On The Precipice of Mediocrity, Teetering
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| I Am John's Stomach Pains. On The Precipice of Mediocrity, Teetering |
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Monday, December 31, 2001 Archiving The Pyre: The Sitting Alien Prequel Every year, I seem to put together a list of shows that I'll be watching by day of the week. The title of the "series" is The Alien Sitting In MyHome. I think it stems from a postcard I once saw at The Crowbar in State College. Anyway, this is technically the first one I did for the 99-00 season. You think I'm bad now... you can't imagine how I was in college. *** TV Is The Alien Sitting In Our Home November 16, 2000 "I'm not happy, 'cause I'm unhappy. I'm unhappy 'cause I'm not happy. I'm not happy 'cause I'm unhappy... I'm not happy... but I got TV." ---Bruce McCullouch I am the perfect example of the Media-Obsessed American. I am Mr. Pop Culture. I go to the movies frequently. I read books whenever I have the time. I enjoy listening to modern music. I'm a video game junkie. Oh, and I also watch a little TV. Okay, some TV... okay, alot of TV! Okay, okay, twist my arm already, I always watch TV. You might know people that watch alot of TV, but I probably blow them out of the water. I watch everything: game shows, prime time shows, syndicated shit, sitcoms, MTV, hell, even the news sometimes. And if I can't find anything on, I'll probably watch an infomercial. It can get pretty bad. But anyway, I thought I'd give a *short* list of my favorite shows currently running on television. If I wrote about all my favorite shows of all time, my page would run out of space... Now, instead of having like a top ten list, I'll do this a little differently. Since I watch TV all week, I'll discuss all my shows in regards to the day they air... makes it much easier to remember anyhow :-) Wrestling Over Monday The problem with Monday is that there are too many good things on, and my VCR can't handle it all!!! Hence, I must wrestle over what I watch... Raw is War ... Stonecold Steve Austin is back ladies and gentlemen! Kurt Angle is the champ! HHH is just as evil as ever, if not moreso! Steven Richards finally has a cool angle! Lita, Trish, Tori, Steph... va-va-va-voom! And best of all? Vinnie Mac is back! Sneering, catch phrases, the over use of the term XFL... welcome back Vin-Man! Boston Public ... David E. Kelley sure has a hit on his hands here. Every teacher on this show has already gotten me engrossed, and the little use of the students in the show has been done beautifully. The principal is amazing, and any show with Fyvush Finkel in it is gonna be great. However, this show does have one thing going wrong with it... it's by David E. Kelley. The thing about Kelley is that his freshman seasons (save Snoops) are always great. I loved the first seasons of Picket Fences and even liked Ally McBeal... but after that, it goes into the shitter. Let's hope this show can stray away from that little curse Roswell ... Who could have ever guessed a show about aliens posing as teenagers would consistently be one of the most entetaining shows ever on television. The best show of last season was thankfully ripped back from the brink of oblivion (Nowhere Man, where art thou?) and thankfully has been keeing it's viewership. I have to say I was disappointed with the first few episodes, but once they got into the groove of not focusing so much on the sci-fi aspect, they got back into what made the show so great. The Summer of '47 was a great episode, and ever since then, it's all delivered. And if you missed the episode "The End of the World" with future Max, you missed one of the most emotional shows ever... Vampirific Tuesday Tuesday has quickly become the best night of television, hands down. Sadly, I can only watch one thing, and that is the WB. What this means is that I must miss the great shows Fox has on at the same time... ugh. Buffy: The Vampire Slayer ... when people ask me what some of my favorite shows of all time are, Buffy is always in that list. I can never remember a bad season, let alone a bad episode. Every episode is entertaing, the writing is the best on television, the acting is surprisingly great for a science fiction/fantasy show, and the comedy is high class. The villains have a fantastic personality (you can't tell me you don't love Spike), and when you don't think they can come up with a better episode, they hit you with a double shot of two great episodes. Although I was afraid of the show slipping in ability with the loss of Angel and Oz, I have been greatly relieved that it has actually gotten better. Riley is a great character with promise, and Willow's new "friend" is being done extremely tastefully. This is a show I never miss... Angel ... as my friend so eloquently put it, Batman meets Early Edition. It had been a while since we've had great, dark detective show, but Joss Whedon and the WB have succeeded with Angel. There have been great fight scenes, and the make-up is actually better than Buffy. Cordelia has quickly grown on me as a likable, albeit annoying, character, and I've come to thoroughly enjoy every scene Wesley is in. Major props to Charisma and Alexis for creating such wonderful charatcers.. My biggest gripe, as is every Angel fan's gripe, was the death of Doyle. How they could do such a cruel thing, I have no idea. The fans loved him. He was the best part of the show, and what does he have to do? Go and be a hero? Damn sidekicks. Thankfully they've come up with a cool character from the streets, Gunn... J. August Richards is gonna be a star. Generation Y Wednesday Are these shows great television? In my eyes, yes. Will they ever win any big awards? No. But the thing about these shows is the guilty pleasure one gets when watching them. These shows are made specifically for me... and I guess a few others :-) Dawson's Creek ... I can proudly say I've been with the this show since day one! This entire cast has their whole career ahead of them, and they are truly honing their art on the wonder that is Dawson's Creek... last year had it's problems, but since abut halfway through last seaosn, it's been delivering. I was a little disappointed by "The Storm", but I think that's just because I had my expections set too high. Felicity ... no jokes, this is probably one of the funniest shows on TV, that also can deal with serious topics such as testicular cancer and alcohol abuse. I will go out on a limb here and say, after Buffy, this show has the best ensemble cast on TV. The only problem with the show is that it is not always consistent in its delivery. One week you'll have a great episode, and the following week it'll fall all it's face. South Park ... Back on track! If anyone thought this show was going to go the way of Beavis and Butthead (i.e. oblivion after their movie) they are thankfully mistaken. Trey and Matt have taken the show even further than I would ever have imagined. The new season has started out strong with a hilairous episode, and the following ones look to be just as appealing. Long live South Park! And I have one word for you: TIMMMMMYYYYYYYY! BattleBots! ... Man, who would've ever thought this show would quickly become one of my favorites. This show combines the brutality of pro wrestling, but without anyone really getting hurt... except maybe the players egos. I was kinda worried it was going to be boring with only three 3-minute "fights" a show, but every single minute is entertaining, from the running commentary, to Donna D'Errico standing there looking pretty, and Bill Nye giving us the scientific background, this show is really fun to watch, and I gotta admit, I'm cheering during those matches. I'm pissed though, my favorite battlebot, Mauler, got robbed!!! Thursday's are Ladies Night This night used to belong to NBC, but no longer! I just can't get into sitcoms anymore... weird but true. Thankfully, the WB, TV gods that they are have given us salvation Gilmore Girls ... This is a show I probably never would have watched, but I thought the mom on the show was really hot, so I decided to catch the first episode. Am I glad I did! This show is very similar to Felicity in that it's a comedy that passes itself off as a drama. Sure, there are the serious undertones, but they're barely there, and most of the time it's just two girls who like to be goofy with one another... and hey, and show that gives Susan Struthers a job must have heart! Charmed ... This is probably my least favorite show of all the shows I watch, but I watch for three reasons. Okay... six reasons. Truthfully, this is a show that gets most of its ideas from older episodes of Buffy, and doesn't really improve upon them. However, it is a guilty pleasure. Three chicks with super powers? Hey, I don't have Charlie's Angels, so I have to settle for the three sisters. Sci-Fi Friday Ahhh!!! I don't have Sci-Fi, so I'm missing the best science fiction shows out there, The Invisible Man, Farscape, and Lexx! And they're gonna be showing Babylon 5 in widescreen... argh! You do not know how much that pisses me off... Syndicated Saturday Ah, the WB... they truly put the sin in syndication. These are the types of shows few know about... it's where the stars of the future will come from *snicker... Earth: Final Conflict ... Probably the only reason I continue to watch this show is becuase I want to see the end of it. This show started off really strong, and I thought, hey, a new great scifi show! Even when they killed off the main character and introduced us to the human/Taelon hybrid that was Liam, I still loved it. But then... well Captain Lily Marquette had to leave... then Doors died... and now the best character on the show, Augur has up and left. But, the basic plot is still intriguing me, so I wanna see how exactly they'll wrap everything up. I doubt it'll last any more than 2 more seasons. Andromeda ... Why oh why do I watch this utter crap? Is it out of respect of Gene Roddenberry? There was a reason this show never got off the ground when he was alive... but of course, I watch. But of course, the show isn't all bad, just the first few episodes. The ast two I've seen have actually been pretty impressive, but the fact is, I just can't take much more of these cliched characters. Don't be surprised if this show disappears from the list after my next update Xena: Warrior Princess ... How did Kate Winslet put it... "I'll never let go Jack, I'll never let go". That's pretty much how I am with Xena... I am still remaining loyal to this show... it's great no matter what anyone else says. I'm sad to say though, this is the last season of one of the most underrated shows ever... it will deeply be missed. Sunday... Bloody Sunday... Leave it to Fox to give us three of probably the best shows on television, and what do they do? Put them all on the same night. Smart Fox execs, smart... The Simpsons ... I'm not the biggest Simpsons fan, but if it's on, I always laugh my ass off. I think Matt Groening put it best, when he said The Simpsons may not be the funniest show on televiion, but it's the most consistent. In every episode, there are at least 10 laugh out loud scenes... not many shows can tout that... Malcolm in the Middle ... Easily the funniest show on television. Okay, one of two, I find Titus pretty damn funny too. The face of comedy is finally changing... no more do we have to be subjected to mushy canned laughter sitcoms, Fox has the balls to put comedies on television that are the pure antithesis of say, Full House. Sure the families love eachother... deep down... somewhere, but they also treat eachother like real human beings... The X-Files ... I have my fingers crossed that this season will go down in the annals of X-Files history as one of the best. Robert Patrick is amazing, and having a main character on the show that we aren't too sure whether we can trust is always good. I love the idea of Scully as a believer now, after everything that she has seen, it would be impossible for her to ignore anything now. I hope they keep giving Skinner more airtime, he's the coolest character on the show... Labels: pyre archive, TV posted by Holz | 10:51 AM | Rant & Rave, Bitches! (0)0 Comments: |
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"Let a man get away with fuckin' you once, you stay bent over so's he can fuck you again whenever he damn well pleases. An' if one man can do it? Another will too. An' another, an' another still. So's being fucked, that's yer life. 'Til who you were, you ain't. 'Cause all you are is an asshole." 100 Bullets #42 | |||||
