TV Week in Review Oct. 25 - 29

Some thoughts on this week's addictions -

Project Runway: Everyone's already ranted and complained about the finale outcome on the interwebs, so the less said from me the better. I'll only add another WTF?! to the thousands exclaimed last night. Mondo was robbed.

Sound of Music cast on Oprah: The entire cast was reunited for the first time in 45 years. It was an amazing episode despite the fact that I wanted to jump through the screen and back in time to throttle Oprah Winfrey. Seriously, why is she so damn annoying?! Also, Christopher Plummer is the hottest 80 year-old ever and I would still run away with him to be his sex slave in a minute.

RW/RR The Challenge: Cutthroat - All you really need to know is that this week's Gulag challenge involved slapping the shit out of your opponent with a fly swatter while holding up a 20lb bucket. And that before the nature of the challenge was revealed, all of the cast were wildly speculating about what it would involve. Some of the best ideas about what the challenge would be about? Brandon's suggestion that the guys would have a dualing "boners" contest and see who would kiss each other first, Brad's overly serious (duh!)insistence that it would involve FIRE, and Danimal's idea that the contestants might get water-boarded. If only. The red team won again so Brandon was safe another week. My Johnny Bananas hair hatred continues unabated. And I still want to find that Czech bar patron who punched Johnny and buy him a beer. And maybe pay him to kick Bananas in the nuts. God, I can't wait for CT to get to Prague and maybe kick some of these people's asses.

Glee - This Rocky Horror episode could've been so much worse. I think that's why, once again, I'm in the minority of those who enjoyed it. I had really low expectations that were succeeded. And hello, I got my wish to see my boyfriend John Stamos sing on the show. And Matthew Morrison and Chord Overstreet were shirtless so there's that.

"Book 'em, Dano!"

Sadly, James MacArthur passed away yesterday. Did you know that he was the adopted son of acting legend Helen Hayes?! I had no idea until last night. He also was an accomplished flamenco guitar player. Who knew? Well Dano, you will be missed. Scott Caan is doing a great job walking in your shoes however.







Also, this gives me an excuse to post my favorite picture of Jack Lord, who passed away over 12(!) years ago -

Now tell me, who else do you know that could ROCK a pink-banded panama hat? Thank you.

Should our nation's leader pander to us little folks?

So, yeah, last night the PRESIDENT OF THE FRIGGIN' UNITED STATES was on The Daily Show. Before I watched, I was really apprehensive about this interview. Generally I feel that once someone becomes the leader of our country they should just do that - lead our country. It makes me somewhat uncomfortable to see our President appear on shows like The View etc. because it kind of belittles his position somewhat in my eyes. Once you're top dog, take care of business and don't try to sell us on stuff that we've already bought.
Well, all that said, last night's full episode interview with Jon Stewart was kind of amazing. I thought President Obama was insightful and passionate and rather humble. And I really liked how Stewart challenged him in his questioning, although calling the PUSA "dude" is kind of disrespectful. All in all, my faith in the direction our President is going was sort of restored. I only hope that the dumbasses in our country get it together and that we don't f*ck things up on November 2, 2010.

A replacement for my Roomba?

 I LOVE these new vacuums from Electrolux! The problem? They were only made as one-offs to be part of a promotional campaign and environmental protection awareness program. The exteriors are made from recycled bits of plastic and trash found on various world beaches, spanning from the Indian Ocean to Hawaii.

Sigh...I was really hoping to find one under my Christmas tree this year.

Movie Review for late October 2010

I finally got around to seeing the film adaptation of one of my favorite books by Kazuo Ishiguro, Never Let Me Go. As far as book-into-movie adaptations go, it was really well done by director Mark Romanek despite the fact that he's responsible for one of my most hated movies of all time (One-Hour Photo).
It stars a triumvirate of young British stars, Carey Mulligan, Keira Knightley, and Andrew Garfield, a young man who is quickly becoming one of my favorite actors to come along in some time. The openness and beauty of his face in this film is almost heart wrenching; his face displays the perfect amount of naivete and soulfulness.  I don't know how he managed to express so much in his eyes and sweet smile, but Garfield's performance steals the show.
Carey Mulligan was also brilliant, and makes me forgive her for doing that Wall Street sequel and for dating Shia LeBouf. And despite my hatred for Knightley, she was such a perfect choice for tragic Ruth that I can't complain at all.
My New Plaid Pants blogger JA does such a phenomenal job in his review of the film, that I feel a little unworthy to say anything more about it. But I will add that while Never Let Me Go is a total downer of a film and will have you leaving the theater teary-eyed, it's so breathtaking, filled with such great performances, and such good storytelling that it really shouldn't be missed. Go see it while you still can! But bring tissues.

"So, there you go."

Thoughts on this week's episode of The Challenge: Cut(My)throat -

• Awesome part 1: Batshit crazy Katie!!! Gawddam, I love this little psycho. And I felt so bad for her when her team sent her into the Gulag instead of useless, annoying Theresa. I'm glad Katie lived to fight (and beat/scream down bitches) another day.
• Awesome part 2: After Katie (rightfully) flipped the f*ck out on Ty for being a mysogonistic, hypocritical asshole, Derrick's response regarding Ty and Emily getting a taste of Katie's crazy - "So...there you go."
• Awesome part 3: The Red Team won this week so Brandon didn't have to go into the Gulag.

• My obsession with Johnny Bananas' hair week #3: I'm truly trying to rack my brain to remember if Bananas always had such whack, fake looking hair and I just ignored it. But I don't recall it ever being this bad - Hair Club For Men lookin', flat-ironed weirdness.

• Awesome part 4: Bananas got punched in the face by a Czech citizen. Thank you brave man whoever you are!
• Awesome part 5: "Medium" Easy whipped dumb Vinnie's ass in the Gulag! And then Vinnie was so mad about it that he acted like a little whiner afterwards. Now, I hope that the rest of the Blue team (minus loyal Derrick and Katie) step up and appreciate the good that Easy brings to their team. Send Bananas into the Gulag you dumbasses!

• Horrible Laurel and her hate-filled spew towards Erik was easily one of the grossest things I've ever seen on this show. Laurel is a digusting mess, who has some SERIOUS mental health issues.

Above: Laurel keepin' it classy in the hot tub.
Who needs mixed drinks when you can just mix your own directly in your mouth?!

TV week in review - Early October 2010

Thoughts on TV this week...

Showtime Shows:
Dexter - Wow, season 5 has really started out strong. Considering season 4 kicked all sorts of ass and there's pretty much no way to live up to it, they're doing an admirable job so far. You can't even tell that much that Michael Hall is wearing a hair piece (because he was undergoing cancer treatment for most of this season's shoot). But seriously, Hall and his real-life wife Jennifer Carpenter who plays his on-screen sister Deb, have been acting the HELL out of the writing they've been given. They both deserve Emmys this year, no question. I'm not even minding nosy ol' Quinn who is bound and determined to fuck Dexter up in some way. I'm intrigued to see how this season's story lines all play out. And hee hee, every time they show Dexter carrying Harrison in his little car seat to all of these weird places to do his forensic dirty work, I get a big kick out of it. Dexter is still the sexiest killer on television.

The Big C - My appreciation for this show has been growing steadily since it started in August. Right from the beginning I loved Phyllis Somerville's Marlene and the great John Benjamin Hickey as Sean, but it took awhile for me to warm up to Laura Linney and the rest of the cast, as well as the story. But after the last two episodes I've really learned to love this new series. Could it be hot hot Idris Elba as Lenny that's making me feel this way? Could be. As we near the end of this first season, I'm hoping for a second one.

Modern Family: I saved up the first 3 eps of this second season so that I could enjoy a nice amount of quality time with my favorite TV family. The show is definitely proving that they deserved that Best Comedy Emmy. I didn't think it was possible to love Phil Dunphy or Cam Tucker (or the actors that portray them, Ty Burrell and Eric Stonestreet) any more than I did in the first season but I was wrong. And I loved the way the writers chose to handle the (TOTALLY STUPID and IRRITATING) brouhaha that's been swirling for the past year over the fact that Cam and Mitchell never kiss on the show.

Cougar Town: First, I love that the producers/writers are totally in on the joke, and have been making fun of the increasingly ridiculous title of this show in their credits each week. Nicely done! So far this show isn't having the sophomore slump that I predicted, which is such a pleasant surprise.

I was sad to hear this week about Courtney and David's marriage split; they seemed like good partners.

Glee: The past few weeks I've read a lot of negative reviews and hateful comments over this second season of Glee. As usual I totally don't understand why people take this show so seriously and can't appreciate it for what it is. Anyway, even the most critical watchers have been saying good things about last night's "Duets" episode. From the snarky mention of Grease 2, to the fantabulous Mercedes/Santana performance of "River Deep, Mountain High", the hilarious way that all of the kids were SO into the fictional Breadsticks restaurant, to the amazing duet between Rachel (Babs) and Kurt (Judy) of the classic "Happy Days/Get Happy", this episode was really excellent.

"The Challenge" aka Real World/Road Rules Challenge aka Freaks on Parade:

Tivo didn't want me to watch this newest season of my favorite televised crack addiction. Even though I shamefully have several different "wishlist" season pass ticklers for this craptastic show, Bunim/Murray have evidently fiddled around with the title so much that my little dvr isn't catching on (it's apparently called The Challenge:Cutthroat this season). So it was with surprise that I was randomly switching channels last Wednesday night and came upon TJ Lavin's stoned mug and immediately squealed "NEW CHALLENGE SEASON!", waking up the dog and cat on my lap and almost dumping an entire mug of tea on myself. I quickly set the dvr to record the 11pm rerun and booted up the lap top to see which drunken losers contestants are gracing this season. I am excited about Abram and Bananas (but not about their unfortunate heads of hair), but was appalled to see Fresh Meat II's Theresa and Laurel back. And contrary to many people, I kind of miss my pasty Canuck Evan and my boyfriend Kenny.

Low Resolution's Joe had a wonderful discussion about this show with the two Sarahs that needs to be shared with all who love this stupid thing.

TV and Movie Week in Review

Movies:

The Social Network - I LOVED this movie that tells the story of how Harvard undergrad Mark Zuckerberg came to create and expand the social networking site Facebook. Jesse Eisenberg continues to impress with his mad acting skillz. The film also gave me a nice look at newcomers Andrew Garfield and Rooney Mara who are getting so much press right now for their future star projects, the revamped Spiderman and the remake of The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo, respectively. And can we talk about Armie Hammer for a minute please? He did double-duty (with body help from Josh Spence) to play both Winklevoss twins, Tyler and Cameron, who sued Zuckerberg in 2006 for supposedly stealing their Facebook idea. Hammer did a great job portraying both twins, and got to deliver some of the best Aaron Sorkin penned one-liners in the movie. The line about being the Karate Kid villain is a classic. And I truly believed that I was watching twin actors in the roles -  that was some spectactular CGI magic there Fincher.  side note: I've actually met the real Winklevoss twins (through rowing association functions), and let me tell you, they're not as cute as Hammer.

This film deserves all of the good buzz that it's been getting from the critics and fans. Even if it does mean that we're robbed of another album from Justin Timberlake in the near future because of his focus on acting.

Television:

Glee's "Britney/Britanny" episode -
I may be one of the few people over 30 who loved this episode but I don't care. Was it nothing more than a thinly threaded series of amazing music videos? No it wasn't. Do I care one iota? No, I do not. The only thing I was disappointed in was that John Stamos didn't sing or dance. I am hoping that this is corrected in coming episodes. Also, before seeing/hearing Heather Morris and Naya Rivera's version of the song "Me Against The Music" I absolutely hated that song. But their version has been playing on a continuos loop on my iPod all week; Naya and Heather BLOW Britney and Madonna out of the water in all aspects both singing and dancing. Madonna and Brit also didn't have Mark Kanemura (SYTYCD alum) in their video, which is another failure on their part. hubba hubba

Cougar Town -
Finally caught up on the first 2 eps of the second season. The show continues to bring the funny; despite unevenness from some of the guest stars (I'm perplexed that Jennifer Aniston got such good reviews from the critics for her turn as Jules' therapist). And Christa Miller and Ian Gomez are still awesome as my favorite married couple on tv.
Grey's Anatomy -
Another meh episode for me but I think we are headed for some stellar work in the coming weeks from Sandra Oh as Christina Yang continues to fall apart after the gunman ordeal last season.