57 Channels and Only This Is On vol. XCVI

Quote of the Week: Leah was pissed to the highest pissisity. (Dre P – Tool Academy)

Song of the Week: Tracks of My Tears – Smokey Robinson and The Roots (Late Night with Jimmy Fallon)

Big News of the Week: Teen Wolf Remake in the Pipeline: I really cannot take credit for there being a Teen Wolf remake because let’s face it, everything will be remade in the new future. But I would like to think that me mentioning it a couple times last month put it on the fast track. But oddly it is not being remade into a movie (yet), but as an MTV show. Sadly that probably that means the budget won’t be enough for my casting suggestions of McLovin as the Wolf and Juno as Boof.

Coalition Links of the Week:
This week, we checked back in with your favorite doctors at Seattle Grace and have a early review of the Grey's Anatomy season premiere to share with you. (The TV Addict)

Which reality will Fringe take place in when season two premieres? The TV Fanatic can't wait to find out. (TV Fanatic)

We got yet another amazing Weeds finale this week. Buzz wonders: of all the seasons, which finale has been your favorite? (BuzzSugar)

This week, Eric shared some pictures from the season 6 premiere of The Office. (Daemon's TV)

Nigel picked his Top 15. Vance picked his Top 25 dance routines EVER from So You Think You Can Dance. (Tapeworthy)

This week, Jace offered an advance review of the first three episodes of Season Seven of HBO's painfully hilarious Curb Your Enthusiasm. (Televisionary)


Greek: It was nice to see Cappie turn down Casey’s advances because the Casey-centric love polygons are extremely annoying at this point. Pick a dude and stick with it. Or just fly solo and stick with it. And there were few thing more telegraphed than Rebecca (who suddenly looks absurdly hot this season) mystery guy turning out to be Fisher. And her “that’s just who I am” excuse is so lame it single handedly ruined the character. You can stream current episodes on Hulu.



Leverage: One has to wonder if Iceman’s accent was supposed to be bad or if the actor’s British accent was so bad that they just wrote in into the script. Either way it was hilarious. But the Sophie sub plot was a little odd and out of place. You can stream current episodes over at TNT.tv. You can also download Leverage on iTunes.

Also check out my First Impressions of Tool Academy 2, my final impressions of Rescue Me 5.x and How I Spent My Summer Vacation.

Free Download of the Week: Fall TV Preview (iTunes): iTunes has preview clips of many of the returning shows from network and cable including previews of ten new shows.

Deal of the Week: TV for Under $20 (The Big Bang Theory, Chuck, Pushing Daisies, Chappelle Show)

Video of the Week: It is a shame that no one goes to see live action movies by Mike Judge. In fact Beavis and Butt-Head Do America made over five times more money at the box office than Office Space and Idiocracy combines. Maybe that is why be brought back the animated duo to hock his latest movie Extract.

Beavis and Butt-Head introduce Extract


“I would pay a chick to pay me to have sex.” Huh, huh, that’s cool.

Next Week Pick of the Week: Leverage, Wednesday at 9:00 on TNT: The summer finale features a guest appearance from Jeri Ryan. And if you are a fan of the show, which you should be, you will be happy to know that TNT has renewed the show for the third season. Expect the show return to finish off its second season sometime this winter and the third to air Summer 2010.

Around the Tubes vol. XXI

I have gotten a plethora of cool press releases have been flooding my inbox recently that you may find interesting. This post will include blurbs on E-Mail Order Brides, Smokey Robinson, Trauma, The Biggest Loser, and the most hotly anticipated returning fall shows.

- How many of you were watching Rescue Me this season when Chief Needles got himself a mail order bride and thought to yourself, “Mmmm.” And if you are a red-blooded American boy, one look at his bride and you did. Well I have a show for you E-Mail Order Brides coming Wednesday September 9 at 9:00 on the National Geographic Channel. The special follow two guys as they try to pick of foreign wives. Here is a clip:



- If Tool Academy ever would have a spin off called Douche Academy and that in turn would spin off Celebrity Douche Academy (and being VH1 which has a Surreal Life family tree of about twenty shows, this is certainly possible), then Jimmy Fallon most definitely be on the first season. But if there is one thing he has ever done right it was to hire The Roots as his house band which has led to some incredible performance (I recommend trying to hunt down them performing Let’s Go Crazy with Incubus). Here is a web exclusive of the band backing up Smokey Robinson doing my personal favorite, Tracks of my Tears:



- Trauma premieres Monday September 28. Here is the latest promo:



- The Biggest Loser has video profiles of all sixteen contestants over at nbc.com.

- TVGuide.com has released a list of their most hotly anticipated returning fall shows. Topping the list: NCIS. Um, yeah, alrighty. For the new shows, the most anticipated, again according to TVGuide.com is, wait, this has to be a joke, NCIS: Los Angeles. Are the only people voting over 65?

How I Spent My Summer Vacation

For some reason, network television still hasn’t figured out if you actually put quality television on during the summer, people may tune in. Instead during the summer months we get crappy reality show and scripted shows that the network figure no one would watch during the fall. So that left me only three shows to watch this summer, Rescue Me, Leverage and The Philanthropist while occasionally catching Raising the Bar, Royal Pains and Defying Gravity at my leisure. I am in no way complaining about the lack of television because it gave me to time to catch up on these shows via DVD:

Alias (Season 5): If my memory serves me correctly, the last season of Alias was moved to Thursday pitting it against Survivor, My Name Is Earl and Smallville and something had to give. The show always had some serious writing flaws, but Rachel Nichols was a great addition and Amy Acker surprisingly made for a good bad girl. Alias ranked in at #62 on The Greatest Television Shows of the 00’s.

Dead Like Me (The Complete Series): Thoroughly enjoyable series but Brian Fuller certainly perfected the jaded twenty-something with Wonderfalls. And the Desmond Hume staring movie wasn’t as bad as the fanatic would have you believe once you get beyond the fact that they ruined Daisy Adair with poor recasting. And the writing certainly did help things either. I wouldn’t be against more. Dead Like Me ranked in at #17 on The Greatest Television Shows of the 00’s.

Deadwood (The Complete Series): You really cannot boil down a series like Deadwood down to one paragraph but let me try to do so in one word: (expletive deleted). Nothing funnier on television possibly ever than when Al and Wu would try to communicate when he only knew three words, Sweargen, San Francisco and (expletive deleted). Good times. On the flip side, it was extremely weird to see Veronica Mars seduce Matt Saracen’s mom. Deadwood ranked in at #13 on The Greatest Television Shows of the 00’s.

The Secret Diary of a Call Girl (Seasons 1 and 2): A show where Billie Piper plays a hooker? Yes please. The Secret Diary of a Call Girl ranked in at #92 on The Greatest Television Shows of the 00’s.

Weeds (Seasons 3 and 4): One major problem with watching shows on delay is that you inevitably get spoilers and knowing that Agrestic burning down and Nancy ending up pregnant is included at that. Weeds ranked in at #90 on The Greatest Television Shows of the 00’s.


And since networks have been nice enough not to put anything on worth watching on Tuesday this fall I may be able to check up on some more television in the next few months. I recently won Mad Man season 1 and hopefully that lives up to the hype. And I will be checking out Dexter season 3 as soon as I can steal it from my sister after she buys it.

With My Teeth Locked Down I Can See the Blood

When a show has a bad season you have to wonder if it just an outlier or signs of what’s to come. The fourth season of Rescue Me just came completely off the rails with silly plots about baby stealing and Tommy being forced to date the chief’s daughter. But if there was one show that benefited from the writer’s strike more than any it would be Rescue Me which had a twenty month layoff between seasons. This apparently gave the writers enough time to get the train back on the track (for the most part) for the fifth season.

Part of the resurgence was song crafty casting that saw Alex P. Keaton turn into a hard drinking, wheel-chair bound tool that somehow landed Janet between the seasons. While an aloof Maura Tierney kept everyone, including the audience, guessing for the last couple episodes. And let us not forget the Garrity family who came to help Sean out during his cancer treatment, that caused the highlight of the season with Garrity musical numbers. By the end I was hoping that his big brother would stick in New York to keep tabs on Sean.

The big theme of the season was relapse. Shortly after getting his one year chip from Alcoholics Anonymous, Tommy found himself back at the sight of the former twin towers talking about his cousin who he hasn’t for that time, getting him back on the wagon. If only he knew this would be his downfall. And finding out his cousin had slept with his wife was the least of his worries from going back to the bottle.

Tommy’s reunion with the alcohol started a chain reaction that eventually contributed to the death of his Aunt. And despite Uncle Teddy only being married to her for a year or two, wanted to get away from her after he got out of prison, and let her get into a car drunk even though he was in prison for killing a drunk driving, he still blamed Tommy for getting almost the entire extended Gavin family back on the sauce. And so Teddy shot Tommy. Twice. In front of everyone at the bar. Leaving him to die a slow death as the season end leaving open what should be an interesting final season.

Rescue Me 5.x gets a on my Terror Alert Scale. Rescue Me came in at #11 on The 100 Greatest Television Shows of the ‘00s.

Anyone for Croquet, Wouldn’t that Be Nice

Next week is Labor Day which means one last hurray for summer; one last cookout before you start getting the patio ready for winter. And the last time the McGavin clan gets to pull out the croquet set for one more round. But before we break out the mallets for the last time in 2009, it is time to enshrine the sport in the Scooter Hall of Fame.

But the bi-annual McGavin family croquet match isn’t you stuffy great aunt’s croquet, like every competition at McGavin gathering (euchre, poker, horseshoes are other favorite),the game is very cutthroat with a lot of trash talking and we are not above cheating just to beat the six year olds playing. And it seems like new rules get added every year to suit different player’s cause.

And don’t even try winning if you are a newcomer to the clan. In fact plenty of boyfriends have been one and done after a round of croquet with the uncles in the family. One in particular actually made it all the way through the course to be the apparent winner only to be told we play poison ball in where anyone that finishes the course becomes poison and then can only be eliminated if they hit a wicket then the last ball standing wins. So flustered, dude hits a wicket and is never heard from again.

But nothing is more entertaining than when someone drunkenly tries to send somebody’s ball only to whack their own foot with their mallet. Good times.

First Impressions: Tool Academy 2

When a reality show has an absurdly entertaining first season like Tool Academy did, there are really only two routes it can take. One can hope that it ends up like Survivor, a decent concept that along with the right casting can still be watchable nineteen seasons later. Then there are the reality shows that end up like Beauty and the Geek, a great concept, but one the cat is out of the bag, not even great casting can salvage subsequent season from being as great.

After the first season ended I was pretty sure Tool Academy would take the Beauty and Geek route, but after the first episode it is clear that there are plenty of tools that are stupid enough to think they have been chosen to compete to be a party king to be entertaining for years to come. Personally I would have been tipped off by the Her energy drink sponsorship which I was shocked to turn out to be an actually drink.

They even found some new kinds of Tools including the Old Tool, Tat-Tool, Hillbilly Tool, and my personal favorite “Special” Tool (their quotation marks, not mine) who may also win this season’s hottest girlfriend contest in Shannon. Although there are Guy-liner Tool, Manscaping Tool, and Spray Tan Tool which basically all of them are all already. And, well, they are all tatted up too, but Tat-Tool still overdoes it more than the rest. But there is still a high probability that this cast gets the Tool Academy logo tattooed at some point this season like the previous cast.

With a show like Tool Academy, it is hard to predict a winner because their rules for elimination seems to change from episode to episode, but I will be rooting for Ohio’s own Dre P., the B-Ball Wannabe Tool to win, who may have had the best line of the night, “Leah was so pissed to the highest pissisity.” Although the Giant Tool blaming his behavior on a “Schick coma” maybe the greatest excuse ever in the history of excuses.

The first challenge may have been better than any of the inaugural season where they had to bail water from a sinking ship. But it was amazing that of the twelve Tools competing; only one of them had the brain power to think, hey maybe I should stick a finger and/or toe in this hole. Then we had an elimination show expositive, the host flipped his lid and just started yelling at the Tool to leave. Luckily this wasn’t the Guy-liner Tool because he almost came to tears and that would have not been pretty.

If there was one complaint of the first season of Tool Academy it would be there were just too many chicks who took their Tools back after being eliminated. And much like last season, the first to go was taken back by his girl despite his huge hissy fit he threw. And not to mention she was already slumming with the guy who was way out of her league. But considering the preview for next week that promises a shocking ending that may finally change this season. Of course in true VH1 fashion, they ended up giving away that shocking ending two seconds later. I really need to stop watching VH1 promos.

Muck like last season, all these guys are definitely Tools, but not all the girls are squeaky clean again like last season which begs the question, when will we get a female version of the show? The biggest obstacle most likely is a name because not of the female equivalent of Tool are really television appropriate. But how about B-Girl Academy? And if you don't know what “B” means, let us explain: “B” stands for Broncos, Benzes, BMWs, bass, bangles, and a pair of bars. We see you pulling up down the alley; you all act like we are stars. We're not trying to make a joke, we’re just trying to make it known that people in the world that we call B-Girls like bars on a Cadillac Brougham.

Tool Academy airs Sundays at 9:00. You can stream current episode on VH1.com. You can also download Tool Academy on iTunes. Tool Academy ranked in at 36 on The 100 Greatest Television Shows of the 00’s.

Previewing The Human Family Tree

Back in middle school, I won the alphabetical lottery when I was partner up with Lisa Mack, the absurdly hot new chick to the school as lab partners in science class. Unfortunately for me, one of the first experiments that year was that we swab our cheeks, put it underneath a microscope to see all the germs living in your mouth. Not surprisingly after seeing all the germs that came from my mouth, we never made out while slow dancing to More than Words at the proceeding eighth grade dance.

I bring this up because I had flashback to traumatic experience while watching The Human Family Tree where the National Geographic Channel swabbed the check of about a hundred Queens residents that partook, it wasn’t to see how many germs they had but to get some DNA that they could then trace their heritage. And the results of the five year study were so interesting it almost made me want to swab my cheek for the first time since middle school. Almost.



The result, airing tonight at 9:00 traces everyone back to a tribe in Africa and in much detail shows how are human family tree branches out slowly until our ancestors found their ways to as far flung places as Europe and South America thousands years before fuel made it easy to travel by ground, water or even air. And really who better to narrate how we are all connected than Mr. Six Degrees himself, Kevin Bacon.

If there was one compliant to be had about The Human Family Tree is that we don’t get that much reaction from the test subject and any reaction is saved for the final eight minutes of the program. And by then you almost forget the African-American model may have more in common with Southeast Asians in the study than those Africans that never left (or the group that left Africa then found itself back to the continent) by the time you get his reaction which is fleeting anyways as they then go on to the next subject’s reaction. Check out a preview of the show below and the Human Tree map:

Human Family Tree – Preview