I Heart TV

I love TV. You love TV. I love to read about TV. Hopefully, so do you.

10.31.2005

omg! bands on the run!

In this post back in May, I discussed my love for the long-departed VH1 reality show Bands on the Run. It's probably my favorite reality show ever, even beating out the Real World/Road Rules Challenge. This morning, Reality Blurred readers that the band Faster Pussycat (I haven't heard of them, but that's not really saying much) is currently filming a pilot for a second season of BOTR, with the same format.

Bands on the Run could be back! And, even better, maybe they will re-run the first season. Oh, I'm so excited!

10.27.2005

veronica mars: blast from the past (3.4)

Some thoughts on last night's episode:

- I'm really pleased with this latest development in Wallace and Veronica's relationship. Too often on TV shows the sidekick is nothing more than a sidekick, but I think that this season Wallace is really coming into his own. I thought Veronica was abrupt and insensitive (but not out of character) when all she said was "the parent who stays is the one who cares" by the lockers, and it's really rewarding to see Wallace call her (and Jackie) out on being too wrapped up in themselves to see what was going on with him. I don't know if I buy Wallace leaving town with Nathan though. Father or no father, he's still a stranger, and that's not exactly a safe move. Plus, what about school? Though maybe they were just going away for a weekend to get to know each other.

- Speaking of Jackie, this week we got our first hint that maybe she's not a cold heartless bitch when she was so upset about Wallace not going to the homecoming dance with her that she took some pills. And her scheme was pretty smart. Still, I hate her, and I don't like the hints this week that something may happen with her and Logan. It reminded me a little too much of Lord of the Bling.

- Duncan and Logan's reunion was the sweetest thing ever, but I wonder what will happen when Veronica finds out?

- Assuming Jackie was telling the truth about only feeding the psychic the stuff about the boob-enhancing cream (and I think she was, because she wanted Veronica to know that she had punked her, and the stuff about Lilly could have been said by anyone), why would the psychic say such a thing? It was a weird, disquieting moment.

- I think we saw a more evil side of Lamb last night. In the past his badness has mostly been about neglect, about not doing his job as sheriff and refusing to consider any solution but the easiest one and refusing to consider anything that contradicts his world view.

- When is Meg going to wake up? I checked imdb for as many episodes as they have listed (up to at least episode 9, if I remember correctly) and Alona Tal isn't listed for any of them. Is she ever going to wake up?

- I feel like we learned a lot in this episode, but I don't like how we've dropped the Casablancas storyline for two episodes in a row now. Wouldn't the kids be talking about it, especially Logan and Duncan when they hang out? I know more stuff about them must be coming up, but I would have liked, for example, if Duncan said to Logan "hey, you can even invite Dick and Beaver" and Logan could have shrugged and said "I don't think they're up for partying" or something like that.

10.25.2005

how could you, prison break?

RIP Marilyn.

Oh yeah, and it was sad when they killed 3 people in this episode, too.

10.24.2005

oh now I get it

This is the first season that I've watched The Amazing Race devotedly, and according to most of the internet I picked a bad season for it. This is the family season, with teams of four instead of two. While it's not heart-stopping excitement (or even as exciting as two episodes ago on Survivor when Blake was surprisingly voted off after talking only about his best drunk stories and his girlfriend's humongous breasts), I've been enjoying it. I was even excited to talk to my mom about it, since she and my sister are longtime fans. But my mom offered an "Ugh!" in response, and echoed the common complaint that it's supposed to be "a race around the world" and that this season is just boring.

Reading the recap of last week's episode on Television Without Pity this morning, I finally understood what all the criticism is about. Miss Alli, the TWOP recapper, was talking about a clue in which teams had to drive in their SUVs to a BP station in Mississippi, find a man named Les, and get their next clue from him. It wasn't terribly interesting to watch, although one team, the Godlewski sisters, did initially miss the station. She says:

When you think about the fact that this is this season's version of finding a guy named Pablo in Mexico City without any indication of who he is or where he is other than a picture of a building, you will weep openly. Because now Mexico City is Richfield, Mississippi, and Zocalo Square is a BP station, and locals are Slim Jims, and Pablo is Les, and the picture is an address, a named location, and a mallet to hit yourself with in case you need additional help.


That quote helped me understand a little bit better just why so many people find this season lacking.

10.19.2005

schroeders

As we watched The Amazing Race last night, my roommate and I wondered about New Orleans natives the Schroeder family, the latest to get kicked off the race and one of my favorites. This article from CBS News details their trip back to their home after the hurricane. It also mentions that the Rogers family, who did not come off well on the show, took the Schroeders in after the hurricane. Aw.

Also, you would think that an article on a network site would get the names of all the families on the show correct. But you'd be wrong.

10.18.2005

old favorites: roseanne

Last night, with nothing on the tivo that we both hadn't seen, my boyfriend and I sat down to watch two episodes of Roseanne. Roseanne was one of my favorite shows growing up, and it's one of the few that I remember watching each week (Wednesdays at 9, if I recall correctly) in my parents' bedroom (the place to watch tv uninterrupted, with my sister already asleep in our shared room, my dad working nights, and my mom watching the day's soaps in the living room) while eating microwave popcorn (my favorite snack in those days) and laughing hysterically. Even at that young age (the show premiered when I was 7), I knew that there weren't many families like mine on tv--families where money was always an issue, where people yelled and were sarcastic and things didn't always turn out okay.

But a lot has been said about the less-than-perfect lives of the Conners, including by me in a paper I wrote for my Women and Television class in college about the conflict between Roseanne and her uppity neighbor Kathy Bowman in season four. But one thing I had forgotten about the show is that things often ended on a very, very down note. This was evident last night in the two episodes we watched from season seven--White Men Can't Kiss and Maybe Baby, about racism and abortion. (They skipped the Thanksgiving episode in between the two, probably because Nana Mary talks about her actual abortions in that one.) Maybe that's also part of what kept me tuning in week after week--I wanted to know if things would be okay for the Conners.

But don't get me started on the last episode of Roseanne, one of the worst last episodes EVER.

10.16.2005

sick days

I've spent the past week battling a stomach virus of death, and that meant a lot of time in front of the television. Unfortunately, due to some active Tivo watching last weekend and the World Series, there wasn't much on the tivo when I stayed home from work Tuesday, just the most recent episode of the O.C. Feeling too out of it to even tackle that, I collapsed on the couch and just went from channel to channel, watching whatever caught my interest.

That sort of random TV watching is something I very rarely do these days. For me, the tivo has made channel-surfing an obsolete activity. If at any given time I have things that must be watched, shows I like that are waiting patiently for me, why would I watch random crap? But on Tuesday, oh boy did I watch a lot of random crap. Even my old standbys--E true hollywood story, law & order, etc--weren't on, so I watched some things I usually never watch. For example:

A Baby Story: I have watched A Baby Story (as well as A Makeover Story, A Personal Story, A Wedding Story, and A Dating Story) before, but an episode about natural childbirth is not something you should watch when it feels like your stomach is trying to exit your body.

Oprah: The last time I watched an episode of Oprah, it was an episode about journaling shown during my Women & Television class in college. I cried. Not just a few tears, we're talking uncontrollable bawling. I am proud that I did not cry this time. It was the episode about how a pedophile was caught after Oprah showed his picture. Although it's a great thing, it wasn't a very moving episode, but then again, what can really be moving when you're trying not to puke?

Murder, She Wrote: The episode I saw featured all kinds of 80's stars and was about a murder at a Napa winery. I watched most of it with my eyes closed and yet still didn't miss anything, but it was oddly comforting, like a very quaint Law & Order.

One Life to Live: There's something endearing about the fact that I haven't watched even one episode of this show in over 2 years and I was still sucked in, able to figure out most of what was going on. Characters on soap operas are so deliciously evil.

I watched other things, of course, but those are the three that stand out. Despite being so very sick, it was actually a little bit fun to guiltlessly watch random TV for a day and escape the pressure of the tivo and the pressure to be productive. I'd like to think it made me feel a little bit better, too.

10.06.2005

shows i have abandoned

To recap mostly for myself, as the fall season started I had plans to watch (or at least check out) the following shows:

Sunday: The War at Home, Family Guy
Monday: How I Met Your Mother/Kitchen Confidential, Prison Break
Tuesday: Biggest Loser, My Name is Earl/Amazing Race
Wednesday: America's Next Top Model, Veronica Mars/Lost
Thursday: Survivor/The OC, Everwood/Reunion
Friday: Twins?
Saturday: ?

The War at Home turned out to suck, with the only bright spot being the son who everyone thinks is gay dressing up like his mom in order to steal the car and then forgetting to take off the women's clothing while driving by the hot girls in his class, so that's out. I've been watching Family Guy, but this past week was already a repeat! It's what, the third week of the season?

So far I am still liking How I Met Your Mother. I think it's the most realistic sitcom about a group of friends that I've seen in years (since Friends, which was not at all realistic on the whole but somewhat so in the way the friends related to each other.) There are no weak links in the cast, but I will admit right now that it's Neil Patrick Harris who makes me want to watch each week. I don't know if it's just that "holy shit, Doogie's doing what?" feeling that I like, but he is surprisingly hilarious, especially after re-watching season 1 of Doogie recently. The one thing that annoys me about this show is the main character's future kids. I think they could have Bob Saget just narrate the whole thing without those little scenes and it would still work.

I liked Prison Break from the start, but only in an "ehh, it's decent and everybody else is watching it" kind of way. Then, last week, with the prison riot, it suddenly got super suspenseful and I actually started to care--not about Lincoln, the character set to die, who defines the term "big lug," but about the other characters. I will actually miss this show during the baseball hiatus.

My other roommate (the non-TV-loving one) changed the channel during the premiere of the Biggest Loser, and just like that, I stopped caring about it. Sure, I could have downloaded the episode, and then I thought to myself, am I really going to go to all that trouble just to watch anonymous (i.e. non-celebrity) fat people lose weight? Besides, I get my reality fill on Tuesdays with The Amazing Race, though the Paolo family reminds me too much of my own and I sort of hope they get kicked off soon. My early pick to win, the Black family, got kicked off at the end of the first episode, so I've got no hunches now.

And My Name is Earl really was great, much quirkier than the average sitcom (and quirky in the real way, not quirky as a synonym for obnoxious), but to watch it, we have to tape it on the other TV, and I'm just not into the effort, especially for a sitcom.

More on the other days of the week later. Back to work.