Bob's speech to Josh on his wedding day? Basically it was like, you're going to want to bone, but you're wife is going to want to be all like blah blah blah, so if you listen to her, you'll get to bone.

Stay tuned to TLC for the premiere of TODDLERS AND TIARAS. Why do these people who are into pageants agree to be on these shows? Don't they realize that people only watch to make fun of them? I can't wait to watch tonight and see a two year old get a spray tan. HAWT.

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Also, did anyone know that Frank Langella, 2008 Academy Award nominee for best actor after portraying Richard Nixon in FROST/NIXON also portrayed SKELETOR!?!?! in the 1987 film HE MAN: MASTERS OF THE UNIVERSE?! That is so hilarious to me. I am about as shocked as when I found out that SOYLENT GREEN IS PEOPLE!

The Real World Gets Quasi Real

2009-01-23T14:32:00.002-05:00

I know I am three episodes late on talking about this of THE REAL WORLD, which took place over the summer in Brooklyn. Some thoughts...

-How lovely to see MTV not just reaching into their sack of smoking hot drunks straight out of central casting. For the first time in a long time, we have a cast of diverse and somewhat subsitive characters. That being said...

-Watching the cast members' get-to-know-you antics was a sorry, sad reminder of how old I am. I witnessed them have forced conversations about sexuality and relationship statuses within MOMENTS of knowing each other and thought about how no mature adults ever do that. FLASHING LIGHTS! Such an observation makes me one of those mature adults. For the first year ever, I AM EVEN TOO OLD TO APPLY TO BE ON THE REAL WORLD! I remember watching the very first seasons of THE REAL WORLD, where cultural references went over my head, and I wondered if I would ever be like these grown-ups one day. But now, nothing can bring back the hour of splendor in the grass, of glory in the flower.*

-I would like to highlight cast member Ryan. I like to refer to him as Catch 22, because either liking or hating this guy makes you a douche. You want to give him props. He was in the military and served in Iraq and is also a fairly talented musician. AWESOME. But then he does things like go on a gay witch hunt, trying to out all of his housemates as possible. I think he even implied the hot tub might be gay. NOT AWESOME. In the end I will like him for his hilarious pranks and faces, and criticize him for bringing along untalented friends who suggest that he play songs about tampons in what could be otherwise legitimate business meetings.

-I was pumped to see what bars would be lucky enough to land the sweet deal of being the housemates' local haunts. So far, they seem to have made return trips to Pete Wentz's east village douch factory Angels and Kings. But I squealed with glee** this week when they ventured into MY neighborhood and went to Matchless.

What's your favorite season of THE REAL WORLD. Mine is Boston. Below, please find a video montage set to some rockingly appropriate late 90s music that someone made to honor the Boston castmates. I really never got the mentality of people that took fandom to the level where they would do something like this, but I guess I shouldn't complain, as it has given me something to share with you all.

*Do I get bonus points for incorperating Wordsworth into a reality television blog?
**I probably didn't squeal with glee

Lost Realizations

2009-01-22T11:54:00.003-05:00

Having watched a solid three hours of Lost last night (the hour-long recap show, and the two-hour season premiere), I've made some discoveries about the show on a sort of meta level. Here they are, in convenient bullet list form.

Lost is now hardcore sci-fi, but probably always was. It seems now that the show is all about time travel, but I think there were consistent, strong hints throughout the previous four seasons that this is the case. Just the fact that four entire seasons only equaled 108 days never quite sat right with a lot of fans, and I think actually pointed to the fact that time functions differently on the island than in the rest of the world. And last season's introduction of quantum physicist Daniel Faraday (Jeremy Davies, who apparently has a contract with all of Hollywood to only play neurotic eggheads, a la Jeff Goldblum) was further confirmation. In TV land, quantum physics ALWAYS means freaky supernatural hijinks, as opposed to, like, the really dry study of physical systems.
There are only "A MILLION UNANSWERED QUESTIONS" if you are completely idiotic about the way that TV storytelling works. That is, when there is heavy-handed foreshadowing, or ridiculously portentous dialogue, the savvy viewer knows how to make pretty good educated guesses. Like last night, in the first hour, producers Damon Lindelof and Carlton Cuse said something along the lines of, "Sun thinks Jin is dead because she saw him on the freighter that blew up." THIS MEANS JIN IS ALIVE. It should not be an "unanswered question." Same goes for Jack asking Ben if Locke is really dead, and Ben's non-answer. LOCKE IS NOT DEAD. So scratch those off your lists, annoying fans.
There is too much Hurley. The producers called him "the heart of the show," which I guess is what you have to say about less-attractive but intermittently-amusing characters. But I really didn't need all that time in hour two of the premiere to be spent on Hurley and his father, Cheech, bumbling around trying to figure out what to do with comatose Sayid. It's annoying and does little to further the plot, which really is what interests me now. That and Sawyer's inability to find a shirt.
The time travel thing is kind of unsustainable. It was cool for the first two hours, but if the rest of the season is spent sending the islanders hopping, skipping, and jumping through time, it's going to become kind of a headache. I suspect that a lot of plot lines will start getting tied up at a much faster pace this season than in seasons past.

Anyone else out there have a Lost breakthrough?? Share. That, or talk about how Benjamin Button really isn't that amazing and why did it get infinity Oscar nominations?!?

A Top Chef/Heroes Crossover?

2009-01-21T14:30:00.007-05:00

Tom Colicchio is a hero! According to E! Online:

While most celebs were spending the days leading to the inauguration partying around Washington, D.C., Top Chef chieftain Tom Colicchio was busy saving lives.

The reality-show judge and all-star restaurateur came to the rescue of a fellow foodie Monday night at the Art. Food. Hope benefit. The event, which featured attendees like Bob Woodward, Carl Bernstein and Rachel Maddow, was hosted by cookbook author Joan Nathan (The New American Cooking).

As originally reported on the Internet Food Association blog, Colicchio was cornered by Top Chef fans peeved by last week's elimination, when another famed chef, Alice Waters, frantically began calling for help. Nathan was choking on a piece of chicken.

And that's when Colicchio sprang into action.

He deftly performed the Heimlich maneuver, dispatching the chicken and saving Nathan.

It's so awesome to see that with all the crazy, medical technology we have today (anyone hear if Obama has done anything about stem cells yet?) that the Heimlich, which sounds like something convicted to death at Nuremberg, is still relevant. One time, a chef from the Dublin restaurant Gallagher's Boxty House saved my little sister's life with the Heimlich. We feld kind of bad since his food really sucked.

Tune in tonight to congratulate the hero and watch TOP CHEF on Bravo. Perhaps more importantly, tune in to send Carla good vibes. Ariane was kicked off last week, so apparently it's time to get rid of the nice, older ladies. Carla is the main reason I watch, ever since Vivian pointed out weeks ago that she bears a striking resemblance in appearance and demeanor to Myrtle Urkel, Steve Urkel's cousin played by the incomparable Jaleel White in Drag. See for yourself...

Hoody!

I wonder if Alanna will finish jizzing in her pants in time to give everyone a LOST recap tomorrow. My money is on red...what?

Videos. You watch them. Very Nice

2009-01-13T13:19:00.004-05:00

HEY watch this videos.

The first is Pat and Carolyn expertly trolling the red carpet at last night's event celebrating Oxygen now airing past cycles of AMERICA'S NEXT TOP MODEL. I think Jaslene might have taken some lessons with Henry Higgins or something; she sounds less Helen Keller and more Helen...a Bonham Carter? I think I stretched too far for symmetry there...

The second is a video of mine and Vivian's cats, who are REALLY excited for the pending release of the Notorious B.I.G biopic. Especially Teagan, because she's so gangsta.

SimulCATS in Simulcast: Episode 2 from Quailhead on Vimeo.

GG Chat!

2009-01-12T11:51:00.002-05:00

Dan of As Little As Possible and I had a GChat for the duration of the Golden Globes last night. I was really cranky because I've been sick for about a gazillion days, too sick to move or bone my boyfriend, and the crankier I am the funnier, apparently. Actually, this makes sense: think about the most depressed person you know. Aren't they kind of hilar? Like, don't you kind of hope they never start taking anti-depressants, just so they can stay bitter and snarky? So yeah. Some highlights:

me: jeremy piven, shouldn't you be in bed with your MERCURY POISONING

Danny: HAHAHA

me: he's such a fake faker

word in NYC is that he just wanted out of his play

keep saying clever stuff so i can make this my golden globes blog post

Danny: he's a loser

i will

i just talked to wilkinson on the phone last week

he's a cool guy

me: did you ask him how the scenery tasted in "in the bedroom"?

re: Anna Paquin on True Blood

me: she is so terrible on a terrible show

Danny: is she really that bad?

me: yes

like she forgot how to act

the only good thing about that show is the theme song

Danny: i heard there's nudity, though

so i want to see it

me: its seriously unbearable

and i love vampires

that's how bad it is

Danny: i heard it was good

hmm

i want to see the sex

me:yeah so true blood, every episode is like "VAMPIRES ARE A METAPHOR FOR OPPRESSED MINORITIES JUST IN CASE YOU FORGOT"

and the southern accents are so so bad

and the writing

that show is like

alan ball forgot how to write, and anna paquin forgot how to act

Danny: ouch

me: more like TRUE AMNESIA

Danny: well i won't rush it to the netflix

or TRUE--*FALSE*

me: brad pitt looks like "i... don't... understand"

he's dumb as a wallDanny: is he?

me:

so i hear

come on, can't you imagine how easily angelina manipulates him

and he's just like, earnestly, "Yeah, that sounds super fun!"

then he has seven kids

Danny: ha!

me: what terrible timing for "confessions of a shopaholic"

Danny: i know right

me: haha i'm glad

i hate movies like that

sex and the city too

Danny: i just communicated your comment to the room and people laughed

i laughed

me: CONSUUUUUUUUUUUME

WOMEN LIKE TO CONSUMMMMMME

haha yah

Danny: i just consumed the shit out of some pasta

Danny: OH MY GOD JESSICA LANGE'S FACE?

Danny: did she come straight from a housefire??

me: this guy doesn't do it for me

gerard butler

Danny: weird voice

me: although i'm always impressed by scottish accents

because they seem hard to have

Danny: yeah

and baldwin's not funny in the speech?

how can that be

boring

me: yeah boo

be funny

you're all performing seals

award = fish

balance a ball on your nose at least

Danny:

what would you do if you won an award like that?

me: probably shove the award up my butt

re: Jeanette's attraction to Paul Giamatti:

Danny: like, does she want to bone him?

is she sexually attracted to him?

me: she really is

Danny: like she imagines herself having sex with him?

me: yes

Danny: how is that

how does that come to be

me: i think there's a last minute mutation in the womb

re: Clint Eastwood watching Steven Spielberg's speech:

me: clint's like, shut this guy up. i want to get back to work.

me: he's such a machine!

Danny: clint's like, "i have pieces of guys like him in my stool"

me: hahahahahahahhaa

More Clint:

me: spike lee was complaining that flags of our fathers should have had black characters

and basically accused him of racism

Danny: ah

me: and clint's response was, "a guy like that should shut his face"

Danny: seriously???

phenom

me: yeah i know

did you see gran torino

Danny: no but i want to

me: its so great, seriously

Danny: subtitle "Get off My Lawn"

Danny: well the show really picked up at the end

me: i guessssDanny: fleh

Dream Men

2009-01-08T14:13:00.005-05:00

30 ROCK is back tonight on its quest to become more than a critic's and smart people audience's darling. HELP IT OUT, FOLKS, AND TUNE IN!

I, for one, am thrilled to see Peter Dinklage as Liz Lemon's love interest starting on tonight's episode. I once had a dream in which Peter Dinklage was hot in pursuit of me, actually. We were in a pony-riding ring when this happened, and I nicely turned him down. I think this dream occurred sometime after his season on NIP TUCK.

In honor of my little person lover's guest starring stint on a show that churns out guest starring Emmy nominees like an Amish girl does butter, I present to you, ladies and gentlemen, television celebrities I have also had (embarrassingly) intimate dreams about.

1. Kelsey Grammar- One of my first dreams of an intimate nature, this one was very straightforward. I was on top, looked down, and thought...gross. He didn't even make me tossed salad and scrambled eggs afterwards. Har har har.

2. Jack Osbourne- I am hard pressed to count this one because in my dream, I was actually somebody else. I have heard that if you are able to dream that you're somebody else, you're clinically insane.

3. Seth Rogen- This one was also straightforward and, in my dream, happened right after a birthday party for my sister. Seth and I ALMOST had a round two in dreamland recently. We were both high school exchange students studying in Japan. We were trying to get weed together and I saw where it was going and stopped it. In reality, though, I wouldn't turn Seth down.

4. Josh Radnor- In this dream, there was no intercourse. Actually, Josh Radnor just gave me a really strong and satisfying hug as he told me he would rather sleep with Charlize Theron. I get it, Josh. I would probably have made the same choice.

I THINK MY MOM WILL LOVE READING THIS ENTRY MORE THAN ANYONE ELSE.

Summer Heights High

2009-01-05T12:29:00.003-05:00

What's that you ask, Alanna? What did I watch over the Holidays? I WILL TELL YOU.

I give an incredibly hearty endorsement to SUMMER HEIGHTS HIGH, and encourage all with HBO on demand to watch all 8 episodes. (You can do it in one day. It's like, the same amount of time as seeing BENJAMIN BUTTON.)

I had never seen any of Chris Lilley's work before, but am now itching to see it all. Chris writes and stars in SUMMER, playing 3 characters over the course of one term in an Australian public school. There is Jamie (pronounced Jah-MAY), a privileged private school "year 11" visiting for the term, Jonah, a behaviorally challenged "year 8" and "Poly" (Polynesian), and Mr. G., the school's stereotypical drama teacher.

Chris' portrayals are absurdly humorous in appearance, as he is an average sized thirty something SEAMLESSLY pulling off a 16 year old girl and 13 year old boy in school uniforms. But once you look past the wolf in obvious sheep's clothing aspect, what makes the show equal parts hilarious and poignant is the seemingly real people casting of the teachers and students surrounding the 3 main players. They make Jonah's plights with discipline in particular borderline tear jerking come the last episode.

Australia is the new Britain when it comes to comedy exports for sure. Chris Lilley and Tim Minchin are both national treasures of epic proportions.

Lost-ticipation

2009-01-05T09:45:00.005-05:00

Apparently I'm so excited about the imminent season 5 premiere of Lost that last night I had a dream I was watching it, but to my dismay it was devoid of Sawyer. Fortunately, according to dorkfest blog io9, he will be around, AND shirtless, for the entire 47 minute first episode.

Other than that, I watched a lot of dumb shit over the holidays, including Storm of the Century, a 1999 miniseries written by Stephen King. It's quite possibly the slowest-moving thriller in the world but I enjoyed the Kingian Manichean ethics on display toward the end. That's right, I just busted out a reference to Gnosticism in a TV blog. And in other Stephen King news, there's going to be a made-for-TV Children of the Corn remake, because... we really need that? Yes, definitely.

What did you watch over your holiday break?

Watch out, honey! There's a metaphorical severe weather pattern approaching!

Pre-holiday Miscellany

2008-12-23T11:50:00.003-05:00

First, I'd like to point you to Three Easy Payments, in which a former classmate of mine reviews commercials. This blog features both hilarity and the correct usage of the word "interrobang."

Second, could someone tell me whether Gail Simmons has left Top Chef for good? Last we saw her, she was being ridiculous at her bridal shower (i.e. blaming the chefs for ruining her upcoming marriage with sub-par sushi rolls). She was conspicuously absent from the last episode, and previews reveal a surly bald Brit in her place. AS IF ANYONE COULD REPLACE GAIL.

I think she's so awesome that I actually permitted my boyfriend to cheat on me with her, should the opportunity ever arise. Seriously, watch reruns and see how amazing Gail's life is. She says nothing of value and appears to be there just to go NOM NOM NOM on delicious food. Every now and then she makes a half-hearted attempt at criticism but mostly just walks around out-adorabling Padma in cutely ridiculous dresses. GAIL 4 LYFE.

Joy to the Television

2008-12-22T14:30:00.006-05:00

Happy Holidays, Tubers. Here in no particular order are some television tidbits for the holiday season.

Firstly, if you haven't already been doing so, tune into ABC Family's 25 Days of Christmas. It's a great place to catch some claymation favorites and play a rousing round of Guess Which Drugs These Stop Motion Animators from the Sixties were on. Acid for the win. Just don't watch THE POLAR EXPRESS. CGI Tom Hanks haunts my dreams, always. Especially as that creepy Santa Claus. Whoever heard of a bitchy Santa in a Christmas movie.

Secondly, I love me some Christmas, but I also can't wait for it to be over so I don't have to see any more grossly anti-feminist diamond commercials, particularly this one from Kay Jewelers.

Really? You're sorry your signing still isn't very good? Maybe before you expect someone to be so head over heals for you, you should have a fluent language in common. Or did you already learn the sign for "Where's my dinner, bitch" and "Blow me," so you think you're good? If this isn't enough to prevent you from being a Kay customer, remember, they're so cheap because they're blood diamonds.

And finally, today's New York Post featured Christmas cards sent by celebrities. Please look below for the most scrumdiddlyumptiously appropriate card, sent by Boob Tuber favorite, James Lipton.

A Deja Gout of Leftovers?! Oh, you crack me up Jimmy.

It's Gilded Globe Time

2008-12-11T10:35:00.004-05:00

The nominees are in, and since more Americans get their television news from boobtubers than from any other source, here are some thoughts, followed by the full list of TV Nominees (my preferences for winners in bold).

For once, my lady parts are giving me a hard time as to who should win best actor in a television series, drama. Usually my loins point me in a straight path towards Hugh Laurie, but now, Jon Hamm has been thrown in the mix, and his Don Draper is as dapper as they come. I'll let me you know when me and "ladytown" have made a final decision...

Of course, you all should know by now that my mind and genitals are made up when it comes to best actor in a miniseries or movie. Giamatti '09. Strike that, Giamatti 4-EVAH!

Hmm, are there any categories that are not determined by a lust factor for me? WHY YES! Best television series drama should go to MAD MEN. I turn my back on HOUSE only because I do have to admit that the writers are still working towards finding a gratifying balance between the old and new teams. I know the writer's strike is partially to blame for the underused Chase and Cameron in particular, but things still have been a bit Clunky in House-ville. Tuesday's Christmas episode was actually fantastic, with seamless plot movement between A - D storylines, so I think we're on the right track, thanks mostly to Peter Blake, but still, I will have to be throwing my support behind MAD MEN this year, mostly because I wish I could drink profusely at work.

Best television series drama
"Dexter"
"House"
"In Treatment"
"Mad Men"
"True Blood"

Best television musical or comedy
"Californication"
"Entourage"
"The Office"
"30 Rock"
"Weeds"

Best miniseries of made-for-television movie
"Bernard and Doris"
"Cranford"
"John Adams"
"A Raisin in the Sun"
"Recount"

Best actor in a television series, drama
Gabriel Byrne, "In Treatment"
Michael C. Hall, "Dexter"
Jon Hamm, "Mad Men"
Hugh Laurie, "House"
Jonathan Rhys Meyers, "The Tudors"

Best actress in a television series, drama
Sally Field, "Brothers & Sisters"
Mariska Hargitay, "Law & Order: SVU"
January Jones, "Mad Men"
Anna Paquin, "True Blood"
Kyra Sedgwick, "The Closer"

Best actor in a miniseries or movie
Ralph Fiennes, "Bernard and Doris"
Paul Giamatti, "John Adams"
Kevin Spacey, "Recount"
Kiefer Sutherland, "24: Redemption"
Tom Wilkinson, "Recount"

Best actress in a miniseries or movie
Judi Dench, "Cranford"
Catherine Keener, "An American Crime"
Laura Linney, "John Adams"
Shirley MacLaine, "Coco Chanel"
Susan Sarandon, "Bernard and Doris"

Best actor in a television series, musical or comedy
Alec Baldwin, "30 Rock"
Steve Carell, "The Office"
Kevin Connolly, "Entourage"
David Duchovny, "Californication"
Tony Shalhoub, "Monk"

Best actress in a television series, musical or comedy
Christina Applegate, "Samantha Who?"
America Ferrera, "Ugly Betty"
Tina Fey, "30 Rock"
Debra Messing, "The Starter Wife"
Mary-Louise Parker, "Weeds"

Best supporting actor in a series, miniseries or made-for-television movie
Neil Patrick Harris, "How I Met Your Mother"
Denis Leary, "Recount"
Jeremy Piven, "Entourage"
Blair Underwood, "In Treatment"
Tom Wilkinson, "John Adams"

Best supporting actress in a series, miniseries or made-for-television movie
Eileen Atkins, "Cranford"
Laura Dern, "Recount"
Melissa George, "In Treatment"
Rachel Griffiths, "Brothers & Sisters"
Dianne Wiest, "In Treatment"

See if I am right on January 11th.

In Honor of the 76th Annual Lighting of The Rockefeller Center Christmas Tree TONIGHT on NBC

2008-12-03T16:40:00.003-05:00

This morning, Harry Connick Jr. was on the Today show (for what seems like the 18th time this month) to promote his new Christmas album as well as his appearance at tonight's tree lighting. I get overly excited when usually stoic and artificial morning TV personalities do something real or funny. Usually I can rely on Matt Lauer to show such glimmers in otherwise painful banter. Today, Harry Connick Jr. played along and did not give into the always looming fear that midwestern housewives will be insulted by obvious sarcasm. HILARIOUS!

And in celebration of that big old tree getting lit, remember these...(Watch 'em all, they get better as they go. I also understand better is a relative term, but watch anyway.)

Vivian's take on The Hills

2008-12-03T14:48:00.001-05:00

I TRIPLE DOG DARE PROMISE that I will be back ASAP with my assessment of holiday themed programming.

Until then, please enjoy guest tuber Vivian's take on THE HILLS, the show that no regular Boob Tuber can watch without experiencing a violent physical reaction...

Might as well call it "Over The Hills"! MTV's hit reality drama appears to take its cues from another sassy foursome--Dorothy, Sophia, Blanche, and Rose of The Golden Girls! Compelling photo documentation is worth a thousand words. I am not including Audrina because she is particularly useless.

Lauren/Dorothy: Both weathered their sex scandals with dignity, grace, and rage. They are the cuckqueaned protagonists who can't laugh at themselves.

Lo/Sophia: The sneering and snarky moms of the protagonist. Such bitches.

Heidi/Blanche: These one-armed vixens share a penchant for big busts and boys boys boys!

Whitney/Rose: Notably nicer than the other gals, these mildly dumb (yet charming) blondes purvey an endless supply of funny faces.

This concludes the most intellectually-challenging analysis of The Hills published on the Internet, or any other media, to date. I promise you.

TV News Roundup

2008-12-01T13:58:00.003-05:00

Tina Fey's husband divulges the origins of her scar to Maureen Dowd, who spends the majority of her Vanity Fair article scrutinizing that and other sundry aspects of Fey's appearance, because that's what womenfolk are good for.

Britney Spears hosted her very own infomercial last night, the saddest in the world, sadder even than the Snuggie.

The Post and I agree that Colbert's Christmas special sucked. I think he has officially jumped the shark, even though the phrase "jumped the shark" jumped the shark a while ago, and therefore this blog has now jumped the shark.

If you love Poor Man's Version of that HBO Show with the Four Narcissistic Harpies Who Probably Helped Inspire the Economy's Downfall, AKA Lipstick Jungle, buy a Nielsen meter and start watching soon OR ELSE.

Can you believe...

2008-11-12T09:57:00.005-05:00

Two can you believe its for today.

1) Can you believe it is TOP CHEF/food porn time again, as the show's fifth season premieres on Bravo tonight? I hope the first challenge tonight is to take spaghetti with tomato sauce, shrimp cocktail, stuffing (as in Turkey/Thanksgiving stuffing), guacomole, and baked potatoes and make something out of them. Those are my favorite foods so I am sure it would be delicious.

Another good thing about Top Chef beginning is maybe a waning down of the NYC transit advertisements for the show featuring an openly hostile statue of liberty wielding a knife. It seriously looks like some of Vigo's primordial ooze from below the city streets in GHOSTBUSTERS II got all up in her grill. Google fails me in finding a viable photo of it, but trust me, not good news.

2) Old news, but can you believe TWO AND A HALF MEN is the number one comedy on television? Honestly, it makes me question my place on this planet to know that what I consider to be, hands down, one of the worst shows on television gets an 8.9/13 rating?!?! On top of plain sucking, now the show is just getting awkward as that little shit on it grows up. Now its more like TWO 80s HAS BEENS/WALKING ZOMBIES DO TRICKS FOR PAYCHECKS AND 80% OF A MAN. That was a mouthful, but you get me.

Ruby Premieres Sunday

2008-11-07T16:29:00.003-05:00

The LA Times review summed up the confusion surrounding the premiere of RUBY best: "... here is "Ruby," which this Sunday joins the home of "Fashion Police," "Dress My Nest" and "How Do I Look?". RUBY, being a docudrama reality series about a morbidly obese young woman trying to lose weight that will air on the Style Network. Style has dipped its toe into some sort of substance with CLEAN HOUSE, the show that reorganizes and redecorates for chronic hoarders; at least here there is some sort of acknowledgement of their psychological disorders and problems that are a little deeper than HOW DO I LOOK?! But then again, their answer is to have Niecy Nash sass the homeowners into order. There is no humor to hide behind in Ruby's case, so I will be curious to see how it goes...

Boob Tubers Endorsement for Treasury Secretary

2008-11-06T13:29:00.003-05:00

Suze Orman, of course! Not only to add a lesbian to the currently exclusively black-and-Jew administration, but because she's, uh, AWESOME!?!

Just think of the possibilities...

Obama: We need to establish a program that will pump funds into higher education.
Orman: Show me the money! Show me the money.
Obama: Well, we're trillions in debt, but young people can't afford coll-
Orman: You have shame and you have blame. How are you going to pay for this?
Obama: Um, I was going to go to the Education House Committee...
Orman: DENIED! Denied, denied, denied. Plant some flowers instead.
Obama: Wha...?
Biden: I have a question.
Orman: Shoot, J-man.
Biden: Can I afford $5,000 hair plugs?
Orman: SHOW ME THE MONEY!
Obama: I am a poor judge of character.

Or You Could Wear a F*cking Sweater

2008-11-04T17:40:00.001-05:00

Casting Call!

2008-11-03T17:34:00.003-05:00

Every blog title today ends with !

Tell me what you think of THIS casting call:

Casting Call: Magical Elves, Inc. the award-winning producers behind Bravo's Top Chef and Project Runway are looking for singles ready and serious about getting married for a new docu-series on Lifetime. The series will explore the concept of arranged marriages and those interested can view the people who are seeking mates at www.ArrangedMarriageTV.com/matches.html . The producers are looking to cast right away; for more information and to be considered for this show, call Liz Alper at Magical Elves, Inc. at 213 630 6530 or email casting@magicalelves.com.

I mean, I am just surprised that this comes to us from the Magical Elves, who usually inject my dreams with images of suckling legs--both of lamb and of Padma Lackshmi, mmmmmm. No matter how la di da classy the Magical Elves make this, there is still the possibility of it turning into some sort of Mike Darnell-ian shit show, like Good old Darva Conger.

I would only go on this show if they could cuarantee me an arrangement with Paul Giamatti.

Skins!

2008-11-03T15:33:00.005-05:00

While everyone else in the country talks about the election and the future of our country and Proposition 8 and Rachel Maddow, I am going to continue talking about shit that doesn't matter. Story of my life.

This weekend, I had the privelege of hosting, among others, some real live Brits. Of course, I knew immiedetely what I wanted their take on.

Me: Hey, you know what I am LOVING that BBC America just brought to us here?
Brits: What? (Yes, this was in unison if memory serves me correctly)
Me: SKINS
Brits: Oh, bollocks. That show is complete rubbish. How can you watch that? It belongs in the bin with the scraps of bangers and mash, fish and chips and curry takeout. It's not fit. It's just like the OC except with more drugs and nudity.
Me: Um, that's exactly why I like it...

So there you have it. I am a simpleton. But if liking this pseudo-edgy drama with brilliantly balanced plot lines between an engaging and unique group of teenage characters makes me a simpleton, then I am ready to get my Forrest Gump on. We just got series one on BBC America, but they've filmed three with an all new cast (Degrassi style) and I cannot wait to see them all. Each episode involves the whole gang but focuses on one character, still seemlessly integrating the ensemble into the show. My favorite is Cassie. OMG!K?#WHO IS YOURS?>!OMG~!

BTW, to fulfill the educational requirements of this blog, SKINS is actually a slang term for rolling papers. I never inhaled, so I don't know whether or not Americans use this term for them or not.

Also, in case you were wondering, the Brits were able to confirm for us that Chris Martin is, in fact, not a national treasure.

Growing Up Isn't Easy...

2008-10-31T16:39:00.003-04:00

I know I am just stealing the brilliant Michael K's steam, but today he made the brilliant choice to have Tim Curry be the hot slut of the day, solely based on his role in the 1980s television movie The Worst Witch.

I. Love. This. Shit. I can still sing the theme song. It fills me with all sorts of youthful nostalgia. Almost as much as watching the claymation special The Year Without a Santa Claus.

My life will be complete if there is anyone out there who can help me remember another favorite movie of mine that aired on the Disney Channel in the 80s. I remember something about the kid going bald, and using some sort of remedy involving peanut butter and dead flies to grow his hair back. Not joking. And go.

Here's part one of The Worst Witch. You're welcome.

GHOSTIES

2008-10-31T12:20:00.002-04:00

My relationship with the Other Side is most akin to Haley Joel Osment's dilemma in the first half of The Sixth Sense, in that I've seen ghosts multiple times and they seem to want to hang with me, but I'm really scared of them and don't want to.

Or at least I don't now. When I was a kid, I was totes down with making ghost-friends, at least according to me ma. Until I was 7, my family lived in an apartment, and then we moved to a house one town over. One day, I turned to my mother and asked, "Why didn't the little girl come with us when we moved?"

"Uh... what little girl?" my mom asked. (I only have a brother.)

"The little girl who sits on my window sill at night and talks to me," I said.

OMG WTF BBQ?!?? But my mom kept her cool and said if I wanted the girl to come back, I should just think of her and invite her to our new home. Now, I was a weird kid, with many imaginary friends, but I could differentiate between fantasy and reality. And I was convinced this nightly visitor was real, not pretend.

So, ghost. An interesting footnote here is that I had no memory of this little girl until my mom brought it up years later, and then I vaguely recalled talking to someone at night.

Since then I've had a few more experiences, all of which also occurred at night. I realize this takes some of the oomph out of my story: it's not uncommon for people's brains, especially when entering or leaving sleep-mode, to interpret some innocuous object they see in a dark room as a human form. Or, for that matter, to be in a sort of twilight, half-awake half-asleep state, and again misinterpret the vestiges of a dream as reality, i.e. something supernatural occurring. But the fact that I saw this little girl EVERY NIGHT, and she spoke to me before I fell asleep, makes me somewhat more inclined to see my subsequent creepy experiences as possibly ghost-oriented.

ANYWAY: other experiences include: sleeping over a friend's house and waking up in the middle of the night to find a boy in the guest room bed with me (was not my friend; there were no other young men in the house); waking up in my parents' house one night and seeing three women seated on an antique bench in my bedroom, staring at me (interesting to note for the next several days my dog behaved very strangely, as though she was spooked by something); and hearing a very freaky deep voice intone my name several times one night in a pub in Australia that I felt was haunted as soon as I entered.

Since then I've sort of put in a formal request to the spirit world to leave me alone. So far so good.

All Hallow's Eve Special

2008-10-30T17:46:00.005-04:00

In honor of Halloween, Alanna and I will be forsaking television and snarkicisms regarding it to share with you what is a casual passion for me and a minor area of interest for her: ghosts/the supernatural. We were both shocked that the usually judgmental commentors of Gawker's sister site, Jezebel, were nothing but respectful and self reflective, sharing their own ghost stories prompted by a feature on this New York Times article on home ghost removal. Ghosts and belief in them seem to be very of the moment, so why not put our expierences out there into the blogosphere.

Aside from my constant obsession with Ghost Hunters, I believe my thoughts on the issue have already been best expressed in a guest blog for Pat over at A Blog About Things this summer. Without his permission, I shall reprint here:

My interest in things otherworldly probably began in 1994, when my best friend and I formed the Fourth Grade Psychic Society. We issued professionally laminated cards to our friends clamoring to be members, but actually could not boast any psychic skill of our own. I think this was more our way of mildly rebelling against our Catholic school indoctrination, so we kept things tame; instead of using a Ouija board, we constructed our own Angel Board (same idea except supposedly not demonic). And we used a shot glass* as the object to move from letter to letter. Which I never pushed. I swear.

This hobby died down over the years, with the occasional tune in to Montel Williams' show when psychic Sylvia Brown was a guest and then, more recently, the propensity to fill my DVR memory with Sci Fi's hit series Ghost Hunters (Don't even attempt to mock. I have become very good at defending myself and will, in fact, blow you out of the water).

My curiosity did perk up a few years ago, though, when for work I had to become familiar with Lily Dale, NY. Lily Dale is located just west of Buffalo, and in order to own a home there, you must be a registered medium** that has passed the Lily Dale board's accreditation. Every summer, Lily Dale has its open season in which there are lectures and workshops, and visitors can make appointments to visit a Lily Dale Medium for a private session in his or her home, which is most likely a Victorian era cottage.

Fortunately, my ability to make friends willing to follow through with my absurd ideas had not died down since the fourth grade. I convinced my friend from Rochester, NY that we should go during my visit to her—it was only a two-hour drive away. Although she was a huge and vocal skeptic, she agreed (She was probably just bitter that she didn't know me in the fourth grade and couldn't be in the Psychic Society).

Our first run in with Lily Dale's mediums happened at an afternoon service held at Inspiration Stump, supposedly the site of some of Lily Dale's most intense spirit energy. A la John Edwards, a crowd gathers here several times each day, and a group of mediums will tag team read the crowd. For most of this session, we were not convinced. It was easy to tell that a vast majority of the visitors to Lily Dale were in search of some fulfillment their life just wasn't offering, meaning we were in fairly miserable company. One medium did come through with someone that, to a T, fit a very specific description of my Great Grandmother***, but I kept my mouth shut. I didn't want to earn an honorary membership in the Sad and Pathetic Psychic Society. And interestingly enough, no one else in the crowd claimed this spirit as their own.

I had made private appointments with one of the town's mediums, but only after some fairly intense research. I steered away from anyone who remotely resembled the woman who told Carol Ann to go into the light, and also avoided anyone looking for a deposit ahead of time (Mediums take paypal?!). Instead, our medium is the definition of down to earth: a former marine and proud lesbian, she has flags commemorating both hanging in front of her two story cottage. She couldn't be older than 38, owns two dogs (and specializes in animal communication), and puts her skills to real world use, working as a grief counselor. Sounded way better than some middle-aged, crystal ball gazer dressed in resort wear.

After a spiritualist prayer, I repeated my name three times, and the medium briefly meditated. The first thing she came back with: My friend and I had said hello to cows on our way to Lily Dale. Had we? Yes. She told me the cows said hi back. Weird. Next, it sounded as if my Great Grandmother may be coming through again (I won't bore you with the exact validations as to why I thought it was her, but believe me, they were pretty impressive). She asked if anyone in my family had recently undergone medical testing, and if so if they were suffering from diabetes. I told her no. Take home point was that my Great-Grandmother wanted me to tell my Grandfather to take care of himself.

We neared the end of our time together, and the medium asked if there was anything else I was interested in. Because of her animal specialty, and my ongoing obsession with Barney, our family dog that we had to put down in February, I asked if she saw any animals around me. Brief meditation... "Do you have cats that you feed ice cream?," she came back with. Yes, my roommate and I make a habit out of, when we are done, spoon-feeding our cats the leftover ice cream. She said she saw a little dog. She was confused because, in life, this dog knew no other co-pets. Yet this dog thinks he is mine and is jealous that he does not get ice cream. "Next time, leave some out for him." She said.

Pretty darn good, right? I mean, I was kind of bummed with the lackluster message for my grandfather—he wasn't the one paying $65 dollars—but at least I knew Barney was no longer horribly arthritic and was still capable of focusing on fine dining. So I called my mom. I told her that if it had worked, the only person that came through was Grandma Kutchins, as we called her, telling Grandpa to take care of himself. "Well that would make sense," she said. "Grandpa was in for tests this week and is in the beginning stages of diabetes."

OMFG?!#WTF?#!?OMFG?! Not your usual reaction to hearing of a grandparent's illness, but warranted in this situation. Looks like my medium was pretty dead on.

One interesting thing to keep in mind is that there are no documented cases of anyone coming through and confirming our earthly superstitions about life after death. For example, my Great-Grandmother was very Catholic, but at no point did she say, "I am chilling here with Jesus! SUCK IT JEWS!" Are any of the earth's major religions right? Or do dead people get a handbook, like in Beetlejuice, asking them not to pass on any info that might start a religious World War III? Or is there a place where the energy of all living things continues on once they die, no deities included?

Or am I just insane?

2008-10-30T10:11:00.001-04:00

For Halloween, my boyfriend and I are going as Don and Betty Draper. I feel like his costume is really easy: he just has to slick back his hair and wear a suit. Oh, and carry around a cigarette and a tumbler of whiskey wherever he goes, but he already does that anyway. I, however, must look like an early 60's princess/housewife. I have a tweedy retro jacket thing I'm going to wear, but I'm open to more suggestions of clothes/accessories that are easy to get and cheap.

Why Hello There, BBC America

2008-10-29T16:10:00.005-04:00

I have taken time out of looking at the non-ironic facebook photo albums of casual friends featuring the New Kids on the Block concert of a few days ago to check in here at boobtuber land.

Firstly, tune in tonight for Barack O'Bama's "fireside chat"-esque, unprecedented 1/2 hour of airtime he purchased on network TV. I am assuming that he will give me a shout out at least once, since I did give him $15. If you like McCain and/or pie more, ABC is keeping it real and sticking with Pushing Daisies for the 8 PM hour. Apparently, as Marissa informed us, keeping Pushing Daisies on the air is our second most important civic duty these days, so either way and your 8 PM television slot should be productive.

Here is what SNL imagined Barack's broadcast will be like, and I hope they're right:

Secondly, after that love fest, inquiring minds should tune into BBC America at 9 PM for Britain's Youngest Grannies, a documentary that promises to look into the lives of 30 something women who themselves had children early, and are now faced with the prospect of grandmotherhood! BBC America has shared a couple of these doc series with us. I most recently watched The 34 Stone Teenager. It's just so funny to watch these staples of American white trashiness coming to a new and untainted nation and being treated as an anomaly. We're like their dirty, grimy, look into your socioeconomic future mirror over the pond, and not even using hoity toity words like stone can change that. Ha!

Save Pushing Daisies!!!!!

2008-10-28T11:30:00.000-04:00

Hello Dear Readers!

This is Marissa... a loyal Boobtubers reader, and avid TV snarkmaster. My dear friend Alanna is allowing me to vent, using this forum under the dire circumstances. Yes, it is true what you have heard that "Pushing Daisies" is in danger of cancellation.... and so disheartened by this news am I, that I am doing everything in my power to convince people to start watching this wonderful show.

"Pushing Daisies" is unlike any show you will ever watch! Full of whimsy and hilarity...with an excellent and supremely talented cast (not to mention the amazing writing), this EMMY nominated show has a little bit of everything. For the Artistic crowd it has colorful sets, sweeping camera action and amazing direction. For the *swoon worthy*, it has the delicious Lee Pace (The Fall), and the luscious Anna Friel. For the musical lovers, it features the ASTOUNDING Kristen Chenowith (Wicked, The Music Man), Ellen Greene (Little Shop of Horrors) and frequents guest stars such as Raul Esparza (Company, RHPS etc...), Molly Shannon, Paul Reubens, Mike White and David Arquette.

Yes, dear readers, this show has everything. I myself fell in love with it on the FIRST viewing... not only as a person who loves musicals and whimsy in general, but the heart of the story, and the persistence of the writers to not turn it into just another prime time drama, makes for a very excellent viewing experience. The characters have depth, humor and good story arcs, and at the end of the day, they are just portrayed so well by the actors, that it's almost like taking a little vacation from your life, to get sucked into this fantasy land, and just allow yourself, for one hour to be supremely happy...

A quick recap, for those who have never seen the show: Ned (The Piemaker) has an uncanny gift... he can raise the dead. If someone has died, he can touch them and bring them back to life for a minute. However, if he does not touch them again before the minute is up (thereby keeping them alive), someone/something else will die in their place. This would not come in handy if it weren't for sketchy (and HILARIOUS) P.I. Emerson Cod (played by the delightful Chi McBride), who uses Ned to wake murder victims and get the scoop on who did them in so he can make some ca-a-ash. Through a series of usually slap-stick events, the unlikely pair solve crimes in their small town. Meanwhile, Ned has a childhood sweetheart, Chuck, who was killed and brought back to life by Ned. This would be-pair has a love affair that requires them not to touch, or else Chuck would die again. Of course this requires you to suspend reality a bit... it is also heart warming and sweet, and the two actors play off each other so well, and have such chemistry that you forget about their inability to touch within seconds of watching them. The cast of characters that surround these 3 range from ridiculous to knee slappingly funny, including but not limited to, a pair of agoraphobic, synchronized swimming aunts, singing waitresses, taxidermy obsessors and a local coroner who turns a not so blind eye to the goings on at the morgue.

I encourage everyone to start tuning in on Wednesdays at 8pm on ABC... and in the meantime, get the 1st season on DVD! Or go to www.televisionwithoutpity.com to reap full recaps of all of the shows thus far. You will not be sorry! In a time when TV is being taken over by "reality" and nonsense...there is one thing we can all use a little of... Charm. And "Pushing Daisies" has it in spades.

Time to Ride Other People's Coattails...

2008-10-28T10:28:00.004-04:00

Hopefully, when you read our interview with Pat Walsh last month, you weren't like, eww, what a horrible and untalented person. I never want to see any success come his way. Because you'd have to eat your words.

Pat and Sonny are writing a pilot for ABC Studios, with Luke Greenfield set to direct and executive produce the project. Entitled Broke Friends, it is sure to appeal to me because I am broke and I have friends.

Read more if you're sexy.

Commercial Break!

2008-10-27T13:31:00.004-04:00

You may remember* my personal vow a few weeks back to watch at least one commercial break per program when viewing a DVRd program, so as to keep television free. Boy, are you fast forwarders missing out on some wacky stuff! Here are some commercials to have recently caught my eye.

Watch this one for Playskool's Helmet Heroes, which aired during House on 10/14. Pay close attention to the commercial's first line and then meet me after for discussion.

Can I imagine getting arrested in my own home?! Sadly, thanks to Post 9/11 Patriot Act politics, YES! And even if I couldn't imagine it, why is that something that I would want to imagine? You betchya, sometimes I just kick back and dream of what it would be like for my household to turn into some sort of Lord of the Flies reenactment, complete with little boys living out their frustration resulting from the cult of masculinity's societal pressures on them. Wow, did you tap into the minds of the House watching demographic, Playskool!

Then there are these quirky adds from Ask.com that have jumped the pond and can be most often viewed during the first two hours of The Today Show.

If you're instinct is to laugh at these, I'll tell you why you are a racist elitist. You know what really nags me? Minorities. And you know what else really nags me? Obese people. Why do we have to have the physical embodiments of our most irritating concerns be represented by people outside of the norm, huh? Is Ask.com telling us that we must take steps to get red of Southeastern Asians and obese people because they're not like us? I think so.

What commercials have caught your eye recently? Let me know when I get back from reading some Irigaray and burning my bra.

*You definitely don't remember.

I know, I know

2008-10-23T09:36:00.003-04:00

Sorry for my prolonged absence. It's just that by day, I am a super successful hedge funder and have spent the past few weeks stuffing mattresses with money.

I'll be back later with a more juicy post, but for now, just in time for Halloween, please enjoy the news that Ghost Hunters is getting another spinoff. According to the Hollywood Reporter:

"Sci Fi Channel's "Ghost Hunters" is about to get a higher education. The network has ordered a pilot for another spinoff of the popular reality franchise from exec producer Craig Piligian. Tentatively titled "Ghost Hunters: College Edition," the show features a group of students going around the country to seek out paranormal activity. The students will be guided by an experienced ghost investigator. Producers have not determined if any cast members from the other shows will be involved in the new project."

I'll tell you which Ghost Hunters cast member I would like to school me. His name rhymes with Deve.

Also, rate my craziness level if I decided to buy this, please.

Weekly Roundup

2008-10-16T15:59:00.002-04:00

Limp dish rag Leanne won Project Runway, defeating the petulant, old-tymey porcelain doll Kenley and Korto from Liberia, whose presence induced compulsive praise of her "ethnic" designs that worked on women of "all sizes," qualities that sound good to the average human, but in the fashion world are actually equivalent to "made from the blood of Gentile children."
Barry and John-Boy faced off for the final time last night. John-Boy got in a few zingers, if you think "I am not George Bush" is a zinger, but his compulsive blinking, incurable rictus, and erotomaniacal fixation upon one Joe the Plumber proved major hindrances for him in the opinion polls.
Jonathan and I finished the first season DVD of Mad Men, which, unlike almost everything in the world, actually lived up to what people said it was, which is: quite excellent. Also, spoiler alert, in the finale the characters smoke, drink, and treat women like objects. Also, Peggy is apparently like one of those people who don't know they're pregnant until they go to poop one day and a baby plops into the potty. You can see them on Montell and the like.

Oh Noes!!

2008-10-10T10:36:00.003-04:00

I was just watching CNN and President Bush was giving a speech in the Rose Garden about HOW EVERYTHING IS GONNA BE OK which totally reminded me of how right after Columbine, my high school principal gave a "Please don't shoot up the school" speech at an assembly, insisting that there were alternatives, etc etc. Like why don't you try being a 16-year-old on this Hellmouth, Mr. Resnick. But ANYWAY Bush mentioned that the paper markets are frozen and all I could think was, "What does this mean for Dunder Mifflin?"

If they were to downsize, which Dunder Mifflin employee do you think would get the first pink slip?

Can I steal you for a second?

2008-10-08T17:08:00.004-04:00

Two irreverent comedy posts in a row! I LOLd today when I read the NY Post TV section's one liner regarding what tonight's third season premiere of the Sara Silverman Program is about: After Sarah smokes pot for the first time, she leaves herself a message that begs her to take her under-the-influence ideas seriously. It may or may not have hit a little too close to home. Watch it on Comedy Central!

In celebration of the premiere, please enjoy a clip from my favorite episode last season. Granted, this is not my favorite scene; my favorite scene is when a young Sarah opts to hold up doody on a stick for passing cars instead of say goodbye to her dying mother, yelling doody as each car passes. But the song is pretty good. I am just ruining my credibility with my off-kilter youtube sharing, aren't I? I swear I am at least of average intelligence...

HAHA Box Office

2008-10-06T18:03:00.002-04:00

That is what HBO should stand for, at least on Sunday nights. This is not referring to Entourage. You laugh at Entourage and you're a simpleton. But if you are a simpleton, get ready, as Entourage was just renewed for a sixth season.

Instead, HA-B-O refers to the back to back airings of Little Britain USA and The Life and Times of Tim.

It took me until this, its second week, to like Little Britain USA. I had only seen the original when living in its namesake country a few years back, and even then only in my altered state of mind that seemed to last for my entire four months overseas. I thought that it was, of course, funny, but sometimes I worry that I see lowbrow, British comedy and just assume that it is sophisticated because it is British. Couple this with the fact that I was kind of resentful of the juxtaposition of British vs. American culture, in which both came out looking foolish but perhaps Americans a bit more so. But fuck it. I can't stop laughing at Phyllis and Mr. Doggy. Please watch below and tell me whether or not this makes me an Entourage simpleton.

And then there is The Life and Times of Tim, whose inappropriately grandiose name makes the minuscule antics that Tim handles in his hilarious monotone even more funny. Like a lot of people becoming successful in entertainment, Tim's creator, Steve Dildarian, came from the ad world--just a little reminder that the creatives in television could use a bit of a shake up. In a lot of ways, Tim successfully outshines the Seinfeld crew in his un-politically correct apathy. OMFG, no she didn't criticize Seinfeld! Yes, I did.

The Debates - Question

2008-10-03T12:54:00.003-04:00

Did anyone find Joe Biden's repeated, enormous smile just a bit... Lynchian?

WHY ARE THERE BAD PEOPLE LIKE FRANK???

House, 9/30/08

2008-10-01T12:41:00.003-04:00

Last night's House was one of the grosser episodes in a while. It guest starred Travis Birkenstock as an underemployed painter and patient of the week. We learn something's up with Travis after he completes a woman's portrait, and she and her husband go ballistic upon seeing the results. Which really just look Cubist-style instead of realistic. Apparently employing the techniques of Cubism gets Travis a punch in the nose (he'll get another later) and a diagnosis of visual disturbances and anosognosia where it got another guy deemed best painter of the 20th century. Also, how could Travis not be aware of the fact that everyone looked like a Cubist painting? Lame cold opening.

Otherwise, I was pretty entertained by this episode's shenanigans. Travis's head and neck swelled grotesquely, he tried to hook up with Thirteen, and the cause of his problems ended up being a bezoar, AKA nastiest thing to appear on TV since Face Melt-a-Thon Airlines. The bezoar resulted from Travis' repeated enrollment in clinical trials to support himself. One trial was for an antacid, which prevented Travis' stomach from breaking down food, so it all just clumped up and also absorbed the other trial drugs he was taking, releasing them at random and causing horrific symptoms. This reminded me of when I was a kid and thought food just piled up in your body and never went anywhere, and wondered how old you had to be until you were 100% suffused with food, and it also reminded me to not enroll in clinical trials.

Elsewhere, House's P.I. has serious chemistry with Cuddy (and also House, who seems to crave male companionship way more than female, not that there's anything wrong with that.) I am having trouble getting over the fact that the actor playing the P.I. also played the insane crackhead hitchhiker that David picked up, and was physically and mentally tortured by, in the last season of Six Feet Under. The guy will forever seem deeply creepy to me.

Also, Foreman is completely useless now. He just sits in the back and acts wearied by everything. Let's make this show ALL TAUB ALL THE TIME. That actor is doing great, subtle work at building a complex character that isn't in-your-face about his complexity.

And w/r/t that, next episode is about House's father dying. Not looking forward to it. I hate these SPECIAL EPISODES that seem to want to provide clues as to why House is the way he is. I maintain that it's much better if House is just an asshole for no particular reason.

Happy Jew Year

2008-09-29T15:18:00.003-04:00

On Christmas, Jews eat Chinese food and go to the movies. So what do non-Jews do tonight? Might I suggest a bit of schadenfreude for your vagina (vaginfreude?) by watching the premiere of the TLC reality series 17 Kids and Counting, in which Jim Bob and Michelle Duggar and their family prepare for the birth of their 18th child. In a huge slap in the face to the woman that birthed them, each child has a name that begins with J, like dad. Today, the family revealed on The Today Show that number 18 will be a girl, so I am pulling for Jeanette.

In fact, I would encourage you all to watch The Today Show interview by clicking here. It's funny to watch Michelle Duggar live, as she inserts as many pro-Jesus comments as possible, causing Ann Curry and everyone else in America who prefers making decisions for themself to cringe. The hole gang was gathered outside a church in Florida where the eldest child, Joshua (20), was married this weekend. Unfortunately, Joshua and his wife Anna (20), were off on their honeymoon, squashing all hope I had of Ann asking them what it was like losing their virginity. I KNOW! I'M SORRY! I'M SICK! But come on, these folks sure do have interesting beliefs...

It's Official

2008-09-29T09:51:00.003-04:00

I can't bear to watch True Blood anymore. Last night I actually let my boyfriend change the channel to a football game in disgust. When Tara started ranting about how the town still frowns upon interracial couples, I dug my claws in, held on, and hoped for a redeeming scene. What I got was Jason's unstoppable boner as a result of drinking vampire blood. And then, Sookie yelling at her boss for not supporting vampire rights.

Seriously, the phrase "vampire rights" need never have been uttered in this show and it would still be abundantly clear what the writers are alluding to. Alan Ball should have to go to some kind of special writer re-education camp where he can learn the "Show, Don't Tell" rule. Zach Braff should go too. (Garden State: "You see, Natalie Portman, I love you. You've changed my life. You've given me hope..." etc. etc. way to RUIN a perfectly okay movie, J.D)

I hate you, True Blood, I HATE you. You could have been so cool. You could have been Buffy with cursing and fucking and Cajun people. You could have helped me to continue pursuing a lifelong fascination with bloodsuckers and the women who love them, but instead, you had to suck so relentlessly. Die in a fire.

Love,
Alanna

The Office Season Premiere, 9/25/08

2008-09-26T13:49:00.009-04:00

It was GREAT to see the whole gang from The Office back in excellent form. And I mean the WHOLE gang. You may remember that at the end of last season, Ryan was taken away in handcuffs and Toby said farewell to Dunder Mifflin for Costa Rica. Well, a supposedly repentant Ryan returned to a Scranton temp agency just in time to fill in for Pam at the reception desk, and Toby was in a horrific zip lining accident and is currently holed up in a Costa Rica Hospital. YAY!

Toby is, hands down, my favorite character on The Office. Which works out well because Paul Lieberstein, who plays Toby, is hands down my favorite writer for The Office. One of the strongest episodes of anything ever continues to be last season's Money, of course written by Paul. "America, irrigation and night time..."

It's hard to write anything of substance since this season premiere has filled me with childlike glee. So I guess I will just ask you to please tell me who your favorite Office character and/or writer and/or writer/performer is, and why.

Oh, and as far as plot goes, Jim and Pam got engaged.

---

And in The Office: Original Recipe news, there is buzz surrounding Ricky Gervais being the next Oscar host, based on the fact that he managed to be the only sincere presenter at last week's Emmys. I say excellent idea. His nonchalance would hopefully give an organic feel to the ceremony, which not even Jon Stewart has managed to do in his two stints.

Look-a-Like

2008-09-25T10:01:00.005-04:00

Last night Jonathan, Josh, and I saw the band Calexico and we each thought the lead singer strongly resembled a different character actor. Help us settle this pressing manner in the comments, please.

The singer, Joey Burns (front right):

I think he looks just like Guy Pearce, of L.A. Confidential, Memento, and lots of crap:

Jonathan says Chris Cooper:

And Josh said Steve Carell. No.

House-a Wowsa Wowsa! House, M.D. 9/23/08

2008-09-24T11:50:00.005-04:00

Wow[sa], I thought last night's episode was just great, which is a relief after last week's mournfest.

It was really nice of the House team to let M. Night Shyamalan guest write/direct the cold open. A montage of people collapsing and bleeding out of their mouths!? How very The Happening!

Also, you may recall the news from a few weeks ago that they would be trying out a new character on House, and if successful, he would get his own show. This is actually an old school method of testing out a new show before investing in a pilot or series pickup. The last time I remember seeing this was when Peter Marc Jacobson, the brains behind The Nanny, used an entire half hour of the show to introduce us to a Queens, NY hair salon, complete with a stereotypical Korean nail technician and older, flamboyantly gay gentleman. Needless to say, we never saw this show come to fruition.

But Michael Weston really came through as private investigator Lucas Douglas, who House hires seemingly to investigate his patients, but of course House really wants to investigate Wilson. I was LOLing at their chemistry fo' sho'. Not clear yet if Douglas has enough to carry his own show, and not sure if I would want him to--aren't we done with the male character actors carrying shows trend? Let's get some ladies up in here. And by here up in here I mean in leading roles on network television.

My one complaint is that Douglas, as well as the patient of the week (POW), both fell into the annoying trap of serving as a catalyst for House introspection. Douglas yeses House, and confesses that he is doing so only because this is what he knows House wants (cue House looking off, clearly pondering how he misses Wilson). And when the POW is unbandaged and can see for the first time, House asks her how he looks. Sad, she says (cue House looking off, clearly pondering...everything). I doubt so many randoms in Gregory House's life would actually take this vested interest in how effed up he is. Find a new plot device, writers!

And finally, in my non-technical words...

Symptons: Multiple people, all recipients of organ transplants from the same doner, are collapsing and dying, each because of the failure of a different organ. The one recipient remaining alive recieved a cornea transplant...

Diagnosis: The doner suffered from some sort of infection that caused foreign cells to become part of major organs, but these cells are incapable of functioning in the way they are supposed to as part of their host organ, leading to a gradual failure. POW had "brain but not brain." As soon as the problem cells were removed, she was healthy and able to see better than ever.

In the Papes

2008-09-23T15:37:00.007-04:00

In which I follow suit to Pat Kiernan's always impeccable work at New York 1 and take a look at what is going on in today's newspapers. Not like, the depressing financial stuff, but the stuff that matters to boob tubers.

"I call myself a fundit." --Joy Behar

Today, the New York Times' Jacques Steinberg took a look at The View's ever increasing role in the political arena in an article entitled 'The View' Has Its Eye On Politics This Year. The show has evolved from Rosie and Elisabeth's playground fights into a legitimate forum for political discussion and campaigning. (Steinberg notes that Bill Clinton only considered a visit to the show once he had seen McCain on it a week earlier.) Yes, it is interesting how this show has evolved, but it is kind of alarming that there must be such close analysis to the fact that a group of women could be interested in discussing such matters, and that their female, daytime demographic would be interested in watching. BOO underlying sexism.

"The Sixth network is playback." --Alan Wurtzel

Also in the Times, Bill Carter writes of A Television Season That Lasts All Year. This week marks the unofficial beginning of the fall television season in that it is when Nielsen Research starts to pay attention. Interesting tidbit that even I, the most avid tuber, did not know is that the tradition of a television season beginning in September dates back to the fact that this is when new car models were introduced. HUH! Anyway, due to outside factors like a crippling writer strike and competition from other new technologies, big wigs everywhere are claiming that the television season is now year round for both broadcast and development and that this September business is hooey. No matter what "they" say, this ain't the truth. There are still only so many dollars that can go into funding new pilots, and what right minded exec is going to leave money in the bank in case something better comes along six months from now? I will be shocked that if by next year, even after having a full year of this alleged 365 day plan, we don't see the same emphasis on September series premieres.

Mr. Wurtzel does raise an interesting point about digital recording technology, though. When viewers aren't watching network television, it's most likely because they are watching something that is DVRd. It is hard to think something that has brought me so much joy could potentially bring me so much sorrow. I vow to watch one commercial break per episode when watching a DVRd program. You do the same, readers. CLAP IF YOU BELIEVE!...what?

"Serial killers are so common on television that you can't swing a dead cat without hitting one." --Adam Buckman

In The New York Post, Buckman takes a look at CBS' The Mentalist premiering tonight. While his assessment chooses to focus on the cliché, that being television's love affair with serial killers, I commend CBS for doing an okay, just okay, job at creating a show that attempts to put a quirky and highly skilled male lead into a world of mystery (this seems to have become a genre in and of itself). Simon Baker's performance in the pilot is good enough to give this series the old college try.

The Schmemmys- Peter Tolan was Right

2008-09-22T10:54:00.009-04:00

Wow, what an underwhelming broadcast. The five hosts idea was a cluster fuck. Yes, cute in theory to have the first ever nominees from the reality show host category tag-team hosting duties, but horrible in execution. Heidi Klum has never seemed so E.S.L. And BOY did Ryan Seacrest come across as bitter. He is not a fan of sharing the spotlight, even though there is plenty of spotlight left to go around when it shines on him (Note, whenever Alanna and I see Seacrest, we say in a high pitched voice, "I'm the LITTLEST man in the world." When he has facial growth, we amend the statement, adding, "And I have the LITTLEST beard in the world." Works on two levels.) ABC should have instead selected Jimmy Kimmel to host the show. When he appeared to present the award to one member of the host cluster fuck, Jimmy did look like he's been living life hard since his breakup with Sarah Silverman (check out those puffy eyes and that swollen face), but I still think he would have had it in him.

Biggest congratulations of the night goes to the ever wonderful Paul Giamatt i . He won for his portrayal of historically significant one-minute man John Adams. You may or may not remember the fact that Paul Giamatti is my everything. I have saved his acceptance speech in order to digitally insert my name wherever possible. I was happy to see his wife looking very average. He slipped up enough to thank Laura Linney instead of his real wife, so it's not totally out of the realm of possibility that he might slip up and "thank" me. Our day will come, Paul.

You youngins can cry all you want about award shows doling them out to the oldies based on their reputation alone, but if not for Don Rickles, last night's show would have bee unwatchable. And what makes The Amazing Race so amazing that it has won best reality competition show for each of the six years the category has been in existence. I mean, it's a good show, but enlighten me. Thrilling to see the 30 Rock sweep and the BIG win for Alec Baldwin. His cool as a cucumber speech was refreshing on a night of otherwise gratuitous industry masturbation. Although, if I had a emoticon right now it would first be flushed with Giamatti lust, and then be embarrassed for never having seen Mad Men, which won on the drama side. Who wants to cuddle up in bed one weekend and watch 'em all?...Paul?

Outstanding drama series: Mad Men
Outstanding comedy series: 30 Rock
Outstanding host for a reality or reality-competition program: Jeff Probst for Survivor
Outstanding lead actress in a comedy series: Tina Fey for 30 Rock
Outstanding lead actor in a drama series: Bryan Cranston for Breaking Bad
Outstanding lead actress in a drama series: Glenn Close for Damages
Outstanding lead actor in a comedy series: Alec Baldwin for 30 Rock
Outstanding lead actor in a mini-series or movie: Paul Giamatti for John Adams
Outstanding mini-series: John Adams
Outstanding reality competition program: The Amazing Race
Outstanding supporting actress in a mini-series or movie: Eileen Atkins for Cranford
Outstanding supporting actor in a mini-series or movie: Tom Wilkinson for John Adams
Outstanding made for television movie: Recount
Outstanding variety, music or comedy series: The Daily Show
Outstanding lead actress in a mini-series or movie: Laura Linney for John Adams
Outstanding supporting actress in a drama series: Dianne Wiest for In Treatment
Outstanding supporting actor in a drama series: Zeljko Ivanek for Damages
Outstanding supporting actress in a comedy series: Jean Smart for Samantha Who?
Outstanding supporting actor in a comedy series: Jeremy Piven for Entourage

FOOD PARTY!

2008-09-19T16:08:00.007-04:00

This past week was the New York Independent Television Festival. Two great things happened as a result of this. One is that in a panel on the future of drama development, Rescue Me co-creator Peter Tolan told us that, "The Emmys can suck a cock." Let's see if they do. Tune in this Sunday night at 8 PM on ABC.

The second great thing that happened was the introduction of Food Party to a broader audience. Food Party was entered in the comedy category, but actually is more of a whimsically, avant-garde cooking show. Within the first ten minutes of watching it, I thought my intelligence was being insulted. But creator and host Thu Tran goes on to actually introduce some unique recipes, albeit not professionally, while also having fun with her cast of disturbing puppet characters and human friends. Appropriately enough, Food Party won the outside the box award.

Below is the first third of the episode that won Food Party the prize. I encourage you to check it out and stick with it. Don't be scared away when the cardboard cutout of a chef starts throwing up slices of pizza--it gets better. Don't you think Thu would be a great contestant to lend some originality to the Next Food Network Star?

DROP EVERYTHING!

2008-09-18T15:18:00.006-04:00

A guy in my office...let's call him John...because that is his name...shared the following casting call with me.

Casting Call: Semi Abound, the producers behind Ghost Hunters on SCI FI Channel, is looking for a person to join the paranormal investigation team on a new series which will begin production very soon. The interested candidate should be a professional full- or part-time ghost hunter, spiritual medium, paranormal researcher or someone who is fascinated by the supernatural. The person must also be outgoing, enthusiastic and ready to join the team as early as September 24. Candidates should send an email to Saboud@pilgrimfilms.tv along with name, phone number, a recent photo and a brief description of why you would be great on the show. Applicant deadline is this Thursday.

This means two things. One, you must apply TODAY if you are interested in joining America's blue collar heroes in their multi-show quest. Two is that I am so unashamedly a fan of Ghost Hunters that I LOUDLY AND PROUDLY shout it across my workplace. Good for me.

I wonder what this show will be...we already have Ghost Hunters and Ghost Hunters International, and even though SciFi is cable I unfortunately don't think they'll do Ghost Hunters: Get in Steve's Pants...so I guess Ghost Hunters Outerspace it is!

An Interview with Pat Walsh, Writer for It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia

2008-09-17T13:59:00.020-04:00

Here ye! Here ye! The fourth season of It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia premieres tomorrow, Thursday, on FX. Check your local listings.

In order to celebrate, Pat Walsh, friend of the Boob Tubers, generally standup guy, and staff writer for the show has granted us an EXCLUSIVE interview. He also has agreed to give us the pictures when he delivers his first baby for a cool two million dollars.

You may be familiar with Pat's work if you have ever visited his acclaimed blog, watched the final season of Rob and Big, on which he and his writing partner Sonny wrote, or took an NBC Studio Tour in New York anytime in late 2004, early 2005. If you like this interview, you will LOVE watching the episode of Sunny that he and Sonny wrote, which airs tomorrow night and is entitled The Gang Solves the Gas Crisis. And if you like Pat's picture, but wish you could see him move and talk, check out his acting debut in an episode airing later this season entitled Dennis Reynolds: An Erotic Life.

And now, please enjoy Pat Walsh: An Interview in Three Hilarious Parts.

For the wannabe writers:

Jeanette: Your friends and blog readers know that your rise to writing success took patience, wit and gumption in varying quantities. For those trying to fill your penny loafers, care to share, in a few lines, what you had to put up with to get to where you are?

Pat: Aside from the constant rejection that goes with trying to be a writer, let me break down what the past few years have looked like for me. I got held up at knifepoint, I had all of my belongings stolen from my apartment, I bought a '97 Saturn that exploded in a month, I lived at the corner of Meth Street and Stabbington Road in Hollywood, I strongly considered semen donation…I could go on. From the day I left college, I have been broke broke broke. This time last year I was temping at State Farm Insurance! But those miserable, lonely, pathetic times gave me stuff to write about. You know who's not funny? Rich people. That's why television sucks, because they'll only give shows to people with proven success. People with proven success are likely rich. And those people can't write shows anyone can relate to, because most of the country is poor. You know what is one of the best shows ever made? Roseanne. They were poor as shit, it was a huge hit, and yet you don't see people like that on TV anymore for some reason. (Also, there was a constant threat of spousal abuse on that show that I found fascinating.) What I’m getting at is that you need to be prepared for a real suicidey couple years if you want to do this professionally.

J: What advice do you have on getting an agent?

P-Money: They all love cocaine, so keep some on your person at all times. Honestly, here's the secret trick on getting an agent -- be a good writer. Connections can help you to some degree, but nobody's going to sign a crappy writer. Unless that crappy writer has cocaine, as we discussed.

J: What was it like coming in on the 4th season of a successful show, where a group of writers have already found their groove? Any hazing?

P: No one made us run through the quad naked or anything, but there's always some hazing in a writers' room. Writers tend to be pretty sarcastic people, and everyone gives everyone else a fair amount of shit. If you wear a pink shirt to work, it’s not going to be an easy day for you. You've got to have thick skin, and you’ve got to be ready to shoot back at all times. That said, you’ll never laugh more than you do in a writers’ room. I’ve been so spoiled on this show. Rob, Charlie, and Glenn are exceptional people, and they are super open to our ideas. That is great because a first year writer on a show is lucky to be listened to, let alone be allowed to write an episode, as Sonny and I did.

J: I was once at an event where Tina Fey's advice to potential writers was to keep on keeping on, no matter what. Seconds later, Lorne Michaels said that at some point if you're not having any success, you should take the hint. If Tina is a 1 and Lorne is a 10, where do you stand? Explain.

P: They're both right, but I'm closer to Lorney. (I call him Lorney.) You have to be persistent and believe in yourself, because no one else will -- absolutely. But to a point. Writing is a very, very difficult business to break into and 99.9% of aspiring writers won't make it. Just because you make your friends laugh doesn’t mean you’re Chris Rock. When I moved to Los Angeles, people told me it's a 7-year town. "Stick with it for seven years, and if you don't make it, try something else." I find that completely ridiculous. If you've been actively trying to be a comedy writer for two years, and you're nowhere closer to your goal, it might be time to rock that GMAT, Chuckles.

J: Sunny aside, what do you think we should be watching this season?

P: Oh man, have you seen the ads for Hole in the Wall? Fat people trying to fit through a hole, so as to avoid getting knocked into a pool. On television! Is that the four horsemen I see on the horizon? Fox owns FX, so I should probably stop knocking their programming. Do any new shows look good? That True Blood is interesting so far, and I certainly appreciate all the nudity. My faves are all returning shows: 30 Rock, The Office, The Shield, Mad Men, and Lost. I pray for another season of Curb Your Enthusiasm, that’s top of the pops. Oh, and I love Tim and Eric Awesome Show on Adult Swim. Those guys have caused me to hyperventilate on more than one occasion, and I'm not a big LOLer.

J: Because your writing partner's name is Sonny and Paddy's Pub is named for you, you Irish brute, true or false, you guys feel you are only claiming what is rightfully yours by writing for this show?

P: True, and it doesn't stop there, Sonny went to college in Philadelphia! And my middle name is Always.

For the Sunny fans:

J: On a show like Sunny, where comedic boundaries are always being pushed, is there any writer's room discussion about how much is too much? Any juicy examples for us? Feel free to make something up.

P: The discussion is never "is this too much?" but "can it be made funny?" A great example for you is that this year we toyed with putting the gang back in high school for an episode (I'll leave details vague incase we use it for a future season). One of the storylines we worked on had the guys trying to stop school shootings. We had a take on it that was really funny, but it just felt…icky. There’s good icky and bad icky, and we always try to land on the good side.

J: This one has two parts. Stay with me. You and Sonny have been doing a crackerjack job running the Paddy's Pub blog. Does this qualify as the kind of new media that had Peter Chernin fearing that he would loser pennies to the dollar to the people that were creating it? It reads as if Peter Chernin's fellow suits have been nowhere near this blog, in that it just reeks of you and Sonny. Do you guys get absolute freedom with what to publish here?

P: Thank you, and we've had so much fun running the Sunny blog (ahem – paddyspub.blogs.fxnetworks.com). The writing/producing/editing we're doing does qualify as "New Media," and we are getting paid to do it. I thank the WGA, even though I have to pay them a shocking amount of dues and they still have not provided me with health insurance. I guess it's one battle at a time over there. Second, we pretty much have absolute freedom on the site, yes. We were told there could be no "fucks," but I'm used to hearing that in my personal life anyway. We get crude, especially with Frank's advice column and Dennis' erotic memoirs, but they encourage that at FX. This is a network that showed a major character forced to blow a dude at gunpoint on The Shield. I will say it is massively awkward that our point person for all this content is a very sweet and innocent woman named Colette, and we have to have conversations that start with her asking "is there a funnier word for cock?"

J: Which character is the most fun to write for? And don't say Sweet Dee so Kaitlin Olson will sleep with you.

P: Oh geez, you're asking me to choose between my bosses! I talk a lot like Mac, Dennis, Dee, and Charlie in my personal life, so Frank might be the most fun because it's more of a challenge to write for a 60 year old pervert. Plus, DeVito's voice makes everything you write gold. I think back to season two -- the way he said "your whore mother" had me in stitches every time. The great thing about this show is that you know whatever line you write will be delivered in the most hilarious manner imaginable. This is the funniest cast on television, right down to the ringers they bring for an episode or two each year -- David Hornsby, Artemis Pebdani, Mary Elizabeth Ellis...I could go on. Come on Emmy voters, you're telling me Adrian Grenier is funnier than Charlie Day? You show me a man who has laughed at anything Adrian Grenier has said and I'll drag him into the street and beat him.

J: Give us at least one spoiler for this season. Go.

P: It's the most ambitious season yet, I can tell you that much. The episode I co-wrote – “The Gang Solves the Gas Crisis” – deals with post 9/11 paranoia and proposes a solution to the frightening situation with gasoline in this country. Other episodes...the gang will consider cannibalism. There will be episodes poking fun at Bachelor-type shows and Extreme Home Makeover. We’ll see what Paddy’s Pub was like back in 1776. And watch out for the episode with the musical -- we were on set for their rehearsals and I think that’s going to blow people away. These guys can really sing!

And finally, Pat Walsh, in the words of Bernard Pivot:

J: What is your favorite word?

P: Delicious.

J: What is your least favorite word?

P: Crotch.

J: What turns you on creatively, spiritually or emotionally?

P: Porno

(Editor's note: He's not kidding.)

J: What turns you off?

P: Boring people. And they are everywhere in Los Angeles. I feel like I'm in a zombie movie sometimes. "Oh, you want to be an actress, do you? Color me impressed!"

J: What is your favorite curse word?

P: Basically any profanity combo from the movie Tremors. That picture has some of the most glorious swearing the PG-13 rating has ever seen. A few choice examples: "Son of a goddamn bitch!" "What the shit?" and "There are two more, I repeat, two more motherhumpers."

J: If Heaven exists, what would you like to hear God say when you arrive at the Pearly Gates?

P: "The sundae bar is right over there."

House, Season Five Premiere 9/16/08: Please Enjoy Our Rendition of the Theme Song

2008-09-16T22:09:00.004-04:00

Back when Alanna and I became House-ites during season two, a magical thing happened. While watching the opening credits, we were moved by the spirit to come up with words to the otherwise instrumental Teardrop by Massive Attack, which serves as the show's theme. Appropriately enough, you will be moved to drop tears when you watch the video below which, for the first time, captures our brilliance. Please enjoy, and feel free to learn and sing along at home.

We'll be back with a more comprehensive recap next week. I don't think you're ready for this jelly--and by jelly I mean a youtube video AND a recap in one post. All you need to know is that emotional dysfunction abounds, per usual.

True Blood: CLUNK!

2008-09-16T16:41:00.002-04:00

That's the sound of Alan Ball attempting to deliver to viewers True Blood's central metaphor.

You'd think the images in the opening credits of white children in Klansmen gear and a church sign reading "God Hates Fangs" would be enough, but no: we also need at least one scene per episode of the spokeswoman for the National Vampire League advocating on television for vampire rights legislation. And we definitely need protagonist Sookie Stackhouse telling her best friend who thinks that vampires can put humans under their thrall, "Yeah right, and black people are lazy, and Jews have horns."

CLUNK! Did someone just drop a boulder on my head, or is Ball once again reminding us that vampires are not just vampires, they're also Jews, blacks, gays, disabled people, Alaskan Natives, Maoris, and [insert oppressed population that has at one time or another fought for their civil rights here]?

This parallel is condescendingly, repeatedly spelled out, and then bafflingly undermined, as in last Sunday's episode when the vampire Bill Compton tells Sookie he can, in fact, charm humans into letting him bite them.

Perhaps True Blood still hasn't quite found its legs. Ball's Six Feet Under, too, is embarrassingly heavy-handed in its earliest episodes.

But I can't help comparing this show to my gold standard for all vampiric programming, Buffy the Vampire Slayer. Buffy, too, relied upon a metaphorical foundation (high school is hell) but made that truth literal through action, rather than awkward dialogue, over the course of multiple seasons. If Buffy was written by Ball, a scene from its first season might go a little something like this:

Buffy: You guys, weird things keep happening here. I found a dead lunch lady in a locker today. She had bite marks on her neck.
Xander: Wow, that's super scary! Like something out of my worst nightmares.
Willow: I would even call it "hellish."
Buffy: Well, high school is hell after all!
(They all laugh wildly. Then they stop abruptly and stare at each other with expressions of dawning horror. Then they embrace. Exeunt.)

True Blood is not without its merits: I like Brit actor Stephen Moyer as the charming/menacing vampire Bill, and the sweaty Louisiana setting is dark and romantic and unusual in disproportionately-urban TV land. I just hope Ball and his writing team stop treating the viewers like dum-dums who need it explained, again and again, what makes the show's subject matter both alluring and relevant.

RIP DFW

2008-09-14T13:46:00.001-04:00

What you are doing this weekend

2008-09-12T16:38:00.005-04:00

You are watching the season premiere of Saturday Night Live on NBC. Michael "Butthisface" Phelps promises to be about as charismatic as any athlete that's ever hosted the show, but it's the season opener in what should be a very exciting few months leading up to the election. Elusive Lorne Michaels won't confirm or deny Tina Fey's return to play Sarah "Bulldog" Palin (Interesting note: Bulldogs are incapable of grooming their own assholes. Frequently, owners find themselves wiping the area on their own. Are we ready ready for a President AND Vice President that can't wipe their own asses? No.). Also stay tuned this season to see if Michaels is successful in his begging of Maya Rudolph to come back and play Michelle Obama.

Newest featured player Bobby Moynihan (pictured left) will also be making his debut. Another writer/performer to come from the Upright Citizen's Brigade theater, complete with an "I don't give a crap" gut and scruffy hair, my pal Kara is most likely correct in her assessment that he will play a role similar to Horatio Sanz. Keep your eyes open for a yet to be named, female featured player to take Amy Poehler's place when she leaves to pop out the world's funniest baby and star on The Office spinoff in November.

You are also routing for my pal Jennifer McNamara Shroff to win the Emmy this weekend for her brilliant job casting 30 Rock. Her nabbing of Dean Winters alone is enough to secure the statue. Check Sunday to see how she did along with everyone else nominated for this years Creative Arts Emmys.

And you are getting shitfaced drunk. No wait, that's me.

Do Not Disturb is Disturbing- HA! See what I did there?

2008-09-10T18:56:00.004-04:00

Even if your alternative is braiding your own arm hair, PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE do not watch Do Not Disturb on Fox tonight. With the exception of How I Met Your Mother, the multi-camera sitcom on network television is DEAD, and Do Not Disturb is just making a sand art of its ashes--and a shitty sand art at that, one that some kid decided to glue feathers and googly eyes all over. I don't know who Jerry O'Connell blew to get Carpoolers off of his resumé, but whoever hired him for Do Not Disturb had obviously never seen that atrocity. And poor Niecy Nash. She finally gets a comedic acting gig that gets her out of her Reno 911 lower-half-of-the-body fat suit and she is forced to resort to ABSURDLY exaggerated, sassy, black lady humor. Watching this show made me feel like I was watching a modern day rendering of Amos 'n' Andy. Am I just being overly sensitive?! Never mind, don't answer that, because answering would require you to watch this show.

And while we're on the Fox berating bandwagon, our pal JJ over at As Little As Possible recently spoke highly of Hole in the Wall the half hour game show in which 2 teams of 3 contestants have to contort their bodies to fit through a hole in the wall or suffer the consequence of being knocked into a shallow pool. Between Brooke Burns shrieking, the way the silver suits awkwardly hug the male genitalia, and the fact that this is not a concept that would keep anything with a vertebrae entertained for half an hour, this is another Fox gem to ignore. JJ, you are intimidatingly intelligent so I can only assume that you have some sort of Post 9/11, existential analysis as to why this show is culturally relevant. But I still think that any and all enjoyment that comes from this concept can be derived from this 4 minute clip of the Japanese original:

Fringe - Pilot, 9/8/08

2008-09-10T10:40:00.003-04:00

Fringe, it turns out, is not about the stuff that used to hang off my mom's clothes back when she was a dirty hippie. Instead, it refers to fringe science, AKA license for J.J. Abrams to do whatever kind of crazy shit he feels like doing on this new hourlong drama.

Fringe begins, like Lost, on a plane. But this isn't Oceanic--this is Face Melt-a-Thon Airlines, and viewers are treated not to a crash but an extremely graphic, Cronenberg-esque tableau of passenger's faces falling off. Yumm-o!

We segue to our heroine post-coital with her boyfriend. I call them, respectively, Poor Man's Cate Blanchett and Bland Blond. Honestly, both of them are so unremarkable that I can't recall their actual names. And, of course, they're both FBI agents, a population that TV wants us to believe is consistently, stunningly attractive. In reality, FBI agents look more like this:

Of course these two are on the Face Melt-a-Thon case, and Bland Blond, in pursuit of a suspect, is exposed to the same chemicals that treated us to the visually scrumptious opening scene. His doctors are stymied--if only they knew to summon Gregory House--and PMCB takes it upon herself to find the one man who just might know how to save BB.

First she needs his son, Pacey. Since leaving the Creek, he seems to have fallen on hard times and gained a lot of IQ points, but I have trouble buying him as a jet-setting bad boy. Probably because he looks exactly like all the smart-douchey boys I went to high school with, who are now waiting for their bar exam scores. (Good luck, guys! Hope living your fathers' lives works out for you!) She and Pacey boost his father, who I will call Frank (for Dr. Frankenstein) from a mental institution, and he does the typical TV crazy guy ramble, interspersed helpfully with clues about how to save BB's life. Then he pees himself. Yumm-o!

They go back to Frank's lab at Harvard, which the university kindly left alone for the past seventeen years, and through the power of a cow, a sensory deprivation tank, special K and acid, and the increasingly-transluscent BB, the team (for they are now a team, you see) finds the man who poisoned him in the first place and saves his life.

But wait! It turns out BB was actually in on the whole thing, and they probably shouldn't have wasted their time experimenting and tripping balls to keep him alive. However, there was one positive result of their efforts: Lance Reddick, who serves as the token black guy and their boss, convinces PMCB to continue to work with Pacey and Frank on other mysterious cases, which apparently there are a lot of. "It's like someone's experimenting, only the world is their lab," Lance says. Whoa! And something tells me the team will get one mysterious case per week, and resolve each one in an hour's time, but probably no sooner than 9:54 p.m.

You might think from my sardonic tone that I didn't like the show, but I did. I am a huge sucker for this brand of nonsense. Check back here weekly for my thoughts on our endearingly ragtag crew, and hope with me for more gratuitous shots of PMCB in her skivvies.

I'll Never Tell...

2008-09-09T13:53:00.008-04:00

Dear Gossip Girl Diary,

Oh boy, what an exciting night! I love the feeling I get in the pit of my stomach as I leave my Hamptons manse for a new year of private school shenanigans, so last night's episode was TOTALLY RELEVANT TO MY LIFE! Here are some of my innermost thoughts on the show. Don't tell anyone, Gossip Girl Diary!

-Really, Nate's mom? You just lived your life in absurd, Hamptons extravagance like nothing was happening, and then mentioned in passing to your son that the federal government is doing an inventory on all your earthly possessions, while you cut lilies that your underpaid gardener put blood, sweat and tears into making look so lovely? Really? Jeez, sometimes I think there are no writers and they just make the stuff up as they go along.

-Oh wait, why don't you just sell those two living mastodons you have following you around as pets to some eccentric millionaire, Nate's mom. That should bring in the big bucks.

-Hmm. I am about to get on a coach bus for a 2 hour ride, but need a little snack. Let me weigh my options...a nutri grain bar? Nah, too convenient. Maybe a handful of delicious and nutritious organic trail mix. Nah, still way too practical. OH I know. How about a tray of gourmet, over sized chocolate covered strawberries. Nice. I definitely made the right choice.

-I really felt Nate's pain in his Ikiru inspired scenes. He just wanted someone to talk to...

-Vivian: What's squash?

Jeanette: It's like tennis, but both players are on the same side of the net, and instead of a net there is a wall.

Vivian: Oh, so it's stupid tennis.

Jeanette: Yes, they should definitely re-market it as such.

On a less disjointed note, Gossip Girl Diary, I am really enjoying the more aggressive Beatrice and Benedict sparring going on with Blair and Chuck. What I once deemed as over-the-top, shoddy acting is now coming across as campy brilliance. Keep it up, Leighton and Ed!

XOXO,

Jeanette

Fringe, Watch It

2008-09-08T14:19:00.008-04:00

This upcoming fall season was slowly pushing me towards the realization that when it comes to case-of-the-week, procedural television, we had seen it all. If it weren't for the awe inspiring final two episodes of House last season, I would have been close to being lumbar punctured out. Law and Order (mostly original recipe, but sometimes SVU) has become incredibly dependent on ripping from the headlines instead of crafting crackerjack cases in the writers' room. Even new offerings are falling short. The Mentalist and Eleventh Hour, premiering on CBS on September 23rd and October 9th respectively, both boast well developed and acted, quirky male leads, but the cases presented in the pilot episode are not the awe inspiring webs of intrigue they should be in order to hook a repeat audience (more on these shows later).

In steps Fox's Fringe. Try to set aside enough time to watch the 2 hour premiere tomorrow night, Tubers. You will not be disappointed. Fringe is the next, sure to be successful, notch in J.J. Abrams' belt. Unlike its older brother, Lost, Fringe won't leave you with a case of the WTFs. Yes, J.J.'s fancy for the other worldly is more than present, but putting his voice in a case-of-the-week format was a brilliant idea in order capture a new fan base who don't like to be kept wondering for half of a year why it is the island just disappeared!#7$%9#!@.

Australian actor John Noble (pictured right) STEALS THE SHOW with an incredibly sympathetic portrayal of Walter Bishop, a real, live mad scientist. I know it is always a struggle for overseas actors to take commercial, American gigs without feeling as if they have compromised their legitimacy, but this role could do for Noble what House did for Hugh Laurie.* Noble's chemistry with Joshua Jackson, who plays his son Peter, is delightful! Yes, delightful.

*Every time you say or write Hugh Laurie, an angel gets its wings. Fact.

Sad Alec

2008-09-05T12:42:00.002-04:00

Has anyone read the profile of Alec Baldwin in the New Yorker? I know, I know, this is my second blog in a row in which I mention the New Yorker. That is because I am trying to be an intellectual (albeit one who loves television). I also recently ordered Civilization and its Discontents from Amazon. The goal is to make low-brow people feel insipid, and high-brow people feel pretentious. I'll let you know how it goes.

Anyway, the profile is 8,000 words of Alec Baldwin hating his life. One usually expects that lengthy a piece to deal with the history of Russian-Georgian relations or be an excerpt from the latest Junot Diaz overrated piece of crap, but no: it's the guy who starred in The Shadow.

It would be easy to dismiss the piece as a spoiled rich out-of-touch actor bitching about what most people would dream of having, but I don't see it that way. I'm one of the people who really believed Puffy when he sang about mo' money mo' problems. And besides, this man wanted to be President of the United States:

Alec Baldwin began at George Washington University in 1976, with the idea of going into law and becoming President of the United States. At the end of his junior year, he split up with a girlfriend and lost a student-body election. Feeling underappreciated, he transferred to N.Y.U. and began studying at the Lee Strasberg Theatre Institute.

And people expect him to just shut up and enjoy being billed second on an NBC sitcom. This is a man with a level of ambition and audacity that most of us can't imagine. He clearly feels he settled, and worse, only sort of settled: elsewhere in the piece Baldwin says he pursued both fatherhood and his acting career only halfway, hoping to create a healthy balance. Instead he has a half-assed family life and a half-assed IMDB page:

"My life, in some ways, has been a half-measure. I didn’t commit myself all the way to my marriage and family, because I would have given up more. And I didn’t go all the way with just being completely selfish. I always wonder where my career would be if I was more selfish..."

Baldwin goes on to fantasize about being a classical radio host and a retired dude bumming around the Long Island Sound in a motorboat. The truth is--and I suspect he knows this--that he will never be satisfied, and wouldn't be had he been more "selfish" with his career either.

He's basically an insatiable person--so too, I suspect, is everyone. You think you've reached the peak you always dreamed of reaching, only to find another looming overhead. So just remember that when you are laughing at yet another Jack Donaghy non-sequitir, you're laughing at a tormented soul whose desires will only be consummated upon his death.

Have a nice weekend!

HBO-a-go-go

2008-09-05T09:29:00.008-04:00

I have a very strong like-hate relationship with Entourage, premiering its 5th season this Sunday night at 10 PM. Despite the fact that it is one of the most flawed pieces of television out there, I watch it religiously. Whenever I find myself reaching new levels of disgust at the flagrant displays of sexism, I remember how hot Adrian Grenier is. Whenever I find myself clutching my stomach at the horrendous acting skills of Jerry Ferrara and Kevin Connolly, I again remember how hot Adrian Grenier is. Jerry in particular is so bad, back when The Sopranos was still on as a showcase for Jamie-Lynn Sigler's comparably vomitrotious acting, you may recall that I toyed with pitching HBO a reality spin off called Acting School, in which the pair would learn not to suck quite so much. But it's all good, because, and argue me on this if you must, Adrian Grenier is the most perfect male, human specimen, even when he spent an entire half of last season dressed up as Pablo Escobar/Tony Clifton.

But last week, it was hard to quell the feeling of full on rage that thinking about Entourage usually instills in me. Getting of the elevated subway just blocks from Alanna's home, I was faced with the commotion of a location set. I looked yonder to see a local bar with a fake sing hung above that read Johnny Drama's. With no Adrian in sight and only the slightly off-kilter mug of Kevin Dillon to look at, it was attitude city when a full of himself PA directed me to a different set of stairs FOR NO REASON. I mean seriously, nothing was happening in the area he was keeping clear; I at least expected to see Jeremy Piven taking a shit there or something. As Alanna and I walked by and filming wrapped, Kevin Dillion yelled out, "Thank you, Queens!," and under my breath, I muttered, "For what..."

If you're looking for something to pregame with before Entourage, you might as well keep your dial on HBO all night and catch Alan Ball's newest creation True Blood, premiering at 9 PM. My love for Ball coupled with my mild vampire-on-TV fetish made me salivate with anticipation after reading this script, but when I watched the first episode, it did not translate so well to the small screen. A clever ad campaign pushing True Blood, a delicious and nutritious blood subsitute meant to prevent vampires from killing people, has created buzz, though. And because this is HBO (pay television) and nothing ever gets canceled, you can at least get invested without worrying about cancellation blue balls. Plus, there is always the intense portrayal of vampire on human sex about halfway through the episode to look forward to--if you're into that sort of thing.

Wedneseality

2008-09-04T10:02:00.013-04:00

That's what happens when you combine Wednesday and reality. Let's recap.

On Project Runway, guest judge Diane von Furstenberg challenged the contestants to make a look for her fall line, inspired by the film An Affair to Remember. So I know that I have the fashion sense of a blind woman who lets her guide dog pick out her outfits, but to me Diane is not a fashion legend. She introduced the world to the wrap dress and other assorted floral looks that now litter the racks of your local Dress Barn, or better yet Chicos, the store that gave Michael Phelps' mom an endorsement deal inspired by her matronly olympic look. But whatever, I guess I don't know anything because Kenley wouldn't stop crying with joy the whole episode. Anyway, it was Leanne for the win, two weeks running, and Stella got the [leather] boot. Leanne's winning design is pictured left. I really like it. I hope that my guide dog sniffs it out of the closet for me to wear one day.

File this next one under ABSURDLY EXCITING television news. Grant, Jason and the TAPS team were back on SciFi last night with all new episodes in the second half of the fourth season of Ghost Hunters. I love these guys. They're like America's blue collar heroes. I wonder if Bruce Springsteen will ever write a song about them. I'll start thinking of words that rhyme with Grant and Jason.

And in picking up Alanna's slack news, America's Next Top Model's 11th cycle premiered last night featuring the first ever actual transexual contestant--not just some bitchy chick with high cheekbones that gets a bad wrap from Miss Jay. Isis was featured in a photo shoot last cycle. You remember, the one where Tyra had the girls pretend to be homeless in front of actual homeless girls. NICE! Tyra decided to bring Isis back to try her hand at actual modeling, not just homeless modeling. Huh. Tyra has been accused of "tampering with the evidence" before; remember how Saleisha won cycle nine after attending Tyra Banks' Modeling Summer Camp for Really Hot Crazy Girls, or whatever its called? Now she is dragging an individual who has obviously led a somewhat troubled life into her Hot Mess Circus, just for the shock value of having a transexual. Is this morally responsible? How much of an actual career in HIGH FASHION modeling can a transexual hope for? And how long until the townspeople finally take their torches up the mountain, cross the moat, push down the barricades and kill Tyra?

For a more thorough look at ANTM, check out the illustrious Carolyn and Pat at A Blog About Things.

ANTM Apologies

2008-09-04T09:33:00.002-04:00

I was supposed to blog today about the premiere of menstrual cycle 86 of America's Next Top Model but I missed the show because I was out with Jeanette at a play about a drag queen who was abducted by aliens, probed, and dropped into a mystical forest, where she ate a magic mushroom. Everything that happened after that was, I think, part of her trip. So it was a lot like watching America's Next Top Model, actually.

For those of you craving excellent TV writing (and aren't yet Beijing'ed out), I recommend you read Anthony Lane's dispatches from the Olympics in lieu of my ANTM scribblings (which will appear here next week.)

Here's Part One and Part Two. He comes across sort of as a higher brow Bill Bryson here, no offense to Bill Bryson, whose patronage I would sure appreciate.

9021...Oh

2008-09-03T09:27:00.011-04:00

The much anticipated (yet not anticipated enough to release to critics) premiere of the new 90210 happened last night. I learned the important lesson that if I am going to watch 16 year olds on TV, I prefer them to be having sex. Or doing drugs. Or both. Simultaneously, if possible. While the kids of the hills may boast better acting skills--yay for Degrassi alum Shenae Grimes, who was only nauseating because of her dramatic weight loss--the 10021 and the Gossip Girl gang beats 90210 when it comes to overall entertainment (those Chuck Bass-tards!).

And now some excerpts from my 90210 journal:

-Really? The only organic way to introduce a black character to Beverly Hills is to have him be adopted by a white family? Really? And if there is any sort of implication of sexual chemistry between Annie and Dixon, I quit television. (Just kidding, TV. I could never quit you.)

-Why do the opening credits feel like Darren Aronofsky directed them? I think I just had a seizure.

-Okay my favorite part so far, and it's not even part of the show: watching Jessica Walter/Lucille Bluth do one of those awkward, at the premiere party interludes. She must be fun at parties. The crazy alchoholic type casting has to come from somewhere.

-Here's my ULTIMATE pet peeve of portrayals of classrooms on television, and let me know if you agree. Teacher says, "Let's start with last night's reading..." Thirty seconds later, bell rings signifying the end of class. IF ONLY, TV world, IF ONLY.

They're back!

2008-09-02T15:38:00.002-04:00

Testimonials

2008-09-02T14:33:00.003-04:00

Here's what some of TV's biggest stars / the unwashed masses had to say about the Boob Tubers' return...

"update this blog. baby jesus would want you to." --Anonymous

"I'm Chuck Bass. And I approve this re-launch." --Chuck Bass

"Even more than the close quarters of my teenage mother's womb, this blog makes me feel safe and warm." --Bristol Palin's fetus

"what the fuck jeanette, did you go on a writers strike too?" --Arthur

"I lied. I was actually admitted to rehab for being addicted to The Boob Tubers, not sex. Can you blame me?" --David Duchovny

"There are only two things that get me churning with excitement: warm ocean waters and the Boob Tubers." --Hurricane Gustav

"OK, OK, I am gay... FOR THIS BLOG!" --Kevin Spacey

"remember when you guys would watch tv?" --Anonymous

Yes, Anonymous, we remember. And we're going to watch TV better than ever before! Check back soon for uh, actual content.

It's happening...

2008-09-02T14:28:00.000-04:00

Have you felt a weird tingling in your stomach these past few days akin to Christmas morning? It's because the BOOB TUBERS ARE BACK starting tomorrow.

How much you earnin', Peter Chernin?

2007-11-08T15:45:00.001-05:00

Only two more months!

2007-10-22T17:13:00.001-04:00

Fee-yarce

2007-10-10T13:19:00.000-04:00

My boyfriend told me yesterday that at times, I can be quite "fierce." (Yes, I have a boyfriend now, which may explain my long hiatus from this blog. That's right. I've been having sex non-stop for the past THREE MONTHS. Boy, am I tired.) What he said made me think of how often that word is thrown around on America's Next Top Model, (pronounced "fee-yarce") and how it doesn't seem to mean anything, really.

It's no surprise that Tyra Banks doesn't understand English, considering that she recently pronounced Asperger's Ahs-pur-jers and that when she had the opportunity to interview Barack Obama, she asked him if she and her mother could have a sleepover party in the Lincoln bedroom. I don't know why this woman is allowed to have multiple TV shows. The only useful thing she has ever done for my life was to give me a shade upon which to base my ultimate cup of coffee. ("Milk and sugar?" "Yeah, make it about Tyra color.")

The model wannabes are increasingly despicable as well, now mocking the disabled and each other's thigh fat (which: what fat??). The only two likeable girls are Heather, who has Asperger's (which: if that means not being able to relate to the other contestants, then I also have Asperger's) and Victoria, the awkward nerdy Yale student. I will watch tonight's episode because it's the makeover one, which is always my favorite, because it leaves me feeling immensely self-satisfied after I correctly predict who will cry at their new haircut.

House, meanwhile, was EXCELLENT last night, inducing Jeanette and I to cry over the clearly manipulative final dog scene. This season's format of auditioning new fellows, Survivor-style, is doing it for me, despite the fact that there's no suspense that Kal Penn's character will be hired. It's also looking like Foreman will return. He has never helped me with my coffee, but he is my favorite second banana character and there's a definite gap in the show without him.

Spoilery nitpick: no way would that dog have eaten the pills off the floor. Having cared for that man for so long, it certainly would have been trained to avoid spilled medication.

Also, as much as I love my cat, dogs > cats.

Watching TV with Peepaw: Extreme Makeover: Home Edition, Law and Order: Criminal Intent

2007-10-08T14:16:00.000-04:00

No, this is not my grandfather, but I will bet he is somebody's grandpa, and I don't want Chuck (my grandpa) to have to deal with a sudden swell of internet fame, so this guy will do.

My grandpa and I watched quite a bit of television together while spending the weekend in the house in the Catskill region of NY that he built with his own two hands (I decided to give him credit for something since I am about to make him an honorary boobtuber without consent).

On this week's EXTREME MAKEOVER: HOME EDITION, Ty and the gang were helping out a family of five whose eight year old daughter was facing cancer for the second time. Their house was full of mold, fault wires, cracks etc.

Grandpa: What?! Why do these people need help?
Me: I think because of all the medical bills, they don't have the money to fix their house up.
Grandpa: Yeah, but she got sick two years ago? What about before then? This is bull shit. Isn't there anything else to watch?!

Thankfully, Bravo was airing a mini marathon of Law and Order: Criminal Intent, and we caught an episode with the illustrious Vincent D'Onofrio.

Grandpa: What's this guy's name?
Me: Vincent D'Onofrio or Detective Robert Goren
Grandpa: Huh, I thought it was Jesus Christ or something. Who knows this stuff? Who could figure this stuff out!?

Stick to NASCAR, gramps.

Check Please- TOP CHEF Finally Ends

2007-10-04T14:06:00.000-04:00

There was no HUNG jury at judge's table last night! No need for Hung's head to be HUNG in shame! Hung won.

Aside from ending the longest reality show run in history, last night's TOP CHEF was very educational.

I learned that while Padma Lackshmi remains the hottest female specimen ever, she should stay away from live television. Bravo's got a dramatic eye in the editing room, and on the pre-recorded shows, Padma has always come off as suave and just an appropriate few notches below bitchy (they left the bitchy edits for Gail Simmons. Whew, someone has a horned cucumber up her butt). Last night, though, when Padma wasn't tripping over words, she spoke to the camera with the same juvenile inflections as Captain Kangaroo or something. I thought she was going to pull out a fake mirror and say she saw me, and Jimmy and Nancy or some shit...

I learned that women really can't be chefs! After giving little girls everywhere glimmers of hope, Casey really effed up in the final elimination challenge. Come on girl! You should have shown those dudes what you were made of! Displayed your womanly talents! Diced some garlic using kegal stretches or something. Man...

And finally, I learned that Marcel from season 2 and Hung must have met in Top Chef Assholes Anonymous and fallen deeply in love. All night, when the camera cut to Marcel, you saw this deep look in his eyes...like if things didn't go his way, he was going to press the button in his shoe causing this homemade explosive of baking soda and salmon flavored foam to go off. Then when Hung was announced as Top Chef, no joke, Marcel ran up to him SO FAST and was the FIRST ONE to embrace him. There were even points where Hung's mother was standing behind him like chopped lychee while Hung and Marcel embraced. Wasn't Hung allegedly doing all this for his mom? Maybe not because last week he said something about sleeping in the kitchen while he grew up...mom must be a hardass.

-----

ANNNND my love affair with Kid Nation continues. As the show goes on, more kids are getting more face time, allowing me to find the town Jew. I KNEW there had to be one somewhere. His name is Eric, and I am sure he will be a usurer or something in no time.

Oh Dad! The Rogue!: Heroes, House and Kid Nation

2007-09-27T14:17:00.000-04:00

We're not even fully into network television's premiere week yet, but here are some random thoughts...

Creative product placement is all the rage in the TV biz these days, what with the Internets taking over buyers' attention spans (way to generalize, Jeanette). Here are some gross offenders I have noticed over the past week...

Claire was SO THRILLED when Horn Rimmed Glasses gave her a car on the season preem of HEROES this past Monday. "Oh, Dad! The Rogue," she exclaimed, standing next to the black Nissan (R). Yes, every teenager's dream...a Nissan Rogue. I can't wait til these start appearing during the grand finales of MY SUPER SWEET SIXTEEN, right after Kanye West pops out of a cake and some marching band geeks are kicked out of the party. Catch this oh so genuine moment when the show is encored this Saturday, and catch the flack NBC is getting for combining the Nielsen ratings of both airings to inflate their success...

Dr. Gregory House munched on some CheezIts (R) during his latest illegal patient break in. Damn, that's it? CheezIts? If I knew Hugh Laurie was going to break into my house, I would have a platter of ME waiting, with a side of ME. And for dessert...ME. And then I would ask how he likes his eggs in the morning, and then make him a ME omlette.

-------

In guilty pleasure news, I do believe I will remain a steady viewer of CBS' controversial KID NATION. This has a lot to do with Jared, a precocious 11 year old from Georgia. Kid is like a walking Bartlett’s! He has been known to spew such gems as, "I'm hungry, and as Martin Luther King Jr. said, I have a dream!" When debating whether or not to sacrifice chickens for the sake of protein, Jared had this to offer: "As William Shakespeare said, To kill or not to kill, that is the question."

When not hoping for Jared to enlighten me, I watch KID NATION to hear Laurel's accent. She must be the baby that Matt Damon's girlfriend was pregnant with in THE DEPARTED, because every time she speaks, it sounds like Boston is throwing up!

If you aren't in love with Jared and Laurel already, be sure to click the links to check out their profiles on CBS' website. Their most admired world leaders are George W. Bush and Jesus Christ respectively. THAT SHOULD SEAL THE DEAL FOR YOU!

------

What are your thoughts on the season so far, and more importantly, will Alanna ever post again?

Oprah is a simpleton

2007-09-21T16:45:00.001-04:00

Girl's got to have some smarts. I mean, she heads a multi billion dollar empire, has Emmys and an Oscar, and apparently makes the curriculum for all of South Africa.

But...today's Oprah is currently airing in the tri state area. For the first half of the show, Oprah interviewed intersex (aka the artists formerly known as hermaphrodites) people. Let's discuss her faux pas.

One, she high fived one of the first guests because it turned out she had a functioning and recognizable va-jayjay. And that is the word she used. Va-jayjay. I'll see you on the soup, insensitive Oprah clip mentioning va-jayjay.

Two, she goes to one of the other guests, "Are you gay?" Nice lead in, Oprah. You have the journalistic integrity and skill of a questioner during the Spanish Inquisition.

And then, after all that, Oprah had the energy to get on her high horse and ask a "question" to her medical expert that was something along the lines of, isn't it better to just accept people as they are instead of insisting they change? Of course, she got enthusiastic applause. But what was the medical expert going to say to that? No? Only if it turns out that the medical expert was Dr. Mengle in disguise.

Rosie, homegirl, thank goodness you didn't go anywhere near that show.

Stay tuned for riveting thoughts on the new television season, including the female reincarnation of JFK running the show on CBS' KID NATION!

UNCLE BOYFRIEND!

2007-08-30T18:17:00.001-04:00

Miss Teen Schadenfreude 2007

2007-08-27T15:25:00.000-04:00

My father has a TV in virtually every room of his tiny, formerly a beach bungalow of a house (which perhaps may mean that the making of a boob tuber truly is genetic). Because of this, as I cooked dinner for Langlieb and Erin on Friday night, we had the TV on...simply because we could, and were therefore not picky with what was on. I give this background only to defend myself from the criticism I will inevitably receive for having tuned into Miss Teen USA 2007, hosted by America's darling, Mario Lopez.

However, had I not watched the pageant, I would not be able to share with you this fantastic clip. Feeling sluggish this Monday? Feel better in knowing that you will NEVER be more stupid than Miss South Carolina.

Viva Viagra

2007-08-17T11:35:00.001-04:00

Sorry it's been so long, folks.* Alanna and I have been consumed living the lives of transient drifters, without a home of our own. That will change just in time for the new fall television season. More Americans get their television related opinions from the Boob Tubers than any other source.

Becuase it's Friday and this head cold of mine is causing more tension than at a co-ed mixer between Camp Sunni and Camp Shiite, here's a mindless entry for you. Please enjoy this national commercial for viagra while asking yourself what. the. fuck.

*I understand no one cares, but don't I look important starting entries like we actually have an audience?

SPOILER ALERT

2007-07-23T17:13:00.000-04:00

Dr. Gregory House's flaming cane is a horcrux!

Plumber, ma'am...Candygram....Flowers...

2007-07-20T16:37:00.001-04:00

Can you belive that Shark Week is an annual event for the Discovery Channel? I mean, come on, is there really enough original programming on sharks to fill a week of primetime every year? The absurd, cardboard popup add in the middle of Entertainment Weekly this week must have cost a small fortune.

I guess there is at least one new idiot every year that gets his hand bitten off by a shark because he couldn't pass on a gnarly wave or something, so they can always count on some exciting piece where viewers can watch his hand being sewn back on. But really...that's about it. Call me when you do a profile of the Land Shark, Discovery Channel.

Best bloopers ever

2007-07-13T16:08:00.001-04:00

Just goes to show that David Boreanaz is a master fucking thespian considering what a nutcase he is in real life... still looks Cro-Mag though.

(I'm unemployed, hence my trolling YouTube for blooper reels from canceled TV shows. Hopefully soon I will be employed AND have something worthwhile to post about.)

When you're lost out there and you're all alone...

2007-06-28T12:26:00.000-04:00

Can you believe that Mary Kate Olsen is actually dating this guy?

Their sex life must be something out of a Bog Saget standup routine!

Wheel of (Mis)Fortune: Pat Sajak Suicide Watch

2007-06-26T13:58:00.000-04:00

For as long as I have been conscious, Pat Sajak has been the host of Wheel of Fortune. To me, a lifetime fan of syndicated game shows, he has served as a vanguard of comfort, a permanent, smiling fixture in the revolving door of TV personalities. He has stuck with The Wheel through its tough times. Remember in the early 80s when you did not win actual cash, but had to spend all accumlated cash in a gallery of crap-tastic prizes, including but not limited to ceramic statues of dalmatians? I do! He has stuck with The Wheel through the good times. Pat's got three Emmys for hosting and a star on the Hollywood walk of fame.

But Pat is so much more than hugs from overweight, midwestern contestants and all-inclusive trips to the Bahamas. As I recall, he has SHINED whenever filling in on Live with Regis and Kathie Lee/Kelly. He even had a taste of freedom when he hosted the short lived Pat Sajak Show for CBS, and again managed to pick through the cement wall with Pat Sajak Weekend for the Fox "News" Channel (see what I did there?!). However, the retractable umbilicle chord attaching him to The Wheel always manages to pull him back and away from the light.

Which brings me to last night's Wheel, a repeat of the first episode from its 24th season. There were not one, but two times where Pat let his guard down at looked at us, the viewers, with UTTER CONTEMPT. I can only assume Pat Sajak is not long for this world. That is why here at BoobTubers, I am starting the...

Pat Sajak Suicide Watch/Pool

Comment back with the exact date and year you think Pat will end it all, and if correct, you will, most definitely win a glorious prize.

In conclusion, here is a scene I wrote for mine and Alanna's opus, THIS SHOW BITES, a play documenting James Marsters' days at Juliard, featuring this relevant play within a play.

This Show Bites
Act I, Scene 6

The lights go up dimly to reveal a completely black environment, which is actually a stage. James sits on a stool centerstage, also dressed in black. As the lights go up, James looks up at theaudience.

Audience: A play within a play! MAAARVELOUS!

James: (dramatically) Intrigue...

A bongo drum is heard in the background.

James: Passion... Bravery... Justice... Brilliance... Charisma... Animal Attraction... I (pause)am Pat Sajak, and this (gestures to figures dressed completely in black modern dancing their way onto the stage) is my life and times.

The drums continue to play and James participates in a modern dance with the black figures during which they strike a different, limber pose for each drumbeat.

Black Figure 1: This is the second grade, Pat. What is a vowel? WHAT IS A VOWEL?

James: I don't know. I DON'T KNOW.

Figure 1: MY CURSE TO YOU IS THAT YOU WILL NEVER BE ABLE TO ESCAPE VOWELS.

Black Figure 2 I am your illegitimate father, Pat. I am a carnie. Get on the ferris wheel. STAY ON THE FERRIS WHEEL!

James: WHY, GOD, WHY?!?!

Figure 2: MY CURSE TO YOU IS THAT THE WHEEL WILL EARN YOU YOUR BREAD!

Black Figure 3: I am your hairdresser, Pat. I will tease your hair. I WILL TEASE YOUR HAIR!

James: SWEET GOD, I HAVE A COIF!

Figure 3: MY CURSE IS THAT NO WIND, NO RAIN, NO LOVER'S GRASP WILL RELEASE YOUR HAIR FROM ITS POSE!

James: The vowels...the wheel... the HAIR. I can't do it, but I must. I embrace my calling...I am the host of a syndicated game show...

All black figures: (starting softly and increasing in volume until they are shouting) Free spin, bankrupt, LOSE A TURN. Free spin, bankrupt, LOSE A TURN. Free spin, bankrupt, LOSE A TURN!

All fall flat on the stage. The drums stop and the lights go out.

Why the 70s Were Better

2007-06-20T15:06:00.001-04:00

Because in that drug-fueled decade, muppets could push literacy like it was Bolivian Marching Powder.