FRED Entertainment

June 14, 2010

TV Or Not TV: 6/14 – 6/20

Filed under: TV Or Not TV — admin @ 3:34 am

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QUICK NOTE: I’m going to be talking about DOCTOR WHO again this week, and I’m going to be talking about episodes that haven’t aired in the US yet. If you don’t want to be spoiled just skip ahead to where you see the word MONDAY, ok?

In keeping my heart as pure as possible and my conscience as clean as I can I have to admit that when I first sat down this week to write what I affectionately refer to as the “upper portion” of this week’s column I was going to attempt a weak handed turn at talking about TRUE BLOOD. I know that many others in the same category of writing are doing just that and if I had an ounce of sense in my head I’d still muddle through the half-hearted and hack-like exercise in writing but truth be told I just don’t want to. TRUE BLOOD was good in its first season, it was great in its second season and it’s either going to be amazing in its third season or it is going to flounder. There are others much better at writing about television that can tell you all about it so let’s all just know that I had no interest in really saying anything about it other than what you find in this paragraph.

This week the direction my passion is leading my words is to talk mainly about the upcoming season finale for the 11th DOCTOR’s first series of DOCTOR WHO. Just like any good TIME LORD (or fan of a TIME LORD) I experience a bit of time shifting in my weekly watching of the show. If I were a person that lived in the UK I’d be two week’s away from this fifth series’ 13th episode. To say, at this point, that I’m very excited about this is a gross understatement. In the next two weeks we are going to find out what the PANDORICA is, we’re going to find out how that bit of shrapnel turned up in the crack in COLD BLOOD and we may find out if the DOCTOR had his coat back in FLESH AND STONE because of a production error or something greater (more on that last bit later).

I’m not the type of person to stick their head in the sand and say that there haven’t been some hiccups in this fifth series of DOCTOR WHO but thankfully there have been more good moments than bad. THE VICTORY OF THE DALEKS and THE VAMPIRES OF VENICE are probably the only two episodes out of the 11 that have aired so far that I have had much fault with at all. Their stories didn’t hold me, there was something that just didn’t feel right while watching them and for one reason or another I was just put off by them. That still leaves nine episodes so far that have aired that I’ve enjoyed and watched repeatedly after their original air dates. That’s a pretty decent track record. This coming week on BBC AMERICA they will be airing “VINCENT AND THE DOCTOR” which, though polarizing for fans of the show, I thoroughly loved. It accomplished a loving tribute to VINCENT VAN GOGH both in context and cinematography. What some found cheesy I found refreshing and touching and even at the risk of you hating it I would say that I recommend it.

Throughout this season there have been seeds planted and growing towards this finale. PRISONER ZERO told us, “The Pandorica will open. Silence will fall” in THE ELEVENTH HOUR and since then the same crack that allowed for his escape has been following the DOCTOR (or has it actually been following the TARDIS?). In FLESH AND STONE we learned that it undoes the time of any that it consumes, erasing them from existence. We’ve gotten hints that its effect has reached across the galaxy and we’ve even seen first hand what happens to someone when they are taken by the crack in COLD BLOOD when the very existence of RORY was undone. We also know that RIVER SONG will be present when the PANDORICA opens because she told us so in FLESH AND STONE. The last real nugget we received was from COLD BLOOD when we found out that a piece of shrapnel from the explosion that causes the crack was a piece of the TARDIS.

With all of these clues laid out for us the real question that I have that I’m sure we will have answered in two weeks is just how important is AMY POND to the resolution of this PANDORICA/SILENCE FALLING situation? She, as a seven year old, was the person that introduced us to this time consuming crack. Ever since she came aboard the TARDIS we’ve been seeing the crack following either her, the DOCTOR or the TARDIS itself. The date the DOCTOR was able to ascertain the explosion that caused the crack to happen was the day of AMY’s wedding. AMY doesn’t remember the DALEK invasion in THE STOLEN EARTH. Every way you look at it things all seem to point back, one way or another, to AMY. Then there’s the matter of the DOCTOR’s coat.

Back in the episode FLESH AND STONE there was a strange thing that happened that I knew was strange but I didn’t know why. I can’t pretend to be smart enough to have put my finger on it myself but thankfully the fine fellows of the DOCTOR WHO-centric podcast RADIO FREE SKARO made me realize why it was strange without going in to great detail. The strange thing that I’m talking about is the moment that the DOCTOR has to leave AMY behind in the atmosphere-generating woods. In this scene we see the DOCTOR in shirt and bow-tie but without his coat because it was left in the grasping hands of a WEEPING ANGEL. Immediately after he leaves her he’s back again, but this time he’s behaving different. He seems less angry and more nurturing towards AMY. He delivers a cryptic message to her about her having to start trusting him and then they have the following exchange:

AMY: “Doctor, the crack in my wall. How can it be here?”
DOCTOR: “I don’t know yet but I’m working it out”¦Remember what I told you when you were seven?”
AMY: “What did you tell me?”
DOCTOR: “No. That’s not the point. You have to remember.”

And then the DOCTOR is gone again. The next time we see him he’s again without his coat. I have to admit that the Uber-geek within me really wants this moment to not be an accident or a continuity error on the part of the production staff. I’m really hoping that somehow this moment was planned, it was shot specifically this way and it will some how be called back to in the next two episodes. This call back, of course, will force a call back to something said in the very first episode by the DOCTOR when AMY was seven. This something is so important that the DOCTOR actually goes back into his own timeline to deliver this message to AMY, an idea they reminded us was possible in the episode THE LODGER when AMY is taken back in time by the DOCTOR to leave a note for him after he was stranded. The prospect of all of this is so very exciting but truth be told sometimes a coat is just a coat, a mistake is just a mistake, and it all may be much ado about nothing.

Of course part of me feels quite foolish talking about the season finale when here in the US it won’t actually air until JULY 24th thanks to BBC AMERICA not wanting to waste any new programming for the 4th of July weekend. This means that those of us in North America won’t be seeing THE LODGER, THE PANDORICA OPENS or THE BIG BANG until the latter part of JULY. Thank goodness for time shifting.

Well now that I’ve droned on long and hard about DOCTOR WHO let’s finally turn our attention to the regular programming you can actually watch now. I tell you now that this week was really hard to find things in so take my advice now and take up a hobby or something. It’s getting bleak.

MONDAY

BBC AMERICA – 8:00 AM: How about a mini TORCHWOOD marathon? The last six episodes of the first season are shown back to back. If you called in sick to work today these should entertain you enough to ignore your cocktail flu.

FOX – 9:00 PM: Last week’s episode of THE GOOD GUYS was almost as good for me as the series pilot. I encourage you to watch if for no other reason for those creepy moments where COLIN HANKS channels the same mannerisms his dad displayed on television 30 years ago.

NBC – 10:00 PM: PERSONS UNKNOWN was just creepy enough to make me tune back in this week. If they an keep the addictive creep-factor up I’ll come back again. According to the ratings though the title might need to be changed to SHOW UNKNOWN.

ABC – 10:00 PM: There is no greater sport than having the vapid and pretty be exposed for just that on TRUE BEAUTY. They may be looking for the person that is beautiful both inside and out but let’s face facts folks, with this group they’re just trying to find the the lesser of all these evils.

TUESDAY

TNT – 7:00 PM: I really think  that the show BONES came into it’s own in the second season around the same time the four episodes being mini-marathon’d tonight originally aired. If you are a fan of the show it’s a great way to relive the season.

NBC – 8:00 PM: OK, first LOSING IT WITH JILLIAN was on at 10 and they told us it would be on at 8. Then they changed their minds and aired it at 10. Now they’ve moved it back to 8. They realize we won’t lose any weight trying to follow the show on their schedule, right?

FOOD NETWORK – 9:00 PM: Apparently the stakes are higher when the cake gets smaller because the cake challenges are now being outdone by CUPCAKE WARS. Is this like the late night wars but sweeter?

BRAVO – 9 PM: KATHY GRIFFIN: MY LIFE ON THE D-LIST returns with acting lessons from LIZA MINNELLI. Ratings in WeHo are going to go through the roof!

WEDNESDAY

BBC AMERICA – 8:00 AM: It’s another RTD mini-marathon with the first part of the third series of DOCTOR WHO.  Is this programming appealing to the unemployed or what?

TV LAND – 10:00 PM: Just when you thought the sitcom stylings of THREE’S COMPANY were long since forgotten along comes HOT IN CLEVELAND. VALERIE BERTINELLI, JANE LEEVES and WENDIE MALICK have an emergency lay over in CLEVELAND and find out that the men there are cougar lovers. BETTY WHITE tries to save the show but this thing almost comes off like it’s trying to parody itself.

THURSDAY

SYFY – 7:00 PM: The TV movie didn’t quite capture the magic of the original story but I still enjoyed STEPHEN KING’S THE LANGOLIERS.

FOX – 8:00 PM: I know that if you already bought the first part of the first season of GLEE on DVD already you’ve worn it out watching the ACAFELLAS perform but those of us that haven’t can tune in tonight to enjoy it all over again.

TBS – 8:00 PM: There was very solid evidence that they never should have made THE LOVE GURU. That evidence? Folks, I give you AUSTIN POWERS IN GOLDMEMBER.

AMC – 8:00 PM: There are movies from my youth that I shouldnt’ have seen and didn’t appreciate until I was older. CADDYSHACK is one of those movies.

FRIDAY

SYFY – 8:00 AM: Looks like the fomer SCIFI network is taking programming tips from BBC AMERICA. They’re showing 7 hours straight of fourth series episodes of DOCTOR WHO.

FOX – 8:00 PM: Remember that show PAST LIFE that nobody watched? Tonight’s the last episode ever. I’m sure nobody is glad to know.

ABC – 8:00 PM: If you have a tween in your house I’m sorry that you’ll have to endure MILEY CYRUS IN LONDON: LIVE AT THE O2 tonight.

SATURDAY

BBC AMERICA – 8:00 PM: If you missed THE HUNGRY EARTH you can watch it tonight before the second half of the story (which I spoiled elements of above) titled COLD BLOOD immediately after at nine.

TBS – 8:00 PM: It is with much shame in my heart that I admit that I wouldn’t mind at all watching BLADES OF GLORY and ROAD TRIP back to back.

DISNEY – 9:00 PM: If you haven’t seen THE INCREDIBLES than I’m going to have to remind you that it is one of the best super hero movies to have been made in the past decade. If you have the DISNEY channel and haven’t watched it yet than do so now. You’ve been put on notice.

SUNDAY

SYFY – 7:00 PM: SYFY tries to update the classic hero THE PHANTOM. I give them props for trying but his revamped costume looks like an attack dog trainer’s protective gear with a bad eye visor thrown on to it.

TLC – 8:00 PM: The fact that TLC is rolling out NATALEE HALLOWAY: LOST IN PARADISE UPDATED right now kind of makes my skin crawl.

ABC – 9:00 PM: VIRGINIA MADSEN stars as the mom of a small-town crime family that’s forced to go straight when dad gets locked up in SCOUNDRELS. Um… OK there’s not much else on so I’ll try it.

TNT – 9 :00 PM: LEVERAGE is back for a third season with NATE behind bars. Yeah, that can’t last long or this is going to be the shortest season ever.

HBO – 9:00 PM: OK, I’ll also mention TRUE BLOOD here in the column as well because it’s on. At press time I still haven’t even watched the season premiere so I can’t say a damned thing about this episode except to say that there’s vampires in the show. Big revelation, I know.

ABC – 10:00 PM: I’ve seen lots of commercials for THE GATES but I have no idea what the heck it’s about. I think it’s a community filled with monsters that are trying to go straight which makes it a much stranger version of SCOUNDRELS.

Hands Down #7

Filed under: Comic Strips,Hands Down — Tags: , , , , — Aaron @ 3:26 am

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Welcome to Hands Down, FRED’s own look into the world of the folks that frequent this sordid world of geekery. Follow Aaron, Brian and Colin (and a menagerie on the way) as they traverse the light fantastic or some such nonsense… What? It’s an online fortnightly comic strip, what kind of description did you expect?

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VISIT THE HANDS DOWN ARCHIVES

Follow Hands Down on Twitter

Written by Aaron Poole. Art by John Merker. Copyright 2010.

FREDagator: 2010-06-14

Filed under: Articles — UncaScroogeMcD @ 12:43 am

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RIP, Jimmy Dean. Your sausage became a mystery meat, but you supported a young puppeteer named Jim Henson…

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June 12, 2010

BIG BROTHER Blog Report: Day 4

Filed under: Articles,TV News — Tags: , — Aaron @ 8:36 am

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Day 4

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They’re only in the house a couple of days and already the bitching has begun.

For those who think that only the first season of Big Brother was a “social experiment” and the rest isn’t, you’re doing it wrong. I always find the interaction of people in group scenarios extremely fascinating on a psychological level and this year the battle lines are getting drawn pretty early.

I mentioned in my first report that Govan was likely to create a partnership with somebody in order to gain a little power in the house. Early indicators seems that it will be Beyonce/Rachael. Which is not a bad choice for him, she seems eager to bitch about everyone in there and likes to throw her weight around a little bit.

It all started when the housemates made their first shopping list. Sunshine was trying to stress that food should be bought with the little money that they had (crazy concept, I know) and the Rachael-Govan monster had a little rant about it behind her back in the kitchen. They claim it wasn’t fair that, as a vegan, Sunshine got her own food. To a certain extent I agree with that as her veganism is a choice and not a health requirement but all she was asking for was food, not a new dress or something. I have no issue with Rachael and Govan being a little bit annoyed by it but they were talking about it as if they deserved a medal for not making it an argument.

This carried on to when Rachael found out that they didn’t buy any tokens to use with hair dryers and straighteners. The hair dresser nearly shit herself over the idea that she might have to tie her hair up for a few days.

To go from acting high and mighty about “buying for the group” during the shopping list while looking down her nose at Sunshine for asking for something personal to then moaning to everyone that they should have spent money on her hair is a pretty big drop in standards in a short period of time. Rachael is painting herself as a selfish prima-donna and I don’t think she even realises it.

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Yeah, keep quiet, you might last longer.

The housemates won their shopping budget with the first house task. They were suspended 40 metres in the air as they sat around a dinner table. One housemate needed to stay in the house and scared-of-her-own-shadow Sunshine asked to stay grounded because she is “medically” unable to stand heights. Right. Anyway, after their sky lunch Sunshine had to draw newspaper quotes in a Pictionary sort of game. For every quote they guessed right, they would get more money for their shopping budget.

I have to give her some credit, Sunshine did a decent job with some awkward phrases. One was “squatter” and I know I would have gone a much ruder route than she did, so fair play.

One thing that made me roll my eyes though was John James during this task. He is literally as dumb as a bag of bricks. You can sometimes see the brass cogs turning in his head as he tries to spell his own name. Keep an eye on him as the days go by because he’s really going to make a show of himself. He kept asking if one phrase had anything to do with Australia. I don’t know why other than it’s probably one of 18 words he knows.

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Does it have anything to do with me?

Poor old Mario. I have to admit, I’m starting to fall in love with this guy. First night there, while talking to Caoimhe he was asked if he liked anyone in the house. He said plastic man Ben was nice. Caoimhe then makes a pretty rude gesture for someone you know less than 24 hours and asked Ben if he was gay. He said no. Instant rejection for poor Mario. Some nice pay back arrived for Caoimhe when Ben claimed he thought she was gay. Sorry dear, but that haircut is doing you no favours so you’ll have to accept that one.

Mario has been sneaking about as the mole fantastically. He has lied through his teeth about the whole ordeal but not once has he come across as a sneak or deceiver. Everyone is buying it hook line and sinker because of his doe eyes and softy exterior. All the while he has been planting evidence of a different mole and throwing food into the pool. He’s the perfect pick for this, even if he was picked out of a hat.

I said before that this task is possibly going to make him a show winner and I still stand by it. He is getting plenty of screen time at a stage that we’re still getting to know the housemates and he gets to have some good stuff with The Tree. For anyone who saw the Celebrity Big Brother season last Christmas will tell you, The Tree is a fantastically funny inanimate object.

Here’s hoping he passes this task and sticks around because it would be a terrible shame to lose him.

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Mario, man of the people/man of the mole people

Quick round up of my other thoughts:

1) Stop talking about cameramen. They’re there to film you, its not a big conspiracy, it’s the fucking show. We don’t care.
2) I still hope Shabby dies somehow.
3) They need to stop imitating Josie’s voice, it’s kind of cruel. And an ear ache.
4) Where did Ife go? You’d forget she was in there.

I’ll be back with more nattering during the week.

– Aaron Poole
Follow Aaron on Twitter – @AaronFever

Soapbox: Wait For It…

Filed under: Articles — Tags: — Aaron @ 6:04 am

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Wait For It…

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The thing about a lot of mysteries is that once the mystery has been solved and the questions have been answered, the source of the mystery isn’t fun any more. For five years now, we’ve been waiting for the mystery of Ted Mosby’s wife to be solved. We’ve looked for clues sifting through red herrings and yellow umbrellas, all the time waiting for any information that might bring us a step closer to finding out who The Mother of Ted’s children is. But How I Met Your Mother isn’t about the mystery and it isn’t about the answer. It’s about the story and it always has been.

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The original idea behind HIMYM (I’m lazy so I’ll be using the abbreviation from here on) “was let’s write about our friends and the stupid stuff we did in New York” and the mystery behind who the titular Mother is grew from the central idea of telling funny stories. The mystery element of the show that has become such a big part of what the show is will never out shine the fact that HIMYM is a show about a guy telling his story to his kids, and a few years from now when the mystery has been solved and we know all the answers we’ll still be going back to watch re-runs because the story of How is more important and more entertaining than the mystery of Who.

But a little speculation never did anyone any harm and the easiest thing to speculate about (in my opinion) is the timeline. Old Ted is telling the story to his kids in the year 2030 and his kids look as if they are in their mid to late teens. Some of the stories that Old Ted tells his kids are pretty explicit and he does seem like a pretty liberal father but I can’t imagine that he’d tell the story of Barney’s “Perfect Week” to kids any younger than that. So if we take it that Ted has his first child no later than 2014, we can safely say that his first child is conceived somewhere in 2013 or early 2014. Upon the return of HIMYM to our screens later this year, that’ll give Ted roughly three years to meet The Mother, court her, get married and conceive a child. Assuming that Ted doesn’t have a shotgun wedding, it’s very possible and indeed likely that Old Ted will at least get to the point in his story where Ted starts dating The Mother in the upcoming season. And unless Ted gets his storytelling style from Will Hayes in Definitely Maybe, he won’t try to disguise the name of The Mother. But even if he does, the famous yellow umbrella will (I assume) be a dead give away.

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At the start of Season Three of HIMYM, Old Ted tells the kids in voice over that although they know the short version of how Ted met The Mother, the one involving the yellow umbrella where we see a visual of the umbrella blowing in the wind down an empty street, there is a longer version of the story which details how Ted became the man he needed to be in order to meet The Mother. Or to put it another way… Ted is actually the least interesting character in the show.

It seems at times that Ted’s sole purpose in the show is to observe his friends’ shenanigans so that he can tell the sometimes inappropriate stories to his kids years later. Like Xander Harris in Buffy, Ted is “the one who sees”. But Xander gets better dialogue. Ted is basically the sitcom version of an “everyman” and though he does have his fair share of wacky shenanigans, the people around him do manage to provide most of the laughs and the emotional core of the series. We already know what happens with a lot of Ted’s story; he meets someone, he gets married and he has two kids.

Now that’s not to say that Ted hasn’t had his fair share of shenanigans, namely the Pineapple Incident and the night of the Paddy’s Day party, but they both involve a lot of alcohol and the encouragement of Barney. On a side note, even though he’s a fictional character, Ted’s vomit-free streak from ninety three up until he puked on himself in “Jenkins” is very impressive. That’s the kind of thing that an Irishman really appreciates and it does make me wonder exactly how much of the characters are based on the real life experiences of the show’s creators.

One aspect of the show that is definitely based on the creators’ real life experiences that is also impressive to this Irishman is the fact that the main hang out for this show’s group of friends is based on a real life pub in New York City. It always seems more realistic than another group of Friends who hung out in a coffee house outside Central Park. The pub in HIMYM, McLaren’s, is based on a real life pub in New York City called McGee’s and McGee’s even gets name checked in the show by Marshall near the end of Season 4 when he produces a bar graph of his favourite pies and a pie chart of his favourite bars. It may seem like a silly scenario, but it’s just one of many, many silly scenarios that the writers put Marshall Erickson into… but more on that later. On the pie chart, McGee’s was listed as Marshall’s second favourite bar. I’ve been lucky enough to have been to McGee’s twice, and given the fact that it’s just around the corner from the office of DC Comics, I think I’d agree that it’s my second favourite pub in New York too. From the time I spent in McGee’s I could tell that it’s just the kind of place where someone in their late twenties would accumulate a lot of stories with his close friends.

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As he’s observing the lives of his friends, each of the four people in the world that ted is closest to have an impact on his life in different ways. They say that we are all the product of the people in our lives, so it makes sense that the four people in the world that Ted spends most of his time with would have such a profound effect on him.

You can say a lot about Barney Stinson, but what he gives to Ted is the idea of getting as much joy out of life as possible. Barney’s not afraid to take chances in life, and that inspiration might be just what Ted needs in order to take the chance that leads to a life with his future wife. Barney’s character has to walk a very tight line in his constant pursuit of sexual partners. There is an element to his character that’s not a million miles away from the sub-human “writer” Tucker Max. Part of what makes Barney’s character so likeable is the way he’s portrayed by Neil Patrick Harris who makes Barney appear as roguish without ever coming across as evil or cruel. Also, Barney does have a heart and he shows every once in a while that he cares a huge deal about his friends, whether he’s trying to reunite Marshall and Lily, fighting off tears at their wedding or rushing across town to see Ted after he’s hit by a taxi. By his own admission, when Barney gets sad, he stops being sad and starts being awesome instead (true story), but much like Dr House, when Barney does display his honest emotions it usually hits home. And if you’ll allow me to return to a bit of speculation, it’s entirely possible that before the end of the series, we will finally see Barney follow his heart and end up with the one woman he’s truly loved in his life, Robin. In any of the scenes of the gang in the future, we never see Barney and we never see Robin, we never hear about how either of them ended up but we do know that they are part of the kids’ lives as Old Ted refers to them as “Uncle Barney” and “Aunt Robin”.

Since Robin was introduced to the show and to the group of friends, her primary focus has always been on her career. She’s never been afraid to try her hand at anything that she thinks would forward her career from fluff news to working a job that required her to start at four in the morning. While Robin has occasionally made sacrifices in order to be with her friends, she’s never given up and she’s never backed down from a job. This is what she gives to Ted, apart from occasional “benefits” that is, she teaches him that anything in life that’s important is worth fighting for. Even though we never see Robin in the future, Old Ted tells us that she has travelled the world and has lived in many different countries. This is another dream of Robin’s that she never gave up on and presumably it’s one that links in with her career as a reporter. I’m also assuming that, even though we don’t see her, Robin is a part of the kids’ lives despite the amount of time she has spent overseas.

During the second season of the show, the producers wisely decided to film a scene with the future kids that is directly involved with the big reveal of who The Mother is. Whether the filmed scene actually reveals who The Mother is or whether it is just a scene of the kids reacting to the information that Old Ted gives them isn’t known yet but nothing stays a secret forever and there’s a very good chance that even though there was a minimal crew on hand for the actual filming something will eventually leak out before the big reveal is aired. The logic behind filming the kids’ reaction to this part of Ted’s story was that the kids had to look the same age at the start of the story as they do at the end of the story as the telling of the story can’t realistically take any more than a few days and at this stage, the original footage of the kids is well over five years old. Lyndsey Fonseca who plays Ted’s daughter has certainly got older looking over the past five years and this year has had….a lot of exposure in two hit movies, Hot Tub Time Machine and Kick Ass. But you can be sure of one thing, whoever The Mother is and no matter when the reveal is made, The Mother has passed Lily’s Front Porch Test.

Lily has always been the mother of the group, trying to get Barney to admit his feelings for Robin, helping Ted stand up to his boss, and going as far as acting as Slap Bet Commissioner. Even in her professional life, she manages to be an authority figure as a school teacher, often bringing in her friends to give (often ignored) life lessons to the kids in her class. Lily shows Ted how to be a parent, long before Ted becomes a parent himself. Lily really steps up as the parent of the group after she accepts Marshall’s proposal of engagement, and it’s Lily’s engagement to Marshall that prompts Ted to begin his search for a wife.

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Jason Segal’s Marshall Erickson is the heart and soul of the show. Marshall loves Lily without question or doubt and is never afraid to show that. There’s no other woman in the world for Marshall, and even when he tries to fantasize about other women, he has to kill off Fantasy Lily before Fantasy Marshall can be with another Fantasy Woman. Despite any protestations from Barney, Marshall is Ted’s best friend and in a lot of ways, he’s Ted’s conscience. Marshall is open to everything that life has to offer him and sees the world in an open, honest, accepting way, which means that the writers can get Jason Segal to do almost anything and make it seem plausible. Over the years, we’ve seen Marshall give a lecture about The Cock-A-Mouse, sing his way through paying his bills, get addicted to visual aids, struggle to “read a magazine” in work, dance to such a degree that he gets iliopsoas tendinitis (or Dancer’s Hip), and on one occasion he nearly made me cry when he got rid of his Fiero. Nearly. More than any of the other characters in the show, Marshall has the biggest influence on who Ted will become, on who he has to become in order to meet The Mother. Marshall is loyal, trusting, romantic, and will go to the ends of the earth for the people he loves, even if that means knocking out Doug the bartender despite his initial reluctance.

None of the characters in the show ever seem to be really stuck for money, and it seems like Old Ted has been able to afford to give his kids everything that they need in life. But he knows that one of the greatest things that he can give his kids is the story of his life and of how they came to be.

Old Ted has learned that people will leave you, money comes and goes and that things that you own end up owning you. But stories last forever, all you have to do is tell them.

– Simon Fitzgerald

June 11, 2010

FREDagator: 2010-06-11

Filed under: Articles — UncaScroogeMcD @ 7:16 pm

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Is this a freaky shark, or a Giger alien? (Hint: It’s a freaky shark)…

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Toy News: Exclusive VENTURE BROS. Toys Sneak Peek

Filed under: Articles — Tags: , , , , , — UncaScroogeMcD @ 4:13 am

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Ahead of their debut at Comic-Con next month, Bif Bang Pow has given FRED readers an exclusive look at the packaged versions of Henchmen 21 & 24 from their upcoming line of VENTURE BROS. toys, plus a special TWILIGHT ZONE bonus

So without further ado, here’s your look at Henchman 21 & Henchmen 24 (plus a peek at Kanamit from THE TWILIGHT ZONE:

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Weekend Shopping Guide 6/11/10: I’m Alright

Filed under: Shopping Guides — Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , , , — UncaScroogeMcD @ 3:37 am

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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 FRED Weekend Shopping Guide – your spotlight on the things you didn’t even know you wanted…

(Please support FRED by using the links below to make any impulse purchases – it helps to keep us going…)

You wouldn’t think a comedy like Caddyshack (Warner Bros., Rated R, Blu-Ray-$24.98 SRP) would benefit so much from high definition, but the new Blu-Ray benefits from a crystal clear picture that looks better than it ever has previously. To add even more incentive, there’s a new feature-length 30th anniversary documentary featuring most of the principals (sans Bill Murray and Chevy Chase) reminiscing, as well as the half-hour featurette from the original DVD release. The film is also available via iTunes & Amazon On Demand.

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Who wouldn’t want a radio controlled robot you can fit in the palm of your hand? I know! Well, the dream you never thought you had has come true with the line of Zbit Mini R/C Robots ($14.99 each). There’s a whole line of the little buggers to choose from, and each one is just as nifty as can be.

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Launched in the wake of Raiders Of The Lost Ark and clearly playing in the same ’30s adventure sandbox, Tales Of The Gold Monkey (Shout Factory, Not Rated, DVD-$49.97 SRP) was TVs attempt to cash in with a pretty damn fun series starring Michael Collins as a young American transporting people on the run in the South Pacific in 1938 via his Grumman Goose seaplane. Felled by high costs after one season, you can now own it all in a set packed with commentaries, featurettes, and more.

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It’s only in hindsight that you realize the entire season you spent watching Ice Road Truckers (History Channel, Not Rated, Blu-Ray-$49.95 SRP) on the edge of your seat worried about a truck (and trucker) falling through the ice was really just an entire season of watching trucks drive. Back and forth. Because nothing deadly has happened yet. Really, you’re just watching a soap opera. In trucks. On ice. The 3rd season set contains all 13 episodes, plus additional footage.

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It’s a shame that we can only get it divorced from the Jim Henson Hour, within which it was originally presented, but it’s worth picking up Jim Henson’s Dog City (Lionsgate, Not Rated, DVD-$14.98 SRP) just to support the release of more Henson specials.

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While most of the attention went to Christopher Nolan’s The Prestige, the other magician film, The Illusionist (Fox, Rated PG-13, Blu-Ray-$24.99 SRP), is a fun little love story wrapped up in a mystery, with a cast that includes Ed Norton, Paul Giamatti, Rufus Sewell, and Jessica Biel. The new 2-disc Blu-Ray features the original standard edition DVD, containing the bonus materials.

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Abandoning the 2-disc half-season sets in favor of the single disc episode collection familiar to fans of Spongebob, iCarly: iSaved Your Life (Nickelodeon, Not Rated, DVD-$16.99 SRP) contains an extended director’s cut of the titular episode, plus a trio of episodes and the movie “iQuit iCarly”. Bonus materials include behind-the-scenes featurettes.

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Many doubted it would happen, but it turns out that Larry David did return for a 7th season of Curb Your Enthusiasm (HBO, Not Rated, DVD-$39.98 SRP), and he brought with him a holy grail of a storyline for comedy fans – a meta Seinfeld reunion, bringing all of the principals together for a the shooting of a special within season. Bonus materials in the 2-disc set includes interviews and behind-the-scenes featurettes.

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For those keeping score, the Charlie Chan TCM Spotlight Collection (Warner Bros., Not Rated, DVD-$39.98 SRP), features the final three films starring Sidney Toler as the legendary sleuth who makes solving crimes a family affair. Those three films are Dark Alibi, Dangerous Money, & The Trap, with Roland Winters debut as Chan rounding out the set in The Chinese Ring.

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Proving once again that their purpose is to really dig into the vaults and release titles that otherwise wouldn’t get a DVD release, the Warner Archive has added the Red Skelton Whistling Collection (Warner Bros., Not Rated, DVD-$24.95), which contains a trio of flicks starring Skelton – Whistling In The Dark, Whistling In Dixie, & Whistling In Brooklyn.

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On the heels of the success of Hercules and Xena, Warners waded into the fray with The New Adventures Of Robin Hood (Warner Bros., Not Rated, DVD-$34.95), which aimed for the same kind of tone but never caught on like the others did. For the dedicated fanbase, though, the Warner Archive has made the first season available, which makes me think the rest of the series will be coming in due course.

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How many of you remember that Family Matters (Warner Bros., Not Rated, DVD-$29.98 SRP) didn’t start out with Urkel? No, the nasally ubernerd was nowhere to be found at the beginning of this spin-off from Perfect Strangers, which began as a simple family sitcom. If only they knew what the were about to be engulfed by in just a few short episodes. The first season set contains all 22 episodes.

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Tween & teen girls are the intended audience for the extended edition release of the Disney Channel movie Starstruck (Walt Disney, Not Rated, DVD-$28.99 SRP), about a small town girl who hooks up with a pop star after a chance encounter. Bonus features include music videos, an additional song, and the soundtrack CD.

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Talk about a show that just limped along to the end – you can now own the 6th and final season of Nip/Tuck (Warner Bros., Not Rated, DVD-$59.98 SRP), a guilty pleasure of a show that became guiltier and less pleasurable as things wound on. Bonus materials are limited to a featurette on the psychology of plastic surgery.

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Featuring over 22 points of articulation, 2 sets of interchangeable posing hands, an openable chest with positive “blue” energy inside, battery-operated illuminated eyes, interchangeable arm cannons, interchangeable rocket boots, and a display base, Hot Toys’ 12-inch Astro Boy figure ($104.99) is not only a fine collectible, but also a great gift for a kid (the ones that take care of their toys, naturally). Unlike their recent vinyl Astro Boy display, this one is fully poseable. Ridiculously so. Get it while you can.

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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…

-Ken Plume

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Trailer Park: A-TEAM Review

Filed under: Reviews,Trailer Park — Tags: , , , , , — admin @ 1:20 am

By Christopher Stipp

The Archives, Right Here

Check out my new column, This Week In Trailers, at SlashFilm.com and follow me on TWITTER under the name: Stipp

A-Team – Review

a_team_posterThe tagline to the 2010 version of the A-Team is that There Is No Plan B. Unfortunately, there seems to have been no Plan A, either.

Watching director/writer Joe Carnahan’s latest action opus you half wonder if he really thought that having characters with absolutely no backstory, no lives to speak of prior to what we see when we hit the ground literally running on the opening fifteen minutes of the film was an especially good idea. Certainly having a Quinton “˜Rampage’ Jackson fill in the shoes left by the charismatic Mr. T in the 80’s might have seemed good in theory but, in execution, it was a miserable decision. Jackson tosses out T’s wildly popular refrain “Fool” as if he were a drunken slob performing it in front of the venerable TV action star in jest. Jackson seems to be well enough equipped to perform as his own if he weren’t trying to inhabit the body of a character decades old but it does feel old. This movie feels old.

What Carnahan’s camera work, accurately depicting what it would look like if you were to strap a movie camera on a paint shaker and left to run, disappointingly fails to accomplish is a sense of visceral action, of fun. In Smokin’ Aces, Carnahan’s last directorial outing, the camera was in love with what it was capturing; be it Jeremy Piven’s descent into madness, the Tremor brother’s equally impassioned decent into madness, or the action that punctuating the moments where mayhem was the name of the game, that film should have set Carnahan up here to make something with an even bigger budget to blow things up. What we get, however, is humor that doesn’t cut as deep as Aces and action set pieces that simply feel perfunctory than they do a visceral part of what we all want. What we all want the whole time, mind you, is one that captures Carnahan’s talents but when the movie takes no time to give these four men, Hannibal (Liam Neeson), Face (Bradley Cooper), B.A. Baracus, and Murdock (Sharlto Copley) any sense of camaraderie or kinship these men are all expendable.

The story itself is painfully simplistic: while performing the kinds of things that the A-Team is known for doing in Iraq, while we don’t know what these things are we do see some of our members strategically battle scarred (Cooper, who has a lot of screen time without his shirt on) for proper effect, they’re offered a job. The job has them retrieving American currency printing plates from the dirty clutches of Iraqis who are up to no good. With shocking ease and movie magic that elevates what these men pull off to heights that even the most forgiving person with a good suspension of disbelief would think is insane, the men do the impossible, literally, and are framed once the job goes south. The men, wanting to clear their good name, are freed by a little nudging of CIA agent Lynch (Patrick Wilson, who plays his part with as much listless gusto as Edward Norton did in the Italian Job) go on the hunt for the plates in a story that presents no speed bumps or obstacles too realistic that these men can’t overcome.

The fault, primarily, lies at the feet of Carnahan, Brian Bloom, and Skip Woods. The former, Carnahan, has no excuse. Both Narc and Smokin’ Aces still hold up as examples for how great and pulpy screenwriting can be and the writing here just reeks of someone who has no interest in logic or depth. Bloom, on the other hand, has an excuse. This is his foray into credited screenwriting after over a 25 year career in Hollywood and if his character in the film (Pike) was any indication of the kind of material he’s capable of producing it’s a sad indication of how one-dimensional he decided to present. However, writer Skip Woods has written such action films as Hitman and X-Men Origins: Wolverine. These two films take the wonder out of trying to decipher why there is no blood coursing through the people we see on the screen, why they feel as alive as a piece of scenery, pawns to be simply moved at the whims of a script that deems it so without any fundamental reasoning.

The wafer thin love subplot between Cooper and Jessica Biel (Charisa Sosa) is a particularly curious addition to the film in that it too feels like it was put there simply to keep it being a premature sequel to The Expendables. A woman and man do not a romance make and the nonexistence of chemistry or, again, deeper history between these two fails to help make this a compelling relationship to care about in any meaningful way. The direction that Gerald McRaney’s (General Morrison) character goes not only feels like lazy scriptwriting but it’s a shameful callback to old Scooby-Doo episodes where the big reveal depends on a literal unmasking. All that was missing in this movie was for these men to all wake up and realize they were just fantasizing the idea that they were all a super team impervious to logic or reality.

This was a movie that is supposed to be fun to watch because we want to see these men overcome the danger of being the hunted while also being on the hunt. The failure to capture the sense these men were in any real danger of either being taken back into custody or being killed on assignment almost makes you wonder whether if this ought to have been shown on NBC as a movie of the week if this was how toothless the movie was going to play out on the screen.

When one of the best compliments you get from a critic who actually gave a positive review of your film remarks about the good-lookingness of your lead actor as a reason why people will like your movie, there’s something wrong with it. We ought to embrace the mayhem and excitement of men like this on the loose, fighting two sides of the law, and we ought to have been given a movie that took an OK television show to explosive heights. Instead, we have a pack of actors just wandering in a movie where you simply don’t care what happens to them. We just want them off our screen so we can go home.

Ken P. D. Snydecast #151: So Very Black

Filed under: Ken P.D. Snydecast — Tags: , , , , , , , — UncaScroogeMcD @ 12:14 am

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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.

VISIT THE SNYDECAST EXPERIENCE

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KEN P.D. SNYDECAST #151: So Very Black – Ken & Dana return with their most depressing recording ever. Seriously. But hey, it ends with a birthday! Sorta.

[CONTENT WARNING]: This podcast may contain some foul language and horribly off-color jokes. Don’t say we didn’t warn you.

DOWNLOAD: (right click to save)
Episode #151 (MP3 format)

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SUBSCRIBE
Subscribe to this Podcast via iTunes

Got something to say? E-mail Dana & Ken at the Snydecast mailbag.

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CLICK HERE FOR THE SNYDECAST ARCHIVES

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June 10, 2010

Soapbox: Heavy Drain

Filed under: Columns — Tags: , , , , , — Aaron @ 4:13 pm

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Pretending Emo Is Primo

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Step one to appreciating Steven Kilpatrick (that’s me-lazy wave included) is to understand that I used to be bitter, then I became an idealist, then I got into graduate school pursuing my dream-and now I’m bitter and educated. Well-at least, I hope, a little more educated than I was before.

Of course, Flannery O’Conner would tell you that colleges haven’t stifled enough of us writers over the years, so take that education with a grain of salt. Either way, color me tentatively unstifled and let’s move on to the good stuff.

I’m still here to talk about video games. However, my take on gaming is directly influenced by those years of snooty pedagogical training about craft and fiction. Imagine Daniel Craig strapped to a bottomless chair being hit in the testicles with John Gardner’s On Becoming a Novelist and you pretty much know what grad school is like.

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None of that may matter to you as a reader, but it has mattered to a few people I’ve spoken with about games, as gaming grows up to be big and strong. You see, gamers are very proud at the moment-very proud of how the industry, the content and caliber of games is maturing. The problem is that we hold this maturation to the standard of other video games and not to the standard of culture.

What the hell am I talking about?

This week I’m talking about Heavy Rain. It’s had its balls critically cradled and moistened for the last couple of months and I can only attribute this lapse in judgment-this appetite for the mediocre-to a starvation of style.

I’m going to say this as gently as possible: Heavy Rain is no good. It’s what hungry people see on islands in Looney Toons cartoons. Because there’s no other alternative, they see a giant talking piece of meat and they salivate for it. Sadly, when the boat comes, drags these people back to society and the real entree arrives, there are going to be a lot of critics wishing they could take back the praise they’ve given to this false idol of “Emotional and Mature Gaming,” which must, by now, be a registered trade-mark of game writers who don’t know what the fuck they’re talking about.

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I suppose, if you spend your summers staring down people dressed as Cloud from Final Fantasy VII-or interacting with the people who still play Halo 3 online-certainly your bar for maturity has probably lowered over the years. Still, were we willing to step outside, let out eyes adjust to the bloom of a mid-day sun, and remember the world as it is-and not as we’ve created it-then can’t we all agree that we face tougher real decisions each day than the ones presented in Heavy Rain? That emotional weight that’s honest and has nothing to do with forced camera angles, mysterious slamming doors, plot twists and bleeding?

I’m attempting to discuss a very complicated issue without spoiling a not-too-complicated game. Every plot point feels like something they left out of a daily soap opera or maybe cut from the next Saw sequel. In fact, if I had to compare this game to anything it would be a really crappy spinoff of the Saw series-only without the immediacy or energy. This is especially unforgivable since this is packaged as a sixty dollar PS3 game. Yes, I know that the game director says not to think of it as a game-and certainly it isn’t a very good one, so I’m half way there-but he wants us to instead think of this as an interactive film.

I wouldn’t pay sixty dollars to own any single film-let alone a film that plays out like an off-off-off-Broadway production of Saw XVIII staring someone’s gym coach who always wanted to act-even if that play is presented in a Brechtian way (i.e. the audience is part of the show).

I’ve met a lot of younger gamers who seem enthralled by this game and I can only assume they respect the narrative because they cheated on all of their English exams in high school. I do this for a living and even I skipped out on The Great Gatsby and Heart of Darkness when I was in high school. There was a time, I must confess, when I thought Smallville was epic storytelling (forgive me Stanley Kubrick). I sympathize.

Still, it doesn’t help explain why so many of our older gamers fall into the same trap. I promise you, if you watched the narrative for Heavy Rain as a film alone-you would feel cheated of even a ten dollar theater ticket. The plot twists are predictable, heavy handed (ooh, look at that car circling the cul-du-sac five-thousand times when nothing else is going on-it’s probably nothing!)

Apart from that, the game doesn’t give us anything new. It is being hailed as ground breaking, but it’s actually a step back in many ways.

-Creepy Camera angles? We’ve been enjoying those since the 90s thanks to Resident Evil.
-Games as Interactive movies? Adventure titles have been paving that street for even longer (and with far more intuitive control schemes).
-Even the consequences have the feel of the old “Choose Your Own Adventure” books-only instead of holding your fingers between the pages so that you can go back, you just create a new save.

Speaking of that, you also don’t have to learn a new way to read a choose your own adventure book just to get from page to page. There are times in Heavy Rain when I’d be on my way to some destination, the camera angle would change (in a super artsy way I’m sure) and suddenly I’d be veering off like a drunk driver. Narrative is never as hard to keep in focus as when your characters seem confused about how to maneuver around their own homes.

Can you imagine any book where paragraphs repeated themselves based on whether you blinked at the wrong time? No? How about a movie that randomly rewound for three seconds? No? Ok, then this isn’t an interactive story-it’s a game and it isn’t doing the game part right.

I love the ambition of the creator to a point (though he seems to regard games in general as a child’s medium). I could pen an entire grumpy rant about his definition of gaming and gamers-but I won’t today. For now I’ll stick to what he didn’t-gaming.

Extra Lives:

Life One:
I wanted to try something different for my second submission (and future pieces should they arrive) and include two little tag sections to my column. Not everything has to be so heavy and important, so what I hope to do is include the extra lives section and then after that a “Continue” section with a closing about what I expect to form an opinion on soon. I think we’ll go with the traditional three lives and if I have something really important I might add a cheesy “1-Up” bullet.

Life Two:
I’m a trophy/achievement whore like anyone else these days. Usually I know when to put the controller down and say, “You know what, I don’t need that lame ass achievement.” I walked away from the Wolfenstein “Break 1,000 crates” trophy based on the, “if it’s not fun, I’m not earning it,” rule I created. Not exactly rocket science.

However, I broke this rule twice this week using the same method. The first instance didn’t earn me a trophy, but it did net me about 23,000 experience points in Borderlands. There’s a meta-achievement within the game called, “I Fired Every Bullet Ever,” which you earn by firing 100,000 times.

My second one was for the game Darksiders. If you ride your horse for 100 miles, you get a trophy called Dark Rider. Now-this is only a bronze trophy so it would be practically shameful to have earned it legitimately-though I imagine my shame is pretty resonant anyway.

I earned them both by taking one of my fiancee’s hair ties and wrapping it around my controller (if you know what I mean). In Borderlands I just hopped in a car (which has unlimited ammo) put the band on R2 and turned off my surround sound and let it shoot for a few hours. For Darksiders I found a giant area for my horse to run around in and had the hair tie hold down the analogue stick at just the right angle to run in circles. The
achievement should be called, “Why I Hate NASCAR.”

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I’m not telling you this because I’m proud-I just think I should be held accountable.

Life Three:
I did end up with a little redemption this week. Despite the low resolution graphics, the lack of mature narrative and the complete absence of trophies or achievements of any kind (nothing at all to increase my E-Peen rating) I was able to enjoy Super Mario Galaxy 2 for hours. Turns out, if the game is good enough you don’t need to supplement it with bragging rights.

Continue?:
E3 is happening next week so there’s a lot to be curious about. I have to admit though-I’m especially interested in hearing about Screen Paper 2.0. EGMi publisher Steve Harris claims that they’re working on a non-flash version of their Screen Paper technology so that they can get EGMi going on the iPad. There’s supposed to be an announcement near or during E3 regarding this update. I know, I know, “what about Epic Mickey!?”

Warren Spector can take care of himself.

Until next time.

– Steven Kilpatrick

BIG BROTHER Blog Report: Day 1

Filed under: Articles,TV News — Tags: , , — Aaron @ 12:48 pm

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Day 1

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Here we go again.

Big Brother UK has reached it’s 11th and final series. For those not in the UK and Ireland, you may not realise the kind of juggernaut this has been on television for the last decade. It has defined a long trend in broadcasting changes, been front page news on innumerable occasions, caused international incidents, raised nobodies to celebrities and tore them back down again. Like it or loathe it (and the people have been picking sides with conviction since day one) you can’t get away from it. At it’s best, it’s a tool for social education and at worst its trash television made to shatter dreams. For the next 13 weeks it’s going to dominate a lot of the press and airwaves.

I bloody love it. And I feel it’s final bow needs to be talked about.

The UK set up is very different from the American one for many reasons but two key reasons in particular:

1) Housemates are forbidden from discussing nominations.
This is important because the US version is very tactical and seems to be more about “alliances” than friendships or having a good time.

2) The housemates (minimum of two) who have received the most nominations for eviction will be voted out by the public.
Now here is where the game really changes because not only are the housemates being watched by the public but they’re also being judged by them. Harshly, too. The pantomime of eviction nights are a cruel thing but part of the beauty of the show. These fame hungry lunatics are driven so demented by whether or not they are being received favourably by the outside world that they start to lose grip of their actions inside the house and things start to get nutty from there.

Add to this the belief that they’re all going to be stars once they leave the house (which in reality is a really slim chance as very few previous housemates are doing anything more than their old jobs or sitting on their arses) and you get a mindset that is more of a ticking time bomb of delusion rather than one of rational thought.

Last night the new housemates entered. The style in which they brought them in changed from previous years. A group of 81 hapless hopefuls were assembled and 13 were chosen on the night. They didn’t really mention why they did this clearly but it was an obvious ploy to stop their housemates being leaked to the press before the night itself.

The 14th housemate was then chosen at random out of a tombola and given a special task for the first week. As seen in previous seasons the housemates have often theorized that a mole would be planted in the house to confuse them, well this year BB decided to be pretty blatant about it and made the poor man dress in a mole outfit, wear a sign saying “I am a mole” and made him sleep in a mole hutch. His task is to not be fingered as a mole. They weren’t joking when they called it his impossible mission.

But, I’m getting ahead of myself here. It was launch night so I’m going to give you my first impressions of our cast and save the house antics for another day.

Here’s my run down. Be aware, I’m going to be blunt.

Ben

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Nob nob nobby nob nob. Extremely posh but in denial about it. Probably isn’t even in denial but he knows that the public who watch this show won’t like his upbringing (we’re a bitter bunch) so is trying to claim he is a man of the people. He has worked behind the scenes on a few reality shows so I’m surprised they let him on. Won’t last very long. He’ll most likely walk out after somebody gets aggressive with him. It’s a shame because he’ll probably be fascinating to watch considering he’ll be the only one in there with table manners.

Caoimhe

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Bollocks, I was hoping there wouldn’t be an Irish entry this year. Made all the worse by the fact that she’s a southside Dublin girl (ask an Irish man about “D4 girls” and stand back). She seems instantly dislikeable but my girlfriend thought she was pretty. I don’t agree with my girlfriend on this though. The only plus to having her around is she’ll probably snog the first guy who shows her interest and her name is hilariously confusing to the Brits. One snag, she pronounces her own name wrong. She says its “kee-vah” but in reality its “Quee-veh”. Lame.

Corin

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“OhmygodlikeJordanismyhero”. Blech. Slapped up like a glamour model and all the class of one too. What was fun though is that as soon as she said she wanted to be like Katie Price the crowd instantly started to “boo” her. She claimed defiantly that she didn’t care what people think but unfortunately my dear they control you on a show like this so you better care. They’ll probably love her by the end though as the British public get retarded over a “tart-with-a-heart” character.

Dave

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As soon as I saw the monk outfit I knew I didn’t like him. Used to be an alcohol and drug abuser until he claims he felt the joy of god and has been getting “high” with the help of the lord ever since. Apparently has big holy raves on a regular basis. This seems to be just a way for him to try and promote his little church of godoholics so good luck to him. He could be comedy but his laugh seems forced and he’ll most likely turn out to be boring once he stops trying so hard.

Govan

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Token queen of the house. He might get crushed in the first few weeks if he’s not careful. Seems like he could be a nice bloke though. He’ll need to get a “bestie” soon as it seems he loves a good gossip and that will go begging if he doesn’t create a harem around himself. His “bff” pick will be crucial to how far he’ll go in the house.

Ife

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Pronounced “Iffy” and sure to give the tabloid writers a heart attack with joy for all the possibilities they can have with her in headlines. She could turn into a wreck the head though as her introduction hinted at a need to be singer. The fame hunger can make people seem desperate and sad sometimes so hopefully she can keep that in check and not wind everyone up with constant attention seeking tactics. “Look at me singing!” “sign me up to a contract!”.

John James

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Asshole. I’m calling it now. Loves himself and doesn’t care about anything else. He has already claimed he won’t clean up and that ALWAYS ends badly on this show. Will probably try and get off with 2 or 3 girls in the house after a few drinks and will no doubt get himself into endless trouble. I actually just want to punch his pouting face. ARGH!

Josie

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My tip to win it (yes it’s only the first night but you can usually call these things early). “Bubbly” country bumpkin and fattest girl in the house. She’s a shoe in. I would like to clarify that she’s not remotely fat but she seems to be the only person who isn’t a stick insect in the house so unfortunately she’s landed with that role this year. She’ll get lots of love for this fact alone from the largely gay/female public. They love the ones who are “just like us” so if she can act a bit dim and be nice to everyone she can’t lose this.

Mario

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Poor sod got landed with the mole task. Seems to be doing his job well though so far. I felt very sympathetic towards him as he seemed like a deer in headlights upon getting the news. This might be the sort of exposure he needed to do well in the competition though because he may have been a background player without this attention. He has no “wacky” angle to play up otherwise. Likeable fellow though.

Nathan

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Mancunian geeeeeeeeezer. Could rub people up the wrong way if he stays as “in your face” as he seemed at first. Another “joe soap” who could go far as long as he doesn’t rock the boat but I get the impression he could start a few arguments and might get a bit aggressive after the booze starts to flow. And yes, I’m being completely judgemental and stereotyping the guy. But it’s the first night.

BeyonSORRY I mean Rachael

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I’m gonna call her Beyonce for the rest of the show and I don’t care. Was happy to tell people she was a hairstylist on the night but seemed a bit embarrassed to talk about her work as a Beyonce impersonator. Prettiest in the house and she’ll fight to keep that title. Already seems to be getting derision from the females watching as our host Davina couldn’t stop making catty remarks about her. She could be the attention of the house for several reasons so I think we’re going to be talking about her for some time to come.

Shabby

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I hate her. For several primal reasons but mostly because she’s trying too hard. “LOOK AT ME, I’M CRA-RAAAAAAY-ZAY”. Ridiculous toff who squats in houses because she’s so arty. Honestly, there is bile building up in me just thinking about her. If we were in medieval times she’d probably run half the country. I would have put her head on a stick or died trying.

Steve

steven

Probably the bookies favourite and for good reason. Amputee from fighting for his country with 8 kids, you try and vote the guy off without looking like a heartless scumbag! Has an easy ride to the final unless he fucks it up by being a bully to someone. I felt a little uncomfortable though during his entrance. This year BB has a “carnival” sort of theme and when a guy with no legs is standing there, waving to a crowd, it was all too literal of a “freak show” to me. It was an awkward decision.

Sunshine

yvette

Her real name is Yvette but she’s another toff (this year is full of upper/middle class kids) who thinks she is a free spirit. She thinks this mostly because she has had a free ride in life. These sort of folks invariably get voted off by the public at a first chance. We may not have the money in our family like you do “Sunshine” but we have phone credit and that means you’re fucked, darling.

–

So there you have it. My opening thoughts on our players for this final game. I’ll be back after Friday night’s show. Stay tuned!

– Aaron Poole
Follow Aaron on Twitter – @AaronFever

A Bit Of A Chat with Ken Plume & Doc Hammer: Part 2

Filed under: A Bit Of A Chat With Ken Plume,Interviews — Tags: , , , , — UncaScroogeMcD @ 3:28 am

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I’m Ken Plume, and soon you’ll be listening to “A Bit Of A Chat” with me, Ken Plume.

In this episode, I have the second of a two-part chat featuring THE VENTURE BROS’ own Doc Hammer…

Oh yeah, and be sure to pick up his band’s new album, WORN THIN.

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Hope you enjoy…

CLICK HERE TO LISTEN TO PART 1

Download “A Bit of a Chat with Ken Plume & Doc Hammer: Part 2“:

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SUBSCRIBE
Subscribe to this Podcast via iTunes

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Drop Ken a line HERE.

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You can also find more of my interviews by clicking HERE.

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June 9, 2010

Contest Round-Up: 2010-06-09

Filed under: Articles — Tags: , , , , , , , , , — UncaScroogeMcD @ 2:44 am

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Welcome to our weekly round-up of featured giveaways here at FRED. Every week, 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 Universal Home Video, we’re giving away five (5) copies of FLASH GORDON on Blu-Ray.

In conjunction with Universal Home Video, we’re giving away five (5) copies of DARKMAN on Blu-Ray.

In conjunction with MGM Home Video, we’re giving away three (3) copies of SHOWGIRLS on Blu-Ray.

In conjunction with Touchstone Home Video, we’re giving away two (2) copies of SHOWGIRLS on DVD.

In conjunction with Playing For Change Records, we’re giving away a PLAYING FOR CHANGE LIVE Prize Pack.

Win a PLAYING FOR CHANGE LIVE Prize Pack!

Filed under: Contests — Tags: , , , , — UncaScroogeMcD @ 2:42 am

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In conjunction with Playing For Change Records, we’re giving away a PLAYING FOR CHANGE LIVE Prize Pack. The pack contains a PLAYING FOR CHANGE LIVE CD/DVD, a digital download of the PLAYING FOR CHANGE LIVE CD (Includes liner notes as a Digital eBooklet PDF), a digital download of an exclusive live video of “A Change is Gonna Come” performed live in New Orleans in 2009, a new Playing For Change T-Shirt (Choose one Men’s or Women’s shirt), New Playing For Change water bottle, a Button and sticker pack, and a choice of DRM-free 320kps MP3 or Apple Lossless file.

Contest ends at 11:59pm EST on Wednesday, June 23rd.

CLOSED! THANKS FOR ENTERING!

Official Rules

No member of FRED Entertainment or their immediate families may enter.

No Purchase necessary to win.

Must be 18 years of age or older to enter.

One entry per day, per person.

All submitted entries must be received by 11:59pm EST on Wednesday, June 23rd.

The winner must allow 4-6 weeks after notification of win to receive the product.

Win WHEN IN ROME on DVD!

Filed under: Contests — Tags: , , , , — UncaScroogeMcD @ 2:29 am

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In conjunction with Touchstone Home Video, we’re giving away two (2) copies of WHEN IN ROME on DVD.

Contest ends at 11:59pm EST on Wednesday, June 23rd.

CLOSED! THANKS FOR ENTERING!

Official Rules

No member of FRED Entertainment or their immediate families may enter.

No Purchase necessary to win.

Must be 18 years of age or older to enter.

One entry per day, per person.

All submitted entries must be received by 11:59pm EST on Wednesday, June 23rd.

The winner must allow 4-6 weeks after notification of win to receive the product.

Win SHOWGIRLS on Blu-Ray!

Filed under: Contests — Tags: , , , , — UncaScroogeMcD @ 2:20 am

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In conjunction with MGM Home Video, we’re giving away three (3) copies of SHOWGIRLS on Blu-Ray.

Contest ends at 11:59pm EST on Wednesday, June 23rd.

Check out the Showgirls twitter account. They’ll be posting photos and video from this coming weekend’s Gay Pride Festival as well as funny trivia throughout next week’s release date!

CLOSED! THANKS FOR ENTERING!

Official Rules

No member of FRED Entertainment or their immediate families may enter.

No Purchase necessary to win.

Must be 18 years of age or older to enter.

One entry per day, per person.

All submitted entries must be received by 11:59pm EST on Wednesday, June 23rd.

The winner must allow 4-6 weeks after notification of win to receive the product.

Win DARKMAN on Blu-Ray!

Filed under: Contests — Tags: , , , , — UncaScroogeMcD @ 2:15 am

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In conjunction with Universal Home Video, we’re giving away five (5) copies of DARKMAN on Blu-Ray.

Contest ends at 11:59pm EST on Wednesday, June 23rd.

CLOSED! THANKS FOR ENTERING!

Official Rules

No member of FRED Entertainment or their immediate families may enter.

No Purchase necessary to win.

Must be 18 years of age or older to enter.

One entry per day, per person.

All submitted entries must be received by 11:59pm EST on Wednesday, June 23rd.

The winner must allow 4-6 weeks after notification of win to receive the product.

Win FLASH GORDON on Blu-Ray!

Filed under: Contests — Tags: , , , , — UncaScroogeMcD @ 2:09 am

contestheader.jpg

In conjunction with Universal Home Video, we’re giving away five (5) copies of FLASH GORDON on Blu-Ray.

Contest ends at 11:59pm EST on Wednesday, June 23rd.

CLOSED! THANKS FOR ENTERING!

Official Rules

No member of FRED Entertainment or their immediate families may enter.

No Purchase necessary to win.

Must be 18 years of age or older to enter.

One entry per day, per person.

All submitted entries must be received by 11:59pm EST on Wednesday, June 23rd.

The winner must allow 4-6 weeks after notification of win to receive the product.

Bagged & Boarded 58: I Brake For Jewish Aliens

Filed under: Bagged & Boarded — Tags: , , , , — UncaScroogeMcD @ 1:52 am

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What happens when two young men let their love of movies, comic books, and all things “geek” take over their lives? They run away from their families, bringing only the most essential DVDs and comics to their secret, highly fortified underground bunker in sunny Southern California, where they start recording podcasts that will change the world.

Are they heroes?

No.

Are they geniuses?

Far from it.

Are they the future of this planet?

I sure hope not.

Simply put… Matt Cohen and Jesse Rivers are “Bagged and Boarded”.

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BAGGED & BOARDED #58: I Brake For Jewish Aliens – In which Matt and Jesse ponder the STAR WARS prequels, jaw about what a “shooter” is, and do their damnedest to offend extraterrestrials of all races. Bagged and Boarded: Now with CGI Dewbacks!

[CONTENT WARNING]: This podcast may contain some foul language and horribly off-color jokes. Don’t say we didn’t warn you.

DOWNLOAD: (right click to save)
Episode #58 (MP3 format)

[audio:http://traffic.libsyn.com/baggedboarded/bagged_boarded-58.mp3]

SUBSCRIBE
Subscribe to this Podcast via iTunes

Got something to say? E-mail Matt & Jesse at the B & B mailbag.

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CLICK HERE FOR THE BAGGED & BOARDED ARCHIVES

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June 8, 2010

FREDagator: 2010-06-08

Filed under: Articles — UncaScroogeMcD @ 3:49 am

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Here’s a classic SNL clip parodying Song Of The South, featuring Tracy Morgan – “Uncle Jemima’s Pure Mash Liqour”…

If you’ve ever been curious to see Disney’s long-vaulted Song of the South, here’s your chance…

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TV Or Not TV: 6/7 – 6/13

Filed under: TV Or Not TV — Tags: — admin @ 12:48 am

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Kate Plus Wait
It isn’t every day that I come to this column willing to admit something that would seem to get me shunned in the real world. Today I’m doing just that because I have to admit that I was always a fan of JON & KATE Plus Eight. Please, whatever you do, don’t let that get in the way of reading my column.

Now that I’ve admitted this to you I feel a little better in the admission of having watched the special KATE PLUS EIGHT event that happened this Sunday night. Even though it was advertised by TLC as somewhat of a return they also, at no time, admitted that this two hours of back-to-back showings of KATE PLUS EIGHT were just that, two hours that won’t be a regular occurrence. It was just a sampling of what is to come. This sampling might not have been too bad either if it weren’t for the fact that both episodes were completely wreaking of PR spin.

I don’t think that anyone is under the illusion that there is 100% pure reality in the beast that is reality television. Footage is show, reviewed, and then it is edited to allow for a story to be told depending on what story they want to have told. These first two hours had a very specific agenda that wanted to hit on very specific items. If you didn’t take the time to watch them (or if you are just here to enjoy a study in PR spin) allow me to break them down for you now.

1) The children aren’t being exploited and they really enjoy doing the show.

The first ten or fifteen minutes of the first hour were dedicated to the ceasing of taping for JON & KATE PLUS EIGHT as well as the reactions by the children, how they were sad about it. After that transition we see the surprise return of the camera crews, how the children love them and play with them, and we should all be comfortable with the fact that this show exists. The message was heavy handed, it didn’t serve much except for this one point.

The second half of the first hour tried to also drive this point home by seeing how the family gets to enjoy certain perks from the fame like a trip to DISCOVERY KINGDOM for the sextuplets sixth birthday. This message probably could have just been overlooked as actually providing some cute kids seeing cute animals for lots of “ooohs” and “aaahs” except from a critical story telling error. One of the older twins, MADDY, has a melt down because the six younger kids are now getting their third birthday party. Yes, their third. Instead of a perk we’re suddenly reminded that what we are seeing is reality television that has been scheduled and planned out. This breaks the fourth wall a bit for someone like me and I suddenly step out of the experience and realize I’m watching a trumped up scenario created for the purpose of showing me the perks the kids get from production. I suppose the good news for TLC is that it worked because I got the message.

2) Kate is a working single mom, just like so many other moms, but her employment is in the media so don’t hate her.

This message was delivered a little bit in the first hour and heavily in the second hour. In the first hour KATE says after she was voted off DANCING WITH THE STARS she just fell right back into her mommy routine. Understandable, but isn’t it also what you are supposed to do KATE? The second hour, where we see a few behind the scene days with KATE where we see her grueling day of trying to train for her upcoming dance number, meet an obligation with the TLC network and suffering from exhaustion. Although informative it just wreaked of, “See how weary she is? Don’t hate her, feel sorry for her! She’s got 8 children and she’s running herself down just to provide for them!”

Other than the heavy handed message I think the only disservice this second hour did was in showing a book signing that they really didn’t need to show. This made me have to guess that possibly there was some press around the LOS ANGELES book signing not having great turn out since they said during the show at least three times how it was ‘thrown together at the last minute.’ I haven’t bothered to explore if that’s right but based on the message they were sending out I’d venture to say that I might be.

Putting aside my observations of the PR-centric nature of these episodes I have to admit that I still enjoyed both hours. My only wish is that the show was actually returning in full force instead of us just getting a few teaser episodes. Now that two hours have aired we have to wait for the next KATE PLUS EIGHT special that will be available JULY 11th.

Now that we’ve gotten all the PLUS EIGHT ought of the way let’s see what else TV has to offer us.

MONDAY

FOX – 8:00 PM: It’s been a while since we last saw LIE TO ME so let’s hope these last final nine episodes pack a memorable punch.

NBC – 8:00 PM: I’m not sure why but LAST COMIC STANDING is back. One redeemable quality is CRAIG ROBINSON being brought in as the show host which is reason enough for me to give it a shot.

ABC FAMILY – 8:00 PM: After this many seasons is there really any secret left in THE SECRET LIFE OF THE AMERICAN TEENAGER?

FOX – 9:00 PM: Since the special sneak peak of THE GOOD GUYS I’ve been jonesing to know if they can keep the magic of that first show going. Tonight I’ll have my answer.

NBC – 10:00 PM: PERSONS UNKNOWN seems on the surface to have elements of the classic THE PRISONER show with people abducted and dumped into a TV where they are monitored via closed circuit television. It’s created by one of the minds behind THE USUAL SUSPECTS so it has a pedigree that warrants at least an episode or two of exploration.

TUESDAY

ABC FAMILY – 8:00 PM: I don’t think you could pay me to watch PRETTY LITTLE LIARS but it might be a good form of torture.

A&E – 8:00 PM: Want to feel better about your life? Watch a few hours of BILLY THE EXTERMINATOR and unless you’re actually on the show you’ll feel like you’re on top of the world.

FOX – 9:00 PM: I’d probably be more on the edge of my seat for the season finale of GLEE with the NEW DIRECTIONS getting to the make it or break it performance at Regionals but the show has been picked up for two more seasons already.

BRAVO – 10:oo PM: KATHY GRIFFIN DOES THE BIBLE BELT may sound like an adult movie but instead it’s the bridge burning spitfire tackles the A-listers during this taped Tennessee performance.

FX – 10:00 PM: OK, KATHY GRIFFIN not butch enough for you? You’ll want to catch the season finale of JUSTIFIED in that case.

NBC – 10:00 PM: After last week’s premiere of LOSING IT WITH JILLIAN MICHAELS did so well at 10 they decided to keep it here instead of at 8 like they said last week. Just a heads up.

WEDNESDAY

CMT – 8:00 PM: Sometimes the things I type even make me do a double take. Here’s one example: THE CMT MUSIC AWARDS hosted by KID ROCK. Yeah, I know… right?

TLC – 9:00 PM: Enjoy another mind-numbing season of I DIDN’T NOW I WAS PREGNANT as it kicks off tonight.

ABC – 10:00 PM: Wait, HAPPY TOWN is still on the air? Whoah, didn’t know that.

THURDAY

FOX – 8:00 PM: No, the schedule is not playing tricks on you. GLEE moves over to Thursday nights for repeats this summer. Squirm uncomfortably with me during the duet of ENDLESS LOVE sung by WILL and RACHEL.

SHO – 10:00 PM: It’s the return of PENN & TELLER BULLS$!T! tonight as the two take on the American splendor of the CHEERLEADING.

USA – 10:00 PM: It’s been FAR too long that we’ve waited for the return of ROYAL PAINS and this week we find out HANK and EVAN’s father is none other than HENRY WINKLER. Last time this guy was near sand wasn’t he jumping a shark? Hmmmmm.

BRAVO – 10:00 PM: REAL HOUSWIFE NYC alum BETHENNY moves into her own show titled BETHENNY GETTING MARRIED? Yeah, I’m not watching it either.

FRIDAY

ABC – 8:00 PM: The Alphabet Network brings us the 2010 FIFA WORLD CUP KICK-OFF CELEBRATION CONCERT.

FOX – 8:00 PM: Hey, remember that show PAST LIFE that nobody watched! Great news nobody, it’s back!

SYFY – 9:00 PM: It’s the end of the somewhat unbalanced season for STARGATE UNIVERSE.

SATURDAY

ABC FAMILY – 3:00 PM: Want to go back-to-back-to-back with all of the BACK TO THE FUTURE movies? Here’s your chance.

DISNEY – 7:00 PM: If you don’t already own them on home video than you can get ready for TOY STORY 3 with tonight’s back-to-back airing of TOY STORY and TOY STORY 2.

SYFY – 9:00 PM: With a title like STONEHENGE APOCALYPSE you’d think it was a high quality TV movie, right? Too bad the movie wasn’t aware it was a parody.

SUNDAY

CBS – 8:00 PM: Tonight THE 64TH ANNUAL TONY AWARDS is the show most networks are not even trying to compete against.

HBO – 9:00 PM: I won’t be watching the TONY’s at all tonight because I’m all about the premier of TRUE BLOOD.

AMC – 10:00 PM: JESSE is on the run and WALT tries to negotiate a deal for their safety on the season finale of BREAKING BAD. Perfect for post TRUE BLOOD viewing.


June 7, 2010

In Praise Of… SPILT MILK by Jellyfish

Filed under: Articles,Columns,Reviews — Aaron @ 8:28 am

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In Praise Of… “Spilt Milk” by Jellyfish

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For my inaugural entry on this fine site (sophomore entry, if you count my introduction), I can think of no better example of something I love wholeheartedly (well, nearly) that seemed to pass most folks right by than the second album by the band Jellyfish, ‘Spilt Milk’. While most music aficionados will be clued into the band and their output, your average Joe has no idea who they are or what blissful melodies and sublime guitar pop they were capable of. To those people, I say, that’s just really sad. But fret not! I’m here to help, and point you to one of the best musical secrets of the past 20 years. If you follow my instructions and run out and get a copy after reading this column, you’ll thank me. And your heart and your ears will be thanking you for a long time to come.

But before we get to my first love fest here on FRED, I should explain what I’m NOT trying to do within this essay. Jellyfish burned extra brightly but half as long, to misquote Mr. Tyrell, and I wish they’d at some point get it all together and make another record. (When I was a producer on VH1’s Bands Reunited I constantly campaigned to go after them, which always fell on deaf ears). But this won’t be about the history of the band, it’s politics, label frustrations, post band work or what cool people have dropped their name in interviews. All of that, I’m sure, you can get on dozens of other sites, far more informed than I am. No, this is just going to be about one man’s unabashed love for another group of men with musical talent.

I’m not positive when it was when I first heard of Jellyfish, but I seem to recall seeing a video or two from their first album, Bellybutton, in 1992 when they were getting loads of airplay on MTV. The song “The King is Half Undressed” was a minor hit, but I didn’t take much notice of them, and never got the record. (I picked it up much later, it’s a fine album, but their follow up is miles ahead of it). A year later, their second effort Spilt Milk was released. I’m not sure what drew me to it, and I certainly hadn’t heard anything off of it. I seem to recall bringing the CD to the counter at a Sam Goody in Minneapolis, and the guy behind it giving me a “thumbs up”. “Great record”, he said. “Really? What’s it like?” I asked. “Well, it’s kind of like the album that Queen and The Beatles never made.” If he had said it had pictures of nude women on the CD face and the case folded out and could be made into a working robot I couldn’t have slapped my hard earned rupees down fast enough. But surely he was being a bit too enthusiastic, no? Beatle-esque was a term bandied about pretty frequently, but I’d never heard a band that sounded even remotely close to Queen. I wasn’t sure there was anyone with courage enough to try. And then I stuck that little shiny disc into the car’s CD player, and was floored from track one onwards.

Now, admittedly, your enjoyment of this record may have a lot to do with how you feel about several bands: the previously mentioned Beatles and Queen, Breakfast in America era Supertramp, The Beach Boys, Wings and Badfinger. (I remember when Alex Ross and I first started our epic phone calls; it wasn’t long before the subject of music came up. By the sheer number and types of bands we were both into, it wasn’t long before one of us asked the other about Jellyfish and Spilt Milk. It was an “instant bond”, if you will). So, if you have a seething hatred of any of the above, you may want to stop reading. To be clear, you don’t have to LOVE any of those artists to dig this album, but I thought it fair to warn you anyway. As you can probably ascertain already, I’m a Beatles fanatic, and Queen are a top ten favorite. The rest I enjoy, but in dribs and drabs. So, now that we’ve gotten the pedigree of Jellyfish out of the way, what about the record?

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The album starts off with a slow, quiet build. Fittingly, the first track is called “Hush”. It really takes it’s time, with what sounds like notes being played on a tinkly child’s piano, before the curtain comes back and beautiful, layered near acapela harmonies sing a sort of lullaby. It’s a little over two minutes, and ends with a “Good night” from the guys, and then the tinkly piano fades out. It’s a strange way to BEGIN a record, wishing us good night and singing us to sleep. But its soon apparent that nothing on this record is ordinary.

Once “Hush” has drifted off to dreamland, guitars and drums come crashing in, signifying the start of track 2, “Joining a Fan Club”. “She turned the night light on and blew him a kiss/He stared back through his green Crayola eyes”, is the first line, and the first of the slightly tongue in cheek lyrical moments through out the record. The song seems to be sung from the perspective of a teenage girl infatuated with a pop star, but man, the tune is all over the place. It’s essentially three different songs, because it manages to get so many different tempos going, similar to McCartney’s “Uncle Albert/Admiral Halsey” or Queen’s “Bicycle Race”. As it starts to wrap up, our teen seems to be getting over the crush, saying “Joining a fan club, it’s a big mistake/ I still get heartburn, when I think about all of the stamps I ate”. Things may not have gone well for the pop idol, as he crashes his car and we’re told to “say a prayer for a fallen star”. Great tune.

Next up is “Sabrina, Paste and Plato”, and our tinkly little piano comes in again, backing our narrator who seems to be in grade school and telling us about his crush. Its another great song, pure pop, but bordering on sickly sweet. The best way to describe it, and I’m no expert on such things, is that it wouldn’t be out of place in a musical the way the story’s told to us. There’s even a chorus of children towards the end, singing what sounds a bit like a nursery rhyme.

The next two tracks are my favorites on the record, and in my alternate reality they’d have both been chart toppers. First up is “New Mistake”, which might have been the first single, I don’t recall. It’s such pure pop beauty that every single time I hear it; it’s as fresh as the first listen. There are few tunes that can do that to me, songs that I literally never get sick of. The Beatles, sure, goes without saying. But even with the Fabs, there are times when I wish I could ‘un hear’ the stuff because I know it so well. I try and give myself breaks from them from time to time, so I can take it all in again. But every now and again, there are songs so perfect and timeless that I could hear ’em every day and still keep smiling, without necessarily being an obsessive of the rest of the artist’s output. “Baker Street” by Gerry Rafferty is one, ‘Roll to Me”, by Del Amirti comes to mind as well. And “New Mistake” is on that list.

The song is basically about getting a girl pregnant, but it could be about landing on Jupiter for all I care. Drums kick the song off, acoustic and electric guitars bring in the melody, the bass line is magnificent. The verses give way to a chorus that sounds like something by Supertramp or any number of acts from the late 70s, with an added edge. It even has the same rhythm flourishes that are in the opening of “the Logical Song”. Without gushing too much more, it has to be heard to be appreciated, but if you fall in love with it, I promise it’ll deliver a smile every time.

Track 5 is my other favorite, and my feelings for it are so close to “New Mistake” that I feel like I’m cheating on it. “Glutton of Sympathy” begins with faint sounds of crickets, leads to a quiet vocal and acoustic guitar. Andy Sturmer’s voice does soft and loud equally well on the album, and his work on this tune alone is sublime. When the chorus comes, the full band kicks in and there are more gorgeous Beatle-esque (you knew that word was coming at some point) harmonies, pleading with whoever is being sung to. The bridge has another favorite line, “Indecision won’t you ever make up your mind?” and gives us a nice mini guitar solo, more harmonies, then Sturmer’s pleading “Will you never cease to be/the Glutton of Sympathy?” before descending to a beautiful close. Those last two tracks could have been a double A side, for my money.

“The Ghost at Number One” was another single off the record, and it’s a belter. Loud guitars, that damn tinkly piano again in the choruses, and enough pop harmony to make Brian Wilson blush. I think the song is about deceased artists making it to Number 1 on the charts, which is sort of really about the labels exploiting the artists for monetary gain. It’s got a bite and bile to it that’s missing from the record up to this point, and it’s heavier than what’s come before too. It’s a nice punch to the gut in the record, which is needed, and brings me to another great point. The album is laid out so near perfectly, track wise, that other bands could study it when planning their masterpieces.
The “side one” closer is “Bye, Bye, Bye”, and suddenly we’re at a traditional Jewish wedding. The middle section is right out of “Fiddler on the Roof”. It’s a great way to close the first half of the album, and sounds absolutely nothing like anything that’s come before it. Again, it sounds most like it belongs in a Broadway show, but in a good way.

The next track, and “side two” opener, is “All is Forgiven”. Guitar feedback signals the onslaught of pounding drums and a cacophony of notes; it’s a whirling tornado of a tune, the noisiest on the record. It took me years to get into it, but when I started to notice the payoff of the song following it, I began to appreciate it more. “Russian Hill” is absolutely gorgeous, the kind of song Nick Drake might have written in a much more minimalist way. The strings and harmonies get me every time.

The rest of the record is wonderful, don’t get me wrong, but it doesn’t hold the appeal for me that those first nine songs do. I realize as I’m writing this that it will become apparent to anyone reading that I’m no record critic. But I guess that’s the point of what I’m trying to do with this column, just give my gut reactions to items from different mediums. You know, the old, “don’t know much about art but I know what I like” defense.

Anyway, back to the record. If Spilt Milk has a flaw, an Achilles Heel, it’s one track keeping it from being a perfect record, it’s “He’s My Best Friend”. It’s an ode to the singer’s penis, and while the tune itself is as eminently hum-able as anything they ever did, the lyrics bring it into comedy album territory. Yes, that’s right, dear readers. Just a few short years after XTC gave us the classic “Pink Thing”, another great band decided to give us a love song to male genitalia. I give them a pass, though; every band has a “Revolution #9” in their arsenal.

“Too Much, Too Little, Too Late” and “Brighter Day” are the album closers, and take us from a fond farewell to a bizarre parade/carnival, complete with horns, cymbals and a marching band drive. All in about 10 minutes. As the last notes fade out via strings and harp, we’re taken back to the quiet hush of where we came in, and the band float off into the distance. I’m not sure how long the end came after this record’s release, I only hope it was as amicable as those things can be. I like to think the door’s still open for these geniuses to work together again.

If any of this has been of interest, and you eventually get the record and enjoy it, be sure to track down the clutch of B sides Jellyfish released as well. “Worthless Heart” is a beautiful demo, one can only imagine how it eventually would have been filled out, and “Family Tree” is the “shoulda-been-on-the-album” tune, the best song Free never recorded.

I hope you’ve enjoyed this little voyage, and that maybe I’ve turned a few more people out there on to this great band. It’s probably one of the albums I give a spin at least a couple of times a month, whether it’s turned up loud in the car or on in the background at home whilst surfing the internet. Because of the miracle of the iPod age and the death of the album, there are artists I love (The Jam, The Kinks, Neil Finn, Radiohead), whose output I keep on shuffle, never minding so much that the songs are all over the place. I’m as guilty as anyone. But Jellyfish’s Spilt Milk is one of the rare ones that I need to hear from beginning to end. I’d love it if any of you out there can hip me to something similar in your lives. Let’s bring the album back to life together. Be seeing you…

– Jason Lenzi

Win a LIFE Blu-Ray & The Companion Book!

Filed under: Contests — Tags: , , , , , — UncaScroogeMcD @ 4:27 am

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In conjunction with BBC Home Video, we’re giving away a grand prize featuring the Blu-Ray edition of LIFE along with the deluxe companion book to the series. Not only that, but a pair of runners-up will win DVD copies of the series.

Contest ends at 11:59pm EST on Wednesday, June 23rd.

About the Blu-Ray:

Four years in the making, filmed over 3000 days, across every continent and in every habitat, with a production budget of £14 million ($22 million) Life is the latest wildlife blockbuster from the BBC’s award-winning Natural History Unit, the producers of Planet Earth and The Blue Planet.

Packed with excitement, revelation, entertainment, and stunning screen firsts, this breathtaking ten-part blockbuster presents 130 incredible stories from the frontiers of the natural world. Discover the glorious variety of life on Earth and the spectacular and extraordinary tactics animals and plants have developed to stay alive, individual creatures under extreme pressure to overcome challenges from adversaries and their environment, pushing the boundaries of behavior.

About the Book:

Life, the spectacular companion volume to the new Discovery Channel/BBC series, tells a majestic and compelling story of survival and of the amazing behaviors animals and plants adopt to stay alive and pass their genes to a new generation. Beautifully written and illustrated with more than 300 high-definition color photographs, Life focuses on the most exciting examples of the millions of species to demonstrate the harrowing and very different challenges that all living things must overcome to prevail and to procreate. In 60 concise and captivating vignettes, intriguingly grouped in categories like Extraordinary Sea Creatures, Fabulous Fish, Irrepressible Plants, Hot-blooded Hunters, and Intellectual Primates, the authors provide the most up-to-date science. Each chapter parallels an episode of the television series, making the book a must-have addition to any interested viewer’s library. From the familiar to the rare–polar bears, Japanese snow macaques, monarch butterflies, and fish-catching bats, a mega-roost of 10 million fruit bats in Zambia, capuchin monkeys that use stone tools, marine life beneath and upon the ice of Antarctica, and tiny goby fish that climb Hawaiian waterfalls–this sumptuous volume brims with information and unforgettable images of the spectacular, the dangerous, and the bizarre.

CLOSED! THANKS FOR ENTERING!

Official Rules

No member of FRED Entertainment or their immediate families may enter.

No Purchase necessary to win.

Must be 18 years of age or older to enter.

One entry per day, per person.

All submitted entries must be received by 11:59pm EST on Wednesday, June 23rd.

The winner must allow 4-6 weeks after notification of win to receive the product.

June 5, 2010

Essential Sounds (2010/06/05)

Filed under: Columns,Reviews — Tags: , , , , , — Aaron @ 8:11 am

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Essential Sounds (2010/06/05)

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Hello there one and all welcome back to another edition of Essential Sounds where I, Malcolm Foster, have been digging to find the freshest new music for your listening pleasure. This week we have a potential death by orgasm, an egotistical super producer, vampires galore and so much more.

1. “Farewell to Wendo” by Mock & Toof

The latest offering from UK duo Mock & Toof (stable mates of James Murphy’s DFA Records) brings us a very catchy piece of ethnic pop. Seemingly structured around the elevated and highly prominent female’s vocals we have a solid background consisting of Japanese strings and tribal like percussion. Whilst being subdued by the constantly shifting synth bass line we are requested by the mystery guest vocalist to “murder her with orgasms” well it’s certainly an acceptable way to go I guess. I have a feeling that we are going to be here a lot more from Mock & Toof so dig into this intriguing number to get a good idea of what we can expect to hear in the very near future.

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2. “I’m Not Made Of Eyes” by General Fiasco

Moving over to Northern Ireland now, our second essential sound comes courtesy of indie trio General Fiasco. What we have here is a very classic mid tempo indie rock sound but with a truly engaging vocal delivery. You can’t help but get a real feel good factor from this song its crammed full of simple yet effective song writing and will no doubt find itself becoming a real summer anthem this year. “I’m not made of eyes” is the group’s second single from debut album Buildings, which I highly recommend and even tip for a potential mercury music prize nomination. Remember you heard it here first.

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3. “Power” by Kanye West

Love him or hate him you cannot deny that when he isn’t invading stages and interrupting award ceremonies Mr West has got one of the most intricate and dynamic ears in the business. Coming back out of the studio with attitude new single “Power” has exactly that, from it’s tribal vocal hook to it’s thumping drums the return of “Yeezy” is anything but subtle. Those hoping the whole Taylor Swift debacle might have mellowed him will no doubt be disappointed as on a lyrical tip he has taken hold of the happenings in his world since last LP 808s and Heartbreaks. Taking the notion of being the “Abomination of Obama’s Nation” he flips an insult into a compliment by claiming it as “one hell of a way to start a conversation” and lets face it takes somebody special to do that and walk with it in his stride. If power is an indication to what forthcoming album Good Ass Job is going to be like we could looking at one of the most talked about albums of the year.

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4. “Jonathan Low” by Vampire Weekend

Our fourth pick comes fresh from the forthcoming Twilight Eclipse soundtrack, yes that’s right you did read that correctly Twilight Eclipse Soundtrack. Fact is unlike the story which the music accompanies I cannot pick a hole in the soundtrack choices for Bella and Edward’s pout-athon. “Jonathan Low” takes a side step from the bands 2010 album Contra, in fact it has an almost Smiths like twang to it until the verse closes and the chorus unfolds where we are showered with an explosion of church bells and string work. This certainly shows Vampire Weekend at their fullest in terms of instrumentation and could be a good look for them if they decide to pursue it any further in forthcoming material.

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5. “Gone For The Summer (Part Two)” by Teen Daze

I might as well book myself a one way ticket to Canada at this rate, as once again they have provided another wonderful essential sound. This week Canada’s contribution to excellent music comes in the form of producer turned solo artist Teen Daze. With “Gone For the Summer” we are treated to a beautiful blend of wishy washy synth’s, echo chambered vocals and funky percussion rhythms. There is a very rich and warm feel to his work and with debut EP Four More Years due out later this year I’m looking forward to seeing what else Teen Daze can provide to sooth my ear and soul.

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–Malcolm Foster

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