Welcome to another edition of TV or Not TV where I hope that these crappy reality TV shows are finally coming to an end.
VH-1 has been pushing out the world’s cattiest and crappiest reality shows for a while now. It all started with Flavor of Love and I’m hoping we’ll finally find an end to it all with Megan Wants a Millionaire and I Love Money 3. Even though I mention these shows you will never actually see them because they have been canceled before they have ever aired. The horrible reason for this is because a contestant on these two shows by the name of Ryan Jenkins was a person of interest in the murder of Jasmine Fiore in Orange County, California.
There’s already a ton of spin being put out by VH-1 as they have removed all mention of these shows from their sites and press information. VH-1 has also been quick to point out that the show Megan Wants a Millionaire was licensed to them by production company 51 Minds and 51 Minds in turn has said that they will take all necessary steps to make sure this type of “lapse” doesn’t happen again. I’m glad that they can call something like the booking of a sociopath on one of their shows was just a “lapse.” I’d hate to see what they consider an outright screw up.
I’m not really here to talk about this terrible occurrence or how this type of programming is leading to desperation in finding people to book for it, what I really want to talk about is how the public’s fascination with this type of programming is lowering the availability of quality television out there. Networks are willing to put money into reality programming because the cost of the production of the show is lower than that of scripted television and if they happen upon the next American Idol or Biggest Loser than they will have the best of both worlds with cheap shows and amazing ad revenue.
This type of cost of production vs. ratings and ad revenue has lead NBC to turn its back on the scripted shows and take the most padded gamble in with the new Jay Leno Show that will be making its premiere this fall. I say padded because, as I said before, the cost of the Leno show is so much lower than the programming that formerly occupied these 10 PM slots that even at a 1 share Leno possibly could be more profitable than the cost of the gamble of a new scripted show. They can try to blame the DVR all they want for the decline in viewing
I can’t plead not-guilty in the reality programming audience since I’ve made it very clear how much I enjoy both The Biggest Loser and Big Brother. There is a major difference between these shows and Rock of Love however. I’d really prefer to see a few quality reality shows than the horrific meat-grinder approach that VH-1 and other networks have been taking.
Now that I’d had my little rant let’s look at what’s happening this week on TV.
MONDAY
PBS KIDS SPROUT – 6:00 AM ET: Pre-schoolers can now enjoy The Wiggles every morning with the brand new Wiggly Waffle Show. Man, how much money do these Wiggles guys make?
NBC – 8:00 PM: It’s the end of the road for The Great American Road Trip.
ABC – 9:00 PM:Dating in the Dark is turning the lights on like the end of an ugly night at a nightclub with tonight’s season finale.
TUESDAY
BET – 8:00 PM: I’m just wondering, has anyone that reads this column actually seen the Jessica Alba movie Honey?
CBS – 9:00 PM: The final six contestants in the Big Brother house play for the Power of Veto and we see them plot and squabble so much it becomes clear that isolation leads to pure paranoia.
SyFy – 9:00 PM: Myka gets trapped in the mirror of Lewis Caroll on Warehouse 13. I only mention it because I’ve had nightmares about this kind of thing.
WEDNESDAY
ABC – 9:00 PM: Remember how I started talking about reality shows that might be pandering to the lowest common denominator? Imagine contestants driving in extreme obstacles courses (and crashing on purpose) just to try to win $50,000. Ladies and gentleman, I give you Crash Course.
HIST – 9:00 PM: Researches go searching for the real Moby Dick on MonsterQuest and I can’t stop giggling because I just found out he was a sperm whale. After all these years I’m still 13 at heart.
THURSDAY
USA – 10:00 PM: I’ve really been enjoying Royal Pains and I’m kinda bummed that tonight is the season finale. Let’s just hope it’s return in the summer of 2010 won’t make audiences forget about it.
SHO – 10:00 PM: The Vatican and the Pope are the topics of discussion on the season finale of Penn & Teller: Bull$hit! Let’s see if there’s a report of either of them being struck by morning overnight.
FRIDAY
DISNEY – 8:00 PM: Finally, all those unanswered questions from the 30 minute restriction of The Wizards of Waverly Place can be addressed in their TV movie.
SYFY – 9:00 PM:Allison finally has her baby on Eureka and I’m sure that some wacky science thing goes wrong at the same time. Hopefully she doesn’t give birth to that Demon Seed robot shelled baby.
SATURDAY
BBC AMERICA – 9:00 PM: The story of the ghost, the vampire and the werewolf sharing an apartment comes to it’s first season conclusion tonight on Being Human. Hopefully it doesn’t end with the Mystery Machine pulling up and them all being exposed by those meddling kids.
ABC – 10:00 PM: The Alphabet Network rolls out the pre-Emmy special from last year with a re-airing of Jimmy Kimmel’s Big Night of Stars.
SUNDAY
HBO – 10:00 PM: It’s the next to last episode of True Blood, so really is there anything else to pay attention to tonight on TV? Really, you want more? OK…
COMEDY – 9:00 PM: The last of the direct to DVD Futurama movies, Into the Wild Green Yonder, is now made available at no cost for your viewing enjoyment.
ABC FAMILY – 8:00 PM: Have you ever noticed how many times a month this channel airs Ella Enchanted? Seriously, I see it every week trying to write this column.
[Spoiler alert: I discuss the plot of this film in detail.]
We’ve all seen the cup. “World’s Greatest Dad.” Michael Scott has a similar cup on his desk, one that reads “World’s Greatest Boss.” The genre is of course novelty shop humor, like one of those backyard chef’s barbecue bibs with funny sayings on them that offer slight mockery of the wearer as a kind of pre-apology for the food on the grill. In Bobcat Goldthwait’s new movie, World’s Greatest Dad, his fourth directorial effort after Shakes the Clown, Windy City Heat, and Sleeping Dogs Lie, the cup logo takes on a larger irony but ultimately takes the novelty humor of it very seriously indeed.
Robin Williams steps forward from his uncredited role as the mime teacher in Shakes to play Lance Clayton, an aspiring writer and high school poetry teacher. His class at school is under threat of cancellation, his ostensive girlfriend (Alexie Gilmore) seems to be more interested in their African-American colleague (Henry Simmons), and though he is an aspiring novelist, Clayton has never had anything published, while his colleague has a first time effort published in the New Yorker.
Despite all his frustrations in love and work, at least Clayton has a family of sorts, consisting of his teen age son Kyle (Daryl Sabara). We need to talk about Kyle. He’s a bit of a problem. He has turned that teenage phase of parental hate and embarrassment into a geographic age. Kyle’s mockery of his father, from Clayton’s enthusiasm about socializing with his son to his taste in music, which seems to consist solely of Bruce Hornsby, is relentless. Like a gold-digger on a date, Kyle flirts with going to a movie with Clayton only to make him a new computer monitor instead, and then abandon him in the mall. Anything Kyle doesn’t like is “queer.” Kyle has no friends at school. Even the Goth girl laughs at him when an athlete punches him in the hallway. He hates music, finds movies lame, and prefers anal pornography, which is why he needs the new monitor ““ to better see the gross images he downloads off the World Wide Web. This is a kid who takes clandestine pix of his dad’s girlfriend’s panties under the restaurant table and who then dies masturbating to them while undergoing erotic asphyxiation. David Carradine would spin kick in his grave.
Clayton is of course distressed to find the corpse of his son in such an unsavory situation. And he does what any parent would probably do ““ disguise the embarrassing death as a teen suicide, even going to the trouble of writing a suicide note. Unfortunately, the note is leaked to off the Internet, and in death the once despised Kyle becomes a James Dean like icon. In a twist not unlike a similar plot development in Atom Egoyan’s Adoration, Clayton exploits the interest in his son’s death to promote his own writing career. It begins innocently enough, as it probably did for “J. T. Leroy.” A thoughtful essay here, a poem there. But it develops into a full diary, forged by Clayton over a long weekend, a book that ends up on the bestseller list and lands Clayton a visit on a day time talk show. How can Clayton extricate himself from this dire situation? Like a Frank Capra hero, he makes a humiliating public confession, one that destroys his career and all the relationships he forged while operating under the ruse.
At first, I didn’t quite know what to make of World’s Greatest Dad. I saw it under certain distracting conditions, and on a disc whose playback seemed video-y and mis-formatted. Parts seemed good (the enjoyable satire of some of the students), parts seemed bad (the Goth girl’s laughter didn’t ring true, but was of course necessary for later plot mechanisms). Also, I am not the biggest Robin Williams fan in the world (though he turned out to be fine in the role). But as it happens, the film stuck with me like few others seen this year, probably because it seemed to strike deeply and uncompromisingly at an array of male fears and phobias.
For one thing, Dad confronts a little discussed minor aspect of American life: sometimes parents just don’t like the kids they’ve sired. It’s an issue that forms the basis for the popular 2003 novel, We Need to Talk About Kevin, by Lionel Shriver. In that tale, parents find that they have spawned a high school mass murderer. That’s an extreme slice of a probable, if only occasional, reality, that a parent can look at a child and wonder where they hell they came from. It is, of course, only one of the 10 million fears that parents have, but Goldthwait, who also wrote the script, mines with over-the-top nimbleness. Misanthropes welcome here.
For another, Goldthwait is the American poet of sexual humiliation. He evinces exquisitely honed gradations of embarrassment, frustration, and jealousy. Clayton’s co-teacher girlfriend has an inexplicable interest in him, but a supremely explicable if unstated interest in the African-American teacher, who is a single dad with a good con going, unconscious or not. There is a perfect moment when, at the nadir of Clayton’s public humiliation after confessing to the fraud, the girlfriend runs to Option No. 2 and embraces him while both shoot daggers at Clayton. A masochist couldn’t ask for a better set-up. It’s a moment worthy of those other masterpieces of sexual humiliation, Malice, The Palm Beach Story, Shampoo, and Blue Velvet.
Still, for all Dad‘s occasional searing wit and tireless thumping on some of our deepest fears, the viewer still might wonder why American performers who otherwise appear to be successful prefer to dwell on failure and unhappiness and leave their protagonists with little if any hope at the end? Goldthwait has been a comic since he was 15, has been married (and divorced) with two children, and then dated Nikki Cox, his co-star on the sit-com Unhappily Ever After. Since then has had a seemingly successful career directing for television. For all intents and purposes, he has achieved a great deal. So then why does he mine childhood feelings and male neuroses? What does he get out of it and what are we supposed to apprehend?
If you thought about it long enough, you could posit the theory that comics distort the world. Think of Woody Allen. Way too many guys in the 1970s seeking a relationship took Allen’s comic persona as a role model, and operated under the delusion that women might actually like self-deprecating failures because such a male might seem honest. So while ordinary shlubs are flopping with chicks all over the country, the real life Woody Allen was dating models and actresses. In mocking the conventions of movie romance Allen unintentionally unleashed a new breed of male, programed to fail. Allen is neither the first nor the last. From Chaplin to Judd Apatow, comedians have trafficked in despair, yearning, failure. Comedies are usually, really, tragedies, often with grim or at least poignant endings. As genres, both tragedies and comedies deal in calamities, with tragedy, broadly speaking, focusing on the noble, and comedy on the quotidian. In Dad, though, Goldthwait has a weird, hybrid aim. He finds that true comedy, not just satire of current social conventions, is located in the deepest recesses of our primeval minds, in our obvious and shared but unstated fears, and treats a comic tale of ordinary people as if it is a high tragedy. Like the recent Observe and Report, World’s Greatest Dad is a comedy that isn’t really a comedy, but the marketers have to call it something. It’s an interesting experiment, if it is intentional (and not just my faulty interpretation), and shows ambitions far beyond . World’s Greatest Dad may not attract the cult following of Shakes the Clown, but it may will live on for those viewers who find it an unusually true comedy
SModcast is the meandering palaver of a pair of dudes whose voices are so dull, they don’t deserve to be on the radio (and, hence, aren’t). Kevin Smith and Scott Mosier are SModcast.The best thing about SModcast? It don’t cost nothing.
SModcast 93: Alive with Pleasure –
In which our heroes spend much of the time doing bad character voices and accents.
[CONTENT WARNING]SModcast features harsh language and even harsher notions of propriety. Listener discretion is advised.
And now, you can follow me on TWITTER under the name: Stipp
Item #1 – ICE CREAM!!!
I’m acutely sensitive to those who ask for what little help I can provide.
I’ve never purported to actually have any ability to sway people to do things, Lord knows that losing 50k in that McDonald’s contest that was based on votes didn’t work out real well for me, but I am always eager to do what I can for those who have taken a chance on me.
Dennis Widmyer is such a guy and he deserves your vote.
The short of it is that you need to go here to watch his short film “ICE CREAM!!!” and vote for it. The long of it is below, straight from Dennis, a guy who has created a really solid short that is at the same time twisted, gory and all sorts of funny. I’ll allow him to explain what is so important about you pushing a few buttons. And, remember, for the love of God, vote on the FilmmakingFrenzy site. It’s the only way this will work. More from Dennis:
I have a short film I directed for Fantastic Fest 09. I’m sure you’ve heard of Fantastic Fest. It was co-created by Harry at Aint It Cool News, and in only its third year, it’s already become the largest genre film fest in the country. Anyway, something cool that FF does is they have this contest called Filmmaking Frenzy whereby they accept entries from filmmakers for ‘bumpers’. Bumpers are like short, 30-45 sec commercials that play before a film at a fest. The rules of the contest state that you need:
– A kid (below age of 18)
– A monster
– 30-45 secs
– End off in the word “Fantastic”
Anyway, my bumper is called “ICE CREAM!!!” and you can watch it here:
It’s actually doing very well right now and we’ve gained a lot of momentum. I think we might actually have a shot of winning this thing. So please offer me whatever vote you think the film deserves. You have to register for the site to vote. The whole process takes about 2 mins. Some people have complained that the process of voting is a little confusing, so I typed up some quick instructions on it that you can view HERE.
Ari Gold, the man who created the very funny ADVENTURES OF POWER, passed along an e-mail message to let me know that the site for POWER is finally in full swing and, I have to say, it’s really robust and has a lot of information about his film which will finally be hitting theaters this fall.
Check out the film I thought was one of the best crafted comedies I’ve seen this year: HERE
For those needing an explanation of the film, here it is:
When hard times hit his small mining town, Power doesn’t wish for riches; he only wishes he’d learned to play drums. But his father could never afford to buy him a drum set, so Power has embraced the next best thing: air drumming. Tired of the constant ridicule, with nothing but a few dollars, some breakfast cereal, and the support of his Aunt Joanie, Power sets off across the country to the “paradise” of Newark, where an underground air drumming crew has invited him to join their team. But as the big air drumming competition looms, so does a rival-multi-millionaire drummer Dallas H., who thinks air drumming is an abomination and seeks to destroy Power and his crew.
More than just a rock’n’roll comedy, ADVENTURES OF POWER is an epic fable about the American Dream-about making something out of nothing, and trusting in your own heartbeat as a way of changing the world. With a phenomenal soundtrack featuring original songs alongside hits by Rush, Phil Collins, the Dazz Band, and more, ADVENTURES OF POWER will have you drumming in your seat and cheering on your feet.
Starring Ari Gold, Michael McKean, Jane Lynch, Adrian Grenier, Shoshannah Stern, and Steven Williams and also featuring Jimmy Jean-Louis, Chiu Chi Ling, Annie Golden and Nick Kroll, the film premiered to widespread acclaim at the 2008 Sundance Film Festival. With classic songs by Rush, Judas Priest, Phil Collins, Dazz Band, Loverboy, Bow Wow Wow, Woodie Guthrie and original songs by Ethan Gold, Adventures of Power will be released theatrically in fall 2009 by Variance Films.
“Adventures of Power” was produced 100% independently, and shot from sea to shining sea-from the forgotten industrial towns of the West to the ghetto cities of the East. It is being released 100% independently as well, with the help of volunteers and fans from all over the country who believe in the power of the human heartbeat to change the world.
Item #3
I’ve got some DVDs to give away. Want some?
LAST HOUSE ON THE LEFT came out earlier this year and it did well. As a low budget movie it made it a little scratch and, in the critics’ eyes, it was acceptable cinematic fare.
If you’d like to add this DVD to your collection, send me a note at Christopher_Stipp@yahoo.com and I’ll enter you in a contest to win a copy of this puppy.
For those who want to know what it’s all about here is a synopsis:
Renowned horror director Wes Craven returns to the scene of the most notorious thrillers of all time in this darkly disturbing reimagining of The Last House on the Left. After kidnapping and ruthlessly assaulting two teen girls, a sadistic killer and his gang unknowingly find shelter from a storm at the home of one of the victim’s parents– two ordinary people who will go to increasingly gruesome extremes to get revenge. Loaded with shocking twists guaranteed to leave you on edge, it’s the ominous film critics call, “One of the best horror remakes ever made” (Scott Weinberg, Fearnet.com).
Director:James Cameron Cast:Sam Worthington, Sigourney Weaver, Michelle Rodriguez
Release: December 18th, 2009 Synopsis: In the future, Jake, a paraplegic war veteran, is brought to another planet, Pandora, which is inhabited by the Na’vi, a humanoid race with their own language and culture. Those from Earth find themselves at odds with each other and the local culture.
Prognosis: Positive. Is there any lack of snarky, nitpicky comments on a movie no one has seen? Welcome to the Interwebs because, no, there are more than a few haymakers to go around.
Before seeing this teaser I’ll be honest in that nothing has really ignited that geek desire to see anything more than the various publicity shots of James Cameron in various states of guidance as he talks to the film’s stars.
Cameron’s legendary control of what people know and when they’ll know it about his films almost make him the Steve Jobs of the motion picture world; he’ll give you what you want when the fever pitch is at its greatest. I would agree with that assessment if his latest eking of information, photos, et al., about the movie actually tantalized. Instead, all we know is that this movie deals with a cripple and a bunch of blue leopards that look like taller, slender Keebler Elves that were rejected from the stage production of Cats. The footage shown at Comic-Con did not incite a wholesale riot of fan boys looking to jizz all over the promise this film was making. That honor went to IRON MAN 2.
So, what to do when the tepid response, proportionately speaking, leaves people wanting more about the tin man than they do your Sesame Street blue man group? You get yourself a 2 minute teaser trailer out there, that’s what.
The opening sequence, to be honest, really does get me into a mind space where I would’ve liked to have been months ago. The way Cameron captures the silence and majesty of space on a grand scale simply cannot be matched, the way we are ensconced in this planet’s ecosystem is genuinely thrilling as the music is perfectly matched to the sense of awe and wonder at an alien terrain where you can walk out freely but need an scuba like system in order to breathe. It feels open and beautiful.
And then I see the worker mechs from ALIENS. And from the crappy MATRIX sequel. I’m left trying to figure out if this a hybrid from ALIENS or if we’re to believe this is its own universe but, if that’s the case, what’s with the cribbed worker mech? Having this argument with myself is taking me out of this grand universe and that’s not what you want for a film that needs to build its own sense of self.
Weird guy with an obnoxious scar across his face (seriously, can we just do away with the overt make-up that will obviously play an important part to someone’s twisted backstory? “Well, yar, I’ll tell ye how I got this scar…”), Worthington rolls by some tanning beds and then, well, we get Delgo. Seriously, I dare anyone with half an idea of what I’m talking about to refute the notion these aliens look like that wretched kids film. If this was an issue of copyright I am pretty sure I could make a mint for Freddie Prinze Jr. in open court. It’s a little nutty and, at almost the half way point, I’m just screaming inside my own head. We’ve got lots of things going on and none of those things have to do with this movie’s awesomeness.
We get the clue that the cripple’s consciousness (and let’s be clear that this movie is obviously making an issue of Worthington’s handicap and I would never call a cripple a cripple. Worthington is, on purpose, a cripple to forward the plot. It’s a device. Like John Locke. He’s a cripple. He can walk in Lost. Same theory applies. I wouldn’t put it past Cameron to have thought that was an awesome idea to have a cripple walk and then meditate on the idea of mobility, the fragility of life and, thus, Sam Worthington the cripple who soon won’t be) is fed into this cartoon character (and let’s be honest, we all can tell it’s a cartoon character. It’s certainly no DISTRICT 9 effect work.) and we’re off into a fake jungle with fake plants and fake animals with chicks who like to get grungy just like in the second crappy MATRIX film.
But I will give praise to the amalgam of cartoon fantasy and live action that seems really action-y. You’ve got machine guns and planes that mean some terrible business and dudes hanging out of planes that are firing all sorts of armament. You’ve got alien people yelling out, with their tiger teeth laid bare, and all hell’s breaking loose. It’s like the Savage Land come to life!
There is so much happening and not much context that the issue I have with this trailer is that it is devoid of some logical sense. I think you could put together the entire film (I’m pretty damn sure Worthington is going to have some alien sex with some alien chick with deadlocks) just by looking at what’s happening and I am pretty sure we’re going to see Worthington have some kind of crisis of conscience as his alien self becomes at odds with the big bad military force. It all sounds hokey to me but the scenery looks pretty nifty and the action sequences look to be rather engaging once we see how this all plays in 3D.
I’m in for sure but, come on, there are some things I really hope aren’t as hokey as what we see in this teaser.
The weekend’s here. You’ve just been paid, and it’s burning a hole in your pocket. What’s a pop culture geek to do? In hopes of steering you in the right direction to blow some of that hard-earned cash, it’s time for the Quick Stop Weekend Shopping Guide – your spotlight on the things you didn’t even know you wanted…
(Please support Quick Stop by using the links below to make any impulse purchases – it helps to keep us going…)
Yeah, so, one of my absolute favorite Disney films I their live-action/animated hybrid musical Pete’s Dragon (Walt Disney, Rated G, DVD-$29.99 SRP), which has languished for years on home video in sort of a 70’s bastard child status. Thankfully, the studio has finally seen fit to give it a nice special edition treatment, giving it a behind-the-scenes featurette, a deleted storyboard sequence, demo recordings, a quartet of promotional pop recordings, and more.
This week’s Thinkgeek recommendation is a piece of cool kit that always seems to be out of stock. It’s just that popular. However long it lasts, it’s now back in stock, so run and pick up your very own Cocktail Chemistry Set ($39.99). As then name implies, this is a cocktail set containing a quartet of shot-and-swig-worthy test tubes, an Erlenmeyer flask, a shaker, a glass mixing rod, and a metal bottle rack. Because yes – mixology is a recognized science, and now you have the kit to prove it.
Seeing as how my nephews are addicted to Nickelodeon (particularly the yellow crack that is Spongebob), it’s inevitable that I’d have to see the programming on offer. One of the shows that I actually enjoy quite a bit – and believe is just as well-scripted as the sitcoms on network TV, better even – is a favorite of my 5-year-old nephew, iCarly (Nickelodeon, Not Rated, DVD-$26.98 SRP). I’m sure that the Season 2, Volume 1 DVD will get plenty of plenty of play. The 2-disc set contains 11 episodes (including an extended cut of “iSaw Him First” and the feature-length “iGo To Japan”), plus a pair of featurettes.
I can’t be the only one who was completely blindsided by the announcement that the 4th season of Everybody Hates Chris (Paramount, Not Rated, DVD-$39.99 SRP) would be the show’s last. A victim of a shoddy network with no vision, I was a fan of the fictionalized tales of Chris Rock’s NYC childhood, and its cast in particular. This 4-disc set contains all 22 episodes, plus audio commentaries, webisodes, featurettes, deleted scenes, and a gag reel.
If you’ve ever watched the UK series Skins and thought to yourself “My teenage years were nothing like that sex party bacchanal,” then The Inbetweeners (Channel 4, Not Rated, £29.98 SRP) is the show for you, because its motley quartet of teens that live awkward, banal, unintentionally funny reality the majority of us experienced. It’s like a Brit Freaks & Geeks – and there’s no higher praise I can give it. The box set contains both Series 1 & 2, plus audio commentaries, documentaries, video diaries, featurettes, deleted scenes, and bloopers.
Well, now that we’ve reached the 12th season of The Simpsons (Fox, Not Rated, DVD-$49.98 SRP), we’re fully into the territory of seasons that were a very pale, quite sad imitation of the show’s former brilliance. The characters have now veered sharply into slapstick, sacrificing the balance of real/cartoon comedy that marked the show’s earlier high notes. Now, it’s easy jokes and an overwhelming number of them self-referential. Sad, really. Still, these sets are at least still worth picking up for the audio commentaries and featurettes that remain packed to the rafters.
It’s double-crosses, mysteries, and intrigue in The Beast (Sony, Not Rated, DVD-$39.95 SRP), which stars Patrick Swayze as FBI vet Charles Barker – a rather unorthodox expert in undercover operations who believes an internal FBI conspiracy may be afoot, who’s also saddled with a new partner who’s got an ulterior motive. I don’t believe it got a second season pick-up, which is a shame as it’s looking like it will most likely be Swayze’s swan song, and it hadn’t quite hit its stride. The 3-disc set contains all 13 episodes.
Like most modern horror remakes, the new Last House On The Left (Universal, Not Rated, DVD-$29.98 SRP) tries just too damn hard for its scares, thoroughly eliminating any of the ghoulishly low-rent charm of the original for the sake of slick “gore scares” and atmosphere-less cinematography. A shame. Bonus features include a featurette and deleted scenes. A Blu-Ray edition ($39.98 SRP) is also available, with identical bonus features.
I know there are devotees who think it’s the second coming of Undeclared, but I have yet to find the appeal of Greek (ABC Family, Not Rated, DVD-$39.99 SRP). Still, there’s a fanbase out there, and they’re sure to be picking up the third season set, which contains audio commentaries, a 20 questions featurette with the cast, and a blooper reel.
So, in short, Total Drama Island (Cartoon Network, Not Rated, DVD-$34.99 SRP) is an animated parody of reality shows which finds 22 teens sent to a remote, run-down Canadian summer camp who must endure inane challenges and hope to avoid elimination if they hope to win a grand prize. Sound confusing? Well, check out the complete first season set and all will be made clear. Bonus features include the reunion special and cast interviews.
After an awkward, sometimes rudderless second season, things were largely back on track in the 3rd season of Dexter (Paramount, Not Rated, DVD-$42.99 SRP), as a new relationship with the Miami DA office leads to some interesting developments in Dexter’s modus operandi. The 4-disc box set contains all 12 episodes, plus interviews and the first 2 episodes of The United States Of Tara. A Blu-Ray edition ($57.99 SRP) is also available, with identical bonus material.
The second season of Gossip Girl (Warner Bros., Not Rated, DVD-$59.98 SRP) finds the East Siders in their senior year of high school, applying for colleges and spinning in hormonal circles. The 7-disc set contains all 25 episodes, plus deleted scenes, featurettes, webisodes, and a gag reel.
It’s not exactly intellectually stimulating, but using the beautiful high-definition of Blu-Ray to take aerial journeys around the world is certainly worth a look see to me, and that’s exactly what you get with both Visions Of Britain & Ireland and Visions Of Italy (Acorn, Not Rated, Blu-Ray $49.99 SRP each) – high-def aerial tours.
After her ridiculously self-confident appearance on Friday Night with Jonathan Ross, I was at least curious about Hannah Montana: The Movie (Walt Disney, Rated G, Blu-Ray-$44.99 SRP). Not curious enough to go see it, mind you – I’m not its audience, and everything I’ve seen of the show has been awkwardly written. Still, there are Hannah/Miley fans aplenty who will snap up the 3-disc Blu-Ray set, which contains an audio commentary, featurettes, deleted scenes, and bloopers, as well as a standard DVD copy of the flick.
You may remember that I heaped heavy praise upon Hot Toys’ Iron Man Mark III a few weeks back, as I was utterly delighted by its movie-perfect sculpting and snazzy light-up features. Well, it may be hard to believe, but I think I like the Hot Toys 12″ Iron Man Mark II ($159.99) even more. While the sculpt is nearly identical (save for the addition of the rivets), the faux-polished metal paint job is a wonder to behold – it really does capture the look to a “t”. The light feature is identical as well, featuring LED-lit eyes, chest, and repulsors. There’s also a swappable head featuring the in-helmet likeness of Robert Downey, Jr. as Tony Stark. In the pics below, you’ll also notice the inclusion of the LED “trophy” heart, which is also screen accurate. Really, you need to head over to Sideshow and get this before you regret missing it.
So there you have it… my humble suggestions for what to watch, listen to, play with, or waste money on this coming weekend. See ya next week…
Adult Swim’s Dana Snyder and FRED’s Ken Plume set out to have a literate conversation between two pals, but inevitably devolve into a verbal, and funny, free-for-all full of bickering, infighting, and the special kind of male bonding that comes from conflict expressed through the podcast medium.
Actor/comedian/raconteur Dana Snyder, you’re certainly aware, is Aqua Teen Hunger Force’s Master Shake, Squidbillies‘ Granny, Minoriteam’s Dr. Wang, and The Venture Bros.‘ Alchemist. Available for weddings and bar mitzvahs (bat availability pending), you can keep tabs on him via his website, www.eyeofthesnyder.com.
Ken Plume is the editor-in-chief here at FRED. He is a friend of Dana’s, as well as his arch-nemesis.
KEN P.D. SNYDECAST #109: Vomit Luge – Ken & Dana return with a chat about popcorn, a little bit of job history, and then dive full-on into a tale of a medical nature.
[CONTENT WARNING]:This podcast may contain some foul language and horribly off-color jokes. Don’t say we didn’t warn you.
LONDON – The Mutant Chronicles unleashes cannibalistic humanoids into a steam punk World War I world. The movie features Thomas Jane (Hung), Ron Perlman (Hellboy), Devon Aoki (Sin City), Sean Pertwee (Doomsday) and John Malkovich (Being John Malkovich) as the only defense against these ungodly creatures in the CGI enhanced environment. Can Aoki cut them all down with her cool sword?
Director Simon Hunter took nearly two years to adapt the role playing game into a cinematic universe. You can get great sense of what he undertook for his first major motion picture on the Two-disc Collector’s Edition DVD and the Blu-ray recently released by Magnolia Home Entertainment. I had a chance to swap questions via email with Hunter. Here’s the Q&A action:
JOE COREY: Have you played the game?
SIMON HUNTER: Yes I have played the game and enjoyed it very much – the world of Mutant Chronicles is huge and complex.
JOE: What was your prime concern when you were directing scenes? How did you keep the big image in mind while creating the live action elements?
HUNTER: To try and keep the audience’s interest – this is hard when there is so much of the story to set up.
JOE: What do you as a director provide the actors so they can know what you need when they are working in front of a green screen? Did you provide rough ups of the final frame?
HUNTER: We had almost no pre-visuals for the cast to see so I tended to explain orally what we would see in the final movie.
JOE: How was it mentally for you to spend 16 months in post-production making the image on the film take form? Was taking so much time a shock after working on commercials?
HUNTER: Hard mentally as you deal with every single shot – each shot becomes a discussion point and is open to debate both financially and artistically. It was a long struggle. Commercials are over so quickly and that is often a good thing as it gives you perspective.
JOE: Is it strange to hear someone say, “We can fix that in post” and know that it can be?
HUNTER: I am never sure about this – what you can’t do is fix the story in post – not really – you can remove boring scenes but if you keep doing that you get to the stage where the story will not make any sense. You have to get it right before you start shooting. So you can fix mistakes visually in post, like a microphone or airplane coming into shot – but you cannot magic an action scene out of the trim bin on the computer. You have to get the script right and shoot it. Its like building a house, the designers plans are the most important – all the lovely paint you apply later is just paint.
JOE: How did you decide on what extra moments went into your director’s cut?
HUNTER: The film was a hard balance – I wanted to make sure people understood the world and the first cut explained too much – we had an early cut very similar to the directors cut but were worried people would not understand it. The balance over speed and plot explanation was wrong and I wanted to correct that.
JOE: What’s your favorite bonus feature?
HUNTER: The documentary – its a real behind the scenes feature length doc – it really shows the struggle!
JOE: Which of the actors looked best as a mutant?
HUNTER: There were only about six Mutants – they all looked great!
JOE: What was your favorite memory of Thomas Jane?
HUNTER: So many – working with Thomas and Ron and all the cast really was the highlight of the film making experience for me.
JOE: What makes Ron Perlman so effective in effect heavy films?
HUNTER: He acts so well with or without greenscreen – he understands the process and is a true gentleman.
JOE: Can you discuss Devon Aoki’s sword play. Were you nervous of her taking a hit in the “Face of Lancome?”
HUNTER: She can move with a sword like no other person!
JOE: Do you remember when Sean Pertwee’s father was Dr. Who?
HUNTER: Yes of course I used to watch it avidly when I was growing up – I’d love to see a new Worzel Gummage with Sean – he would be great in it!
JOE: In America, we have a cruel image of a headmaster thanks to Pink Floyd’s the Wall and “If.” What was it like growing up as the son of a headmaster?
HUNTER: Not much fun – but I did have the school to myself when everyone went on holiday!
JOE: Is your next project going to involve such a long post-production?
HUNTER: I have about three projects that are fairly well advanced and one of them has very heavy post the other two do not.
SPEEDY DELIVERY
Sometimes you have to go to the postman to receive the goods. In this case it was a chance to hang out with Mr. McFeely. Since 1968, he’d been making the rounds of Mr. Rogers’ Neighborhood with his cry of “Speedy Delivery!”
I borrowed a small child that looked like she could be my own and scooted over to the Parkwood Library in Durham. The meeting room filled up with a nice crowd of pre-schoolers and a few old timers that remembered McFeely’s Speedy Delivery promise before FedEx was founded. McFeely arrived in his uniform and was ready to meet the kids. In this world of massive Disney glitter shows aimed at overwhelming little tykes, he asked if any of the kids wanted to sing a song for the group. He took the time to ask every kid their name. This time together wasn’t just about him. He was happy to finally have a chance to meet his TV friends. It was a sharing moment with McFeely.
This wasn’t a solo act. McFeely brought a few friends to say hello to the kids including puppets for X the Owl and King Friday. The real treat was getting to see Donkey Hodie in person. The little kids got a kick out of shaking hands with the puppets. He read a book about his character guessing what’s in packages that was written by Fred Rogers. Then we sang more songs that he enjoyed from the series. It was a relaxing time with him.
During a question and answer segment, he mentioned his recent trip to Los Angeles included dinner with Spongebob Squarepants…well it was Tom Kenny – the voice of Spongebob. The kids were thrilled that these two icons had broken bread. That ought to be the follow up to My Dinner With Andre and My Brunch with Blassie.
When actor David Newell landed the part of Mr. McFeely, he thought the gig would last one year. Over 40 years later, he’s still playing the part of America’s favorite postman that likes delivering the mail (unlike Cliff from Cheers). He wasn’t even 30 when he was cast in the role that made him look like he was already for early retirement. Now he’s 70 and spry while making his rounds of libraries and events to make sure kids know that Mr. Rogers’ lessons about community and friendship are still vital in the 21st Century. You can learn more about him in the documentary Speedy Delivery. It focuses on Newell’s lifetime role as Mr. McFeely and his work as director of public relations for the company that controls the Mr. Rogers episodes. It can be picked up on DVD at http://www.speedydeliverymovie.com.
Since the passing of Fred Rogers in 2003, Mr. Roger’s Neighborhood has been getting pushed off the PBS daily schedule in favor of the more marketable Barney, Curious George and Dragon Tales. McFeely gave the good news that soon the PBS website will be streaming several of the 895 episodes for parents who want Fred Rogers to be their kid’s TV friend.
He wrapped up his visit by signing autographs for all who wanted it. During this time, I asked him about the bogus internet email that claimed Mr. Rogers was a Navy Seal during the Vietnam War and had to wear his cardigan to hide his tattoo covered arms. Mr. McFeely pointed out that Fred Rogers was doing the show during the Vietnam war. He wasn’t covered in tattoos. He suspected that this tale evolved over a promotional photo of Mr. Rogers in a scuba suit from an underwater neighborhood special. The rumors that Lady Elaine Fairchilde is Dick Cheney remains under investigation.
What was interesting is that for a character that constantly said, “Speedy Delivery,” Mr. McFeely knew how to take time with kids on that afternoon in Durham. As I said good bye to the man who had been a part of my life since I could walk, I felt proud that we were TV friends.
TV FRIENDS
After my time with Mr. McFeely, I kept thinking about him being my TV friend. Who on the TV screen really is worthy of our TV friendship? Is anyone on MTV, VH1 or 99 percent of the reality shows really want our TV friendship? Or do they merely imagine themselves as superstars and us as their adoring (and always forgiving) fans? The closest show on TV to Mr. Rogers’ Neighborhood is Food Network’s Ace of Cakes since it is the Village of Make Believe inside Duff’s bakery. Duff ought to wear a cardigan and sneakers when he arrives at Charm City. Would you want to be a TV friend with anyone appearing on Brett Michael’s Rock of Love? Or a Bridezilla? Or anyone on Bravo’s Real Housewives series? TV now gives a platform for the worst of humanity to blind us with their dim bulbs.
Which leads me to a new batch of competitors on Dancing With the Stars These people want you to imagine yourself as their TV friends because they need you to call and vote for them so they can make fat dollars. But are they even worth dialing a toll-free number? The producers selected a group of 16 Reality Retreads and Floundering Fools to prance for our entertainment.
Donny Osmond gets to see if he can go beyond Marie. This means more Osmond facetime on Entertainment Tonight. Rumor has it that Jimmy Osmond is slated for 2013. Let’s hope Mayan Doomsday doesn’t destroy his comeback campaign. Debi Mazar might finally get noticed after being “I’ve seen that actress in another film – who is she?”
There’s going to be a lot of rehab mantras repeated backstage with Aaron Carter, Kelly Osbourne and Michael Irvin. If you want to sabotage their footwork, sit in the audience and waggle a coke spoon. Chuck Liddell continues his trek from former UFC champ to dunking booth clown. Kathy Ireland will remind us that she once had an acting career that peaked when her film was molested on Mystery Science Theater 3000. Model Joanna Krupa’s entire career is based on ripping Terrell Owens a new one on the unbearable Superstars series. Maybe she’ll tear Melissa Joan Hart a new one by saying her mechanical cat has more grace doing a tango. Macy Gray gets a chance to revive her career after she killed it on an MTV award show by wearing her album’s release date as a decoration on her dress. Singer Mya will also remind us that she once was a major force in music before iPods. Why exactly is the son of George Hamilton getting star status? The guy was on a single episode of Oz. Lenny the guy who hangs around the Today Show is a bigger star than this Ashley Hamilton. Donald Trump wouldn’t cast Ashley. And he wouldn’t even think twice about grabbing Iron Chef America‘s Mark Dacascos, Olympic swimmer Natalie Coughlin and snowboarder Louie Vito. I know grandma is going to go nuts seeing Vito. “Is that the Flying Tomato?” she’ll keep asking us.
Last season there were a lot of injuries. My hope is that former House Majority Leader Tom DeLay gets rolled off the dance floor in full traction. This guy is scum. ABC ought to feel shame for casting him in hopes of tapping the Fox News crowd. Why not let Squeaky Fromme on the show? She’s out of prison and ready to rehab her image as Manson Girl. There’s no point in voting him off early. He’s got to stick around long enough to require hip and knee replacement surgery when he bites it during his Hip Hop Freestyle.
WORST TV FRIEND
Do not buy the Heidi Montag Playboy magazine. Let Hugh Hefner know that we won’t accept this sort of behavior in the pages of his magazine. We have to prevent more faux-stars from ripping us off. If a semi-famous person wants to pose for Playboy, she better strip down and show us her landing strip. You want to pose arty without showing your naughty bits, haul your plastic surgery enhanced ass over to Maxim or Cat Fancy.
FORE RINGS
What’s the point of golf in the Olympics? Do we really need to turn the Olympics into another tour stop for the pros? Haven’t we learned the lesson from tennis? The court action was a “well that’s nice” event. When is the last time a tennis pro was hyped for their Olympic performance? It’s merely another piece of hardware in their collection. Here’s the rule of how a sport should be allowed into the Olympics: will the Gold Medal be the pinnacle of an athlete’s competition accomplishments? If it’s just another nice honor like winning the Alpo Match Point Open; the sport has no business inside the five ring circus. If Tiger Woods burns his green sports coats from the Masters and melts down his British Open jugs for a chance to win a Gold Medal, then the golf should be in the Olympics.
DVD SHELF
Californication: The Second Season reminds us that David Duchovny is not a happy man no matter how happy things should be. At the end of season one, he’d regained the love of his ex-gal (Ronin‘s Natascha McElhone). They were braced for a great time. However things go extremely wrong. She has Hank get a vasectomy and the snip cuts something inside him. During a wild party, Hank thinks he’s going down on Natascha in a dark room. But he’s picked the wrong door. However this bad moment turns out to be a good career choice as he hooks up with renowned rock producer Lew Ashby (Battlestar Galactica‘s Callum Keith Rennie). The musical madman wants David to write his biography. It’s a good job since he needs something to take his mind off his novel being stolen by Madeline Zima. Should it be mentioned that she ends up boffing Lew? Pamela Adlon (the voice of Bobby Hill) goes on a coke bender that sounds like a psychotic King of the Hill episode. David also discovers that before he was snipped, he knocked up one of his guest stars from season one. The Showtime series didn’t have a sophomore slump. Season 3 starts Sept. 28.
Simpsons: Season 12 finally gives the Comic Book Guy his due with the honor of the box cover. It’s the best box cover. Ever! In case you’re curious, Season 12 took place back in 2000. “Treehouse of Horror XI” features “G-g-Ghost D-D-Dad” spoof of the Bill Cosby turkey, “Night of the Dolphin” and “Scary Tales Can Come True.” “A Tale of Two Springfields” has the city getting divided by a new area code. The only ting that can bring the town together is a massive concert by The Who. John Entwistle was still alive to voice his part in this Homer wasteland. “The Computer Wore Menace Shoes” pays tribute to The Prisoner. “HOMR” makes the dad smart when they remove a crayon that’s been stuck in his brain. “Simpsons Tall Tales” makes the family ride the rails with hobos. They give us the true Americana stories. The boxset is loaded up with bonus features. Every episode has a commentary track. The Comic Guy even gets his own special. There’s even vintage Simpsons ads from Butterfingers and Burger King. Here’s a little clip to remember Homer’s love from 2000.
Scrubs: The Complete Eighth Season finally lets me see the show since ABC did weird scheduling stuff after it took the show over from NBC. This will be remembered as the time that Zach Braff grew his Tubb’s beard. The big change at the start is Courteney Cox taking over as chief of medicine. Don’t cry for Bob Kelso (Ken Jenkins) since he’s hanging out eating free muffins in the hospital coffeeshop. Human Giant‘s Aziz Ansari is part of the new interns. He doesn’t stick around long since he’s got to take his smug distracted jerk routine to NBC’s Parks and Recreation. “My ABC’s” is my favorite episode since it features cameos from Oscar the Grouch, Grover and Elmo. Oscar gets to hang with the Janitor. The two part “My Finale” was supposed to wrap up Braff’s role on the show. However there will be a 9th season with Zach back for a few more shows to create a transition. They’re making Scrubs into the American Doctor In the House.
Samantha Who?: The Complete Second and Final Season leaves me asking what happened to this show? How did it go from the top rated sitcom to canceled in barely a 18 months? The easy answer is that the network removed it from it’s rating partner Dancing With The Stars and stuck it with a batch of failed sitcoms. Christina Applegate is Samantha. She was hit by a car and developed amnesia. She discovers what an evil person she was in her former life. The quality of the sophomore outing is up their with the freshman year. “The Rock Star” has her dating John Taylor of Duran Duran fame. The wife was upset that the show was canceled since it meant for the first time in 9 years, she couldn’t see Melissa McCarthy on the little screen. She was TV’s original Sookie before True Blood. While the box lists only 17 episodes, there are 3 episodes in the bonus feature section. At least with both seasons on DVD, you won’t have to forget Samantha Who?
NCIS (Naval Criminal Investigative Services): The Sixth Season keeps David McCallum (The Man From UNCLE) busy tracking down evildoers. However this new season starts off with Mark Harmon and his crack team split up by their new boss. There’s a mole in their midst. There’s also plenty of navy murders, suicides and major crimes. “Capitol Offense” has them dragged onto a case by a Senator. They discover the ugliness of politics in a military case. “Heartland” has the team investigate a case in Harmon’s old town. His past is explored where we find out his dad is really the dad from The Waltons (Ralph Waite). The series last year received another bump in the ratings and became the #5 show on TV even when it ran opposite of American Idol. NCIS will be investigating how the Naval Academy was slaughtered by West Point.
The Untouchables: Season 3, Volume 1 unloads more tales from the Tommygun era. Eliot Ness (Robert Stack) and his crack unit keep busting up the underworld operations of Frank Nitti (Bruce Gordon). The stars come out to play gangsters in these 16 episodes on 4 DVDs. “The Troubleshooter” has Peter Falk (Columbo) destroying Ness’ public image. “Power Play” makes Carrol O’Connor (Archie Bunker) an evil bail bondsman. Telly Savalas (Kojak) is the named star of “The Matt Bass Scheme. Telly’s come up with a great way to deal in bootleg liquor. “Loophole” is a triple talent threat with Jack Klugman (Quincy), Martin Landau (Mission: Impossible) and Gavin MacLeod (The Love Boat). That’s enough for a night of 100 stars, but they throw in Joe Turkel (The Shining) as a goon. “The Canada Run” goes fast with Simon Oakland (The Nightstalker) using the church to assist in his smuggling operation. “The Gang War” has Victor Buono (Batman‘s King Tut) tangle with Nitti over smuggled liquor. “The Death Tree” bleeds from Charles Bronson taking out his competition. This is another stellar batch of episodes from The Untouchables. Season 3, Volume 2 is slated for release on Nov. 10.
Greek: Chapter Three makes me wonder why I despised frat houses back in college. Maybe if I went to Cyprus-Rhodes University, the idea of being spanked by classmates with a wooden paddle would be so appealing. Since the show airs on ABC Family, it’s probably safe to guess that the tales I remember from frat houses will never be covered. The channel might allows the characters to explore drinking, sex and homosexuality, but they draw the line at putting body parts inside cows. That was the rumored pledge highlight of one frat at my old school. Chapter Three covers the first 10 episodes of the second season. We get more fun from Casey and Rusty, the siblings that embrace the Pan-Hellenic life. There’s a casino night in the hopes of bailing one of the kids out of debt. Plenty of confused love crops up. Ultimately this is the show that fans of High School Musical can use as their safety school for a major in entertainment. Season 4 starts August 31.
Julia stars Tilda Swinton (Oscar winner for Michael Clayton) as a drunk woman going on a cart ride to hell. What’s remarkable is that after two decades of either being a complete ice queen or David Bowie’s sister from Man Who Fell to Earth, Swinton is carnal and look female. Although she’s not the most likable of lushes. She’s constantly get sloshed and banging anyone who drags her home. She gets a sense of direction when she agrees to help a neighbor that’s in Alcoholics Anonymous get her son back from a rich possessive grandfather. Tilda decides that it’s not good enough to reunite mother and child. She wants to unite herself with the rich grandfather’s bank account. This is not an happy uplifting film. For people used to her cold gaze in Chronicles of Narnia and Constantine this film will remind us that she’s not an androgynous android sent from the future to confuse us. But we still can’t let her near the children since she’ll use duct tape on them. Ouch.
Surveillance is Jennifer Lynch’s comeback film that should leave you confused and frightened on every level. Two FBI agents (Bill Pullman and Julia Ormond) arrive in a small town to investigate a grizzly murder and a car wreck involving serial killers. The killers wear latex masks so everyone is a bit of a suspect. Everybody has something to deny during their talks with the law except for little Stephanie (Ryan Simpkins). Even the cops have issues that shouldn’t end up in police reports. French Stewart (Third Rock From The Sun and Clamato ads) is an officer who instead of setting up speed traps prefers to shoot the tires of speeding cars. You won’t think of him as an alien goofball after this film. Pullman and Ormond are perfect as the FBI agent who want to know everything. They make the queasy seem natural in their eyes. It’s good to see Jennifer Lynch making a movie after getting mocked too hard for Boxing Helena. If you only see one film filled with psychotics this year, let it be Surveillance.
Beyond The Ordinary – T.V. Sets brings the pilot episodes to four series that have futuristic or supernatural themes. Star Trek: The Original Series has “The Man Trap.” Dr. McCoy discovers his old flame might be related to a monster that uses sucker fingers to work the salt out of humans. What are the odds that Kirk’s going to put the moves on her cause you know those toupees are so salty. Medium has Patricia Arquette getting a vision of a murder in Texas. It might have just been the Dallas Mavericks choking their season to death. Joan of Arcadia has a young girl getting message from God. It’s a fun series that lasted only two years. God couldn’t control the People Meters. 4400 has 4400 people that were abducted by aliens return to Earth. They now have special powers. The US government isn’t sure what to do with these folks. Are they puppets for aliens? 4400 lasted 4 seasons. Coincidence? If you enjoy any of the shows, you’ll be able to catch up on the entire series on DVD.
Crime and Punishment – T.V. Sets presents four cop shows from the past and present on a single DVD. Hawaii Five-0 gets represented by “Full Five Fathom.” Kevin McCarthy has been killing women and dumping their bodies off the islands. It’s up to McGarrett and his crew to uncover this murder scam. As Jack Lord would say, “Be there, aloha.” The Streets of San Francisco‘s “The Thirty-Year Pin” reminds us at how horrible health care was in 1972. A cop gets shot during a robbery. The “EMT” crew consists of two guys that look like bank guards, a stretcher and an ambulance that looks like delivers potato chips. The cop has a bullet in his gut and these EMTs don’t even try to patch him up, give him CPR or an IV drip. They aren’t even in constant radio contact with the E.R. The show itself has Karl Malden hunting down the shooter since he’s tight with the cop. He drags Michael Douglas around the Bay. CSI:NY brings the franchise to Manhattan. Gary Sinise and folks have to hunt down a killer. The only witness can only communicate through blinking. The episode is remarkably called “Blink.” Dexter rewrote cop shows. Dexter (Michael C. Hall) is the Miami police’s blood splatter expert. He’s also the area’s resident serial killer. He only kills guilty people who have cheated to escape justice. The Showtime series makes you root for what would normally be the bad guy. Far as buying the season DVDs, both Dexter and CSI:NY are up to date in season sets. Hawaii Five-O is up to 6 of the 12 available in boxsets. Season 7 gets released on Oct. 20. It’s been a while since they completed the second season of Streets. Should it be a good sign that they continue the series on DVD with this plug.
Meteor reminds us that we deserve to be doomed when Christopher Lloyd is the only scientist that can spot a meteor heading straight toward the Earth. However Lloyd doesn’t play his role for laughs. He looks like a scientist that could get real funding for his experiments unlike his time on Back To The Future. Even with a sensible look, he can’t get a real response thanks to government inaction. The apocalypse must be certified in triplicate with stamps for 14 agencies. This mini-series is packed with enough stars to make the impending doom seem entertaining. Marla Sokoloff (The Practice), Ernie Hudson (Ghostbusters), Michael Rooker (Henry: Portrait of a Serial Killer), Stacy Keach (Titus) and Jason Alexander (Seinfeld) almost make this feel like a disaster filled Love Boat. The destruction when the smaller rocks start hitting the earth hold up compared to an Irwin Allen production. Can we stop the hammer of the Gods from striking California? What I learned from Meteor is that if you fear a massive meteor shower; the best thing to do is move to the other side of the Earth.
Grey’s Anatomy: Complete Fifth Season, More Moments seemed to have as much drama on Entertainment Tonight as the actual show. Everybody kept waiting for the upset producers to finally kill off Katherine Heigl after she mouthed off about the writers with her “I’m a Movie star” attitude. T.R. Knight split the show before his contract ran out. The saddest part of the season wasn’t Heigl’s battle with cancer, but Brooke Smith (Silence of the Lambs) finally getting to join the main cast after two seasons in a recurring role. They made her the lesbian lover of Sara Ramirez. Somehow female doctor on female doctor action didn’t sit well with the devoted and she was sent packing before Christmas. There was rumors that the producers were going to “soften” the relationship by making it a threesome with a guy. That would have been a great Christmas gift. The DVD has extended episodes, deleted scenes and a Behind-the-scenes documentary on the 100th episode.
Private Practice: The Complete Second Season gives the Grey’s Anatomy spin-off a chance to grow after the strike shortened debut season. Kate Walsh thrives after she splits the hospital life for Oceanside Wellness Centre in sunny Los Angeles. There’s a touch of reality as the Centre seems to be struggling in this harsh economy. There’s fear of bankruptcy. But no matter how bad the financial crunch gets, Kate and her friends always have time for a good romp in the bed. Just cause she’s not on Grey’s Anatomy doesn’t mean she has to remain celibate like Marcus Welby. “Serving Two Masters” has two pregnant women who don’t know they share the same husband. This must happen a lot in a city with two NBA teams. There’s crossover action with Grey’s Anatomy so the devoted will have to buy both boxsets. The bonus features include deleted scenes, bloopers and a special piece on Audra McDonald.
Oh no! Just when you thought it was safe to hang out at the Quick Stop…
Cabin Fever (hosted by the twisted souls Brian Fitzpatrick and Aaron Poole) is the result of having too much time on your hands and access to your local community radio station.
Over the course of an hour, they manage to trawl the depths of good taste, plus throw some music in. How much more could you want from a podcast?… Quality? Oh… we didn’t think of that.
Enjoy! And we hope our cross Atlantic friends can understand the Irish accent 😉
Hugs and Kisses,
Aaron P. + Rev. Fitzy
CABIN FEVER #74: Name That Tune – The boys spend the first half of the show discussing wedding bands, The Beatles, and recent movie releases, and the second half being befuddled by listener-sent news stories. Just a typical Cabin Fever episode, really. Music provided this week by the excellent Chubb Rock and Wordsmith.
[CONTENT WARNING]:Explicit contents! We say every naughty word you can think of. You have been warned!
Welcome to our weekly round-up of featured giveaways here at Quick Stop. Every Wednesday, we’ll present a new clutch of DVDs, books, and other cool stuff you can take a shot at winning. All you have to do is click on the graphics below to be taken to their respective contest pages. And good luck!
In conjunction with Nickelodeon Home Video, we’re giving away three (3) copies of iCARLY: SEASON 2 VOLUME 1 on DVD.
In conjunction with Warner Bros. Home Video, we’re giving away three (3) copies of SMALLVILLE: SEASON 8 on DVD.
In conjunction with Shout Factory Home Video, we’re giving away five (5) copies of THIRTYSOMETHING: SEASON 1 on DVD.
In conjunction with Fox Home Video, we’re giving away three (3) copies of LIE TO ME: SEASON 1 on DVD.
In conjunction with Universal Home Video, we’re giving away three (3) copies of FIGHTING on DVD.
In conjunction with MGM Home Video, we’re giving away three (3) copies of BOOT CAMP on DVD.
22 YEARS LATER, THIS GENERATION GETS THEIR ROBOCOP!!!
In 1987 there was this movie with a silly name, odd premise, a main character that looked like something out of Metropolis, and a non-A-list-celebrity in the lead role. The movie opened in theaters and subsequently kicked down the front door of Hollywood, gave it an uppercut to the jaw, and started pissing in its coffee pot. This film was Robocop.
Two decades later Hollywood had lost its way again, it forgot its lesson. Luckily, on August 14th 2009 director Neill Blomkamp decided to crawl into the bedroom window, while Hollywood was sleeping, and knock up its daughter. He did it with a film called District 9. It was exactly what we needed.
No big-name actors to weigh down the budget, no lame attempts at adapting already existing properties, no non-sense, no entanglements… District 9, much like Robocop, is just hardcore, passionate film making from a new voice. A voice not to dissimilar from a young Paul Verhoeven.
Now, first off, if you are looking for a straightforward review of the film may I direct your attention over to the talented writings of QuickStop’s own Christopher Stipp. Second, I am in no way saying that District 9 is a “rip off” of Robocop. While there are tonal, character, comedic and satirical similarities between the two films, my point is not to insult District 9 for rehashing, stealing, or ripping off of another movie. Let me repeat that: I’M NOT SAYING THEY ARE THE SAME MOVIE; I’M NOT TALKING ABOUT PLAGIARISM; THE PICTURES ARE NOT MEANT TO POINT OUT THEFT. However I could probably say that 50 times and still some body will come on here, look at the pictures without reading anything and call me an idiot. The internet is a beautiful thing. Still, my point is one of praise. This film is not only an artistic success, but a financial one as well, much like Robocop, it will leave Studio Execs scratching their craniums wondering how and why this film worked.
Both of these movies, above all things, are social commentary. They are bloody, gritty, dirty, futuristic satires. District 9 is obviously about apartheid, political corruption and corporate greed, where as Robocop is about fascism, political corruption and corporate greed. And for people that have a hard time thinking outside the box, and tying their shoes, I suppose they are about aliens and robots as well. They are good companion pieces in that they use these rather deep socio-political frameworks to ask questions, not answer them, and to ultimately facilitate the action, special effects, gore, and humor.
The tonal similarities they share are pretty significant, to the point of being complimentary. You have two cities in dire straights, Johannesburg and Detroit. A corporation offers to swoop in, get involved politically, and take care of the problems at hand. District 9‘s MNU (Multi-National United) is painfully similar to Robocop‘s corrupt behemoth of industry called OCP (Omni Consumer Products). This is not theft; this similarity is simply a by-product of the fact that a giant, evil corporation with a cold-industrial moniker is the only way to skin that particular satiric-cat. When films like this are done properly, they are bound to share elements. I know I sound defensive against my own assertion that these movies are similar but, sue me, I like to argue with myself.
Wikus, District 9‘s “hero” is not unlike Officer Alex Murphy. The two men both start out the respective films as part of the machine that is trying to fix the problem. In the process of such, they both get injured, disfigured, loose their humanity, their ties with their family, are betrayed by their corporate superiors and are forced to use their new found situation to fight for what they see as right, all under the back drop of a much larger dystopian future. Wikus’ situation isn’t as finite as Murphy’s (as Murphy never had the option of going back to what he was, he died,) nor is Wikus a purely “good” soul as Murphy is, yet the similarities of their loss are apparent. Both futures, I might add, are very dank, dirty and covered in decade old grime. They both sport monuments of former glory, statues that depict utopia are engulfed in excrement and failure. Johannesburg is shown to be over run by a slum motif, covered in 20 years of stagnation, much like Detroit in Robocop; it is a city that looks like it has been without maintenance for several years.
District 9 starts out in a documentary style, which, I would argue is the equivalent of Robocop‘s several commercials and news programs. In the 80’s that is simply the way they decided to break the fourth wall, today audiences are more open to characters just talking to the camera. This device in both films, leads to, or creates most of the humor. The humor being very important, cause if you’re not laughing from time to time, you will forget what the filmmakers want you to remember… this is entertainment, it should be fun. However, it’s not mindless fun, there is depth, and sometimes it’s damn funny.
Neither film bothers to deal with the grandeur of the devices at hand. Robocop‘s narrative isn’t about the technical developments of robotic technology; District 9 isn’t about the complex nature of the alien’s world, society, and knowledge. In fact, District 9 shows audiences something very new to this decade, aliens that aren’t all that remarkable. They are about as smart and physically vulnerable as us, they just happen to have lived long enough to develope space travel and superior munitions technology… other then that, they are just humans that look different. A fresh, gut-punch approach to such sci-fi material is what made Robocop so biting in the 80’s. Same goes for District 9.
If you look at a lot of the criticism of District 9, you will see a pattern. My opinion is not fact, nor is anyone’s, but it seems to me that those that have put the movie in a negative light are not seeing the movie for what it is, they are simply seeing the premise. The premise sounds stupid, much like Robocop (which also has the added opposition of have a name that sounds ridiculous.) However, there is still people to this day that don’t “get” or “understand” the love for Paul Verhoeven’s sci-fi-horror-action classic… they are so dense that all they see is a stupid violent movie about a robot cop. The same goes for District 9, which is confusing, since even critics that are fully aware of the African Apartheid plot device still seem as though they aren’t in on the “joke.”
If everything I just said about the comparison between the two films seems like just a meandering mess… then at I’ll give you a good, clean, surface comparison. District 9 had its own ED-209:
That proves nothing, and goes against the angle of approach I was taking, but why fight it, let the internet have its fun.
The biggest similarity that the films share is in what they represent for mainstream entertainment at the time of their release. These are real films, not adaptations, written and directed solely for the screen and the screen alone. Big-budget science fiction films, with substance, made with passion instead of a goal (i.e. “We want a movie based on this toy line… do it, do it right, and do it so everybody can understand it!”) They are huge, filled with counter-culture ideas, abnormal themes, for a select audience, and most of all heavy with questions. That is what you get when studios get behind things other then the bottom line. So thank you to Neill Blomkamp, Paul Verhoeven, and even Peter Jackson for “mavericking” the hell out of cinema. Let’s hope that Hollywood doesn’t try to emulate-rape the premise… the last thing we need is the Robocop 3 version of District 9, I wouldn’t buy that for a dollar.
SORORITY ROW
Really? So did we just have a script lying around from the lame horror trend of the 90’s that a studio thought they might as well sink a couple millions into it just for laughs? This movie is 10 years past its prime. The sub-genre ignited by Scream and killed by every subsequent Scream rip-off, then chopped up by no less then 76 Scary Movie spoofs is coming to a theater near you!!! Isn’t it too early to do throwback to bad movies of last decade? Well at least Carrie Fisher is in it.
Welcome to TV or Not TV where I’ve been on vacation.
Yes, even I from time to time will escape from the weekly grind and take time off. During these types of hiatus there isn’t much time for enjoying television. If anyone reading this has children then you know that any of the television that you might walk in far away places will be of the Cartoon Network variety more than anything else. As such I can say that there isn’t exactly a lot for me to expound upon in this week’s forward.
One thing I can talk about, however, is what I like to refer to as my background noise. When I’m sitting here in my office my favorite thing to do is have something that I’ve already watched and I’m familiar with to have on in the background to help give me a benchmark for the passage of time. A few weeks ago I picked up the Roku box that allows you, through a broadband Internet connection, to watch Netflix or Amazon instant viewing items to be played directly to your television. This has allowed my daughter to enjoy things I’ve never bought on video like Who Framed Roger Rabbit?, Milo & Otis, Free Willy and many others (including an endurance run of Sponge Bob Square Pants). Without it you just need your web browser and in my office I decided to use this feature. I mistakenly thought that I could have LOST playing in the background and found that I was absolutely glued to the television and not getting any work done. Keeping the events of the most recent season in mind really opens one’s mind up in many different ways in watching the first season again. If you have something to do having LOST in the background won’t suit you for productivity.
That’s all I’ve got for right now, so let’s turn our focus instead to what we have available to watch in the week to come.
MONDAY
DISCOVERY – 8:00 PM: If you haven’t seen the post-apocalyptic survival simulation called The Colony than you have a chance to watch the first four episodes back-to-back tonight. This is the kind of reality television that doesn’t make me feel guilty watching it.
E! – 8:30 PM: In Reality Hell the unsuspecting mark goes on a reality show where everyone else are actors and they are subjected to absurd challenges each week as a new reality show type is skewered. Yeah, I know, sounds a lot liked Punk’d and every other piece of Candid Camera rip-off out there. Might be worth a chuckle or two however.
ABC – 10:00 PM: I’m sorry I just can’t stop talking about Castle. It’s like candy that I just can’t get enough of.
TUESDAY
SLUETH – 4:00 PM: Lazy afternoon? How about 8 hours of Monk? If I were home I’d be in for sure.
TBS – 8:00 PM: How bad are the viewing choices when I’m willing to suggest watching two hours of Family Guyrepeats? Some questions just answer themselves, don’t they?
CBS – 9:00 PM: If you like drama and haven’t watched Big Brother 11 than I would really encourage you to watch the completely mental group of people that are locked in this house. At press time I don’t know if the show Sunday night actually mentioned a house guest that’s been kicked out, so maybe today you’ll see a person implode.
TLC – 10:00 PM: I don’t know if it speaks well or not of Masters of Reception that the first thing that you hear about it that it’s produced by Kelly Rippa and husband Mark Consuelos, but anything following around wedding planners has to be entertaining.
WEDNESDAY
FOX – 8:00 PM: Just like a bad cold coming back FOX is bringing us Octomom: The Incredible Unseen Footage. I needed something to write about or I wouldn’t have even mentioned this. Please, don’t watch. Let’s make her finally go away.
ABC – 8:00 PM: I’ve got two words to tell get you interested in watching Who Wants to Be a Millionaire: SNOOP DOG! REGIS: Is that your final answer Snoop? SNOOP: Fo’ shizzle Reeg. Oh yeah, I’m watching it.
BRAVO – 9:00 PM: Sin City helps spice things up with the new season of Top Chef: Las Vegas.
THURSDAY
DISCOVERY – 8:00 PM: How have I missed American Loggers this long?
BRAVO – 10:00 PM: The network may be different but Project Runway will still provide all the stitch-in-time drama you’ve all grown to love.
FRIDAY
DISCOVERY – 7:00 PM: Can you survive four hours of Survivorman? First bit of advice, pee on your t-shirt and wrap it around your head to stay cool. Wait, only do that if you are in the desert.
TLC – 10:00 PM: Just when you thought there was a reality show about everything we now get to see behind the scenes of the horse racing industry with Jockeys, or as I like to think of it Little People, Big Horses.
SATURDAY
ABC – 8:30 PM: The visual effects are amazing and if you’ve never seen it War of the Worlds will have you sitting on the edge of your seat. Why not watch it for free?
DISCOVERY – 9:00 PM: Tonight Extreme Bodies goes to extreme opposites with one hour being about the people with conditions making them giants and the next hour being those with dwarfism.
SUNDAY
NBC – 7:00 PM: If you’ve been watching (ratings say odds are you weren’t) Merlin than you will want to watch the season finale tonight.
DISCOVERY – 7:00 PM: Four hours of Planet Earth is like candy for the eyes and food for the mind.
HIST – 9:00 PM: Nothing says fun like driving 300 miles without brakes on the season finale of Ice Road Truckers.
ABC – 10:00 PM: The crew hits the turn-back threshold and has to come to grips with it on Defying Gravity.
SModcast is the meandering palaver of a pair of dudes whose voices are so dull, they don’t deserve to be on the radio (and, hence, aren’t). Kevin Smith and Scott Mosier are SModcast.The best thing about SModcast? It don’t cost nothing.
SModcast 92: Flame On! –
In which our heroes crack Quebec’s greatest unsolved mystery.
[CONTENT WARNING]SModcast features harsh language and even harsher notions of propriety. Listener discretion is advised.
Ari Gold, the man who created the very funny ADVENTURES OF POWER, passed along an e-mail message to let me know that 
I’ve got some DVDs to give away. Want some?
Director: 
Yeah, so, one of my absolute favorite Disney films I their live-action/animated hybrid musical 
This week’s Thinkgeek recommendation is a piece of cool kit that always seems to be out of stock. It’s just that popular. However long it lasts, it’s now back in stock, so run and pick up your very own 
Seeing as how my nephews are addicted to Nickelodeon (particularly the yellow crack that is Spongebob), it’s inevitable that I’d have to see the programming on offer. One of the shows that I actually enjoy quite a bit – and believe is just as well-scripted as the sitcoms on network TV, better even – is a favorite of my 5-year-old nephew, 
I can’t be the only one who was completely blindsided by the announcement that the 4th season of 
If you’ve ever watched the UK series Skins and thought to yourself “My teenage years were nothing like that sex party bacchanal,” then 
Well, now that we’ve reached the 12th season of 
It’s double-crosses, mysteries, and intrigue in 
Like most modern horror remakes, the new 
I know there are devotees who think it’s the second coming of Undeclared, but I have yet to find the appeal of 
So, in short, 
After an awkward, sometimes rudderless second season, things were largely back on track in the 3rd season of 
The second season of 
It’s not exactly intellectually stimulating, but using the beautiful high-definition of Blu-Ray to take aerial journeys around the world is certainly worth a look see to me, and that’s exactly what you get with both 
After her ridiculously self-confident appearance on Friday Night with Jonathan Ross, I was at least curious about 
LONDON – The Mutant Chronicles unleashes cannibalistic humanoids into a steam punk World War I world. The movie features Thomas Jane (Hung), Ron Perlman (Hellboy), Devon Aoki (Sin City), Sean Pertwee (Doomsday) and John Malkovich (Being John Malkovich) as the only defense against these ungodly creatures in the CGI enhanced environment. Can Aoki cut them all down with her cool sword?
Sometimes you have to go to the postman to receive the goods. In this case it was a chance to hang out with Mr. McFeely. Since 1968, he’d been making the rounds of Mr. Rogers’ Neighborhood with his cry of “Speedy Delivery!”
Oh no! Just when you thought it was safe to hang out at the Quick Stop…
