Best of the Week - 3/10/12

Quote of the Week: How do you eat an elephant? One bite at a time. (Lionel Richie, The Voice)

Song of the Week: Time After Time – Cindi Lauper (as sung by Jody, Shameless)

Scene of the Week:



Big News of the Week: Mediocre Tuesday: I do not know what it says about the candidates that are still in the race, but when I went to the polls this past Tuesday, I ended up voting for Jon Huntsman since his name was still on the ballot. Not that my vote would have meant much either way because there was no knockout punch during the shrinking Super Tuesday. Well Newt Gingrich was all but eliminated and now Rick Santorm now needs about two-thirds of the remaining votes if he was to get the Republican nomination. Of course if they continue to remain the thorn in Mitt Romney’s side that may mean the brokered convention that Hilary Clinton robbed me of four years ago.

Preview Picture of the Week:

Wild Justice, Sunday at 9:00 on Nat Geo Wild

Worthless Walking Dead Character of the Week: T-Dogg (Seriously, had I have done this segment since the inception of the show T-Dogg would by far have won this award every everyone else, aside from being beat up by a redneck and cut his arm open, dude’s done nothing)

Free Download of the Week: Can't Go Home – Good Old War (iTunes)

Deal of the Week: $3.99 Albums on Amazon: Every month Amazon releases a hundred albums you can download for $5.00, but if you look closely they actually have better deals than that periodically on their site unadvertised. I do not know how long it will last, but as I write this there is a bunch of albums for only $3.99 including The Black Keys, N.W.A., U2, and the forty song Deluxe Edition of Nirvana’s Nevermind which comes out to ten cents per song by my math.



New Album Release of the Week: Delta Spirit - Delta Spirit

New DVD Release of the Week: American Pie 2 (Blu-ray/DVD Combo + Digital Copy)

Video of the Week: I am not sure if we should read anything into Community returning on the Ides of March, but the show will be returning to its 8:00 timeslot this Thursdays. No word yet on if Annie’s Boobs shows up. To honor of the occasion the cast is getting animated and not stop motion animated like last Christmas but more traditionally this time around. Check out all three parts below.







Next Week Pick of the Week: March Madness, All Day, Thursday through Sunday on CBS, TNT, TBS, and TruTV: Brackets are being released tomorrow, so do not expect any work to get down this week on Monday or after noon on Thursday and Friday. Look out for my picks on Monday.

Around the Tubes - 3/9/12

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 Community, Monster Man, Real Fear: The Truth Behind the Movies, America the Wild with Casey Anderson, Wild Justice, ABC Family, Single Black Female, Veep, The Real Skinny, The Voice, America's Got Talent, and Azealia Banks.


- Community returns this Thursday and NBC recently released an epic trailer for the show that features the return of (SPOILER ALERT!!!) Evil Abed. As a wise man once said: can’t wait. Unfortunately no Annie’s Boobs sightings yet.



- You may not recognize the name Cleve Hall, but you undoubtedly have seen his creations as he is behind many of Hollywood’s most terrifying creations. And now he is the subject of Monster Man premiering next Wednesday on Syfy just before he makes a guest appearance on the competition show Face Off. Check out a clip below:

Evolution


- On Sunday, March 11 @ 8pm, Chiller’s all-new special, Real Fear: The Truth Behind the Movies, will uncover the terrifying real-life stories that inspired some of the most popular horror films of all time! Paranormal investigator Katrina Weidman (Paranormal State), along with three of her colleagues, reveal the secrets behind four iconic movies: Poltergeist, The Amityville Horror, Silent Hill and The Mothman Prophecies.

- Two premieres this Sunday on Nat Geo Wild. First at 8:00 is new series America the Wild with Casey Anderson where the naturalist travels across North America to hand out with elusive and endangered species. Then at 9:00 is the second season of Wild Justice which follows California’s Game Wardens as they protect wildlife from poachers and other threats. Check out a preview of the former below:

Wolverine to the Rescue


- Want to watch full episodes of your favorite ABC Family shows on your iPod, iPhone, or iPad? Well now there is an app for that. Head over to iTunes to download the ABC Family app for free.

- Gabrielle Union fans will be glad to hear that the actress may be heading back to the small screen after being tapped for the lead in Single Black Female, a BET hour long Pilot from the duo who created The Game. Do not bother asking if she will be playing Bridget Fonda or Jennifer Jason Leigh because she will be playing the host of a 24-hour cable news show who is not on the lookout for a new roommate.

- You still have to wait about a month until the latest HBO show Veep starring Julia Louis-Dreyfus. Until then, here is the first teaser poster:



- On Monday at 10, TLC is going inside the world of dramatic weight loss after people have lost the weight and the excess skin that goes along with the slimmer figures. The Real Skinny will document a man and woman who have elected to undergo skin removal surgery.

- For those tuning into the Battle Rounds of The Voice this week and found yourself wondering how much longer until the Live Show, NBC recently announced that the show will go live starting Monday April 2. They will also be adding a live results show on Tuesday April 3 at 9:00 following a newly shortened Biggest Loser. Then the winner will be announced on a special two hour live show starting at 8:00 on May 8. The following week, Howard Stern will be joining the judging panel of America’s Got Talent with two two hour hour shows on Monday and Tuesday May 14 and 15both starting at 8:00.

- The New York Times recently profiled rapper Azealia Banks.

All Our Youth and Beauty, it’s Been Given to the Dust

Let’s get this out of the way first, the last Bruce Springsteen album was painfully bad, I would sooner listen to Born This Way all the way through than listen to Working on a Dream with all its hopey change songs. Optimism does not suit Bruce very well and is at his best when channeling the angry and downtrodden. But if Waiting on a Dream was his hope in a transformative Barack Obama presidency, released just as he was being inaugurating, calling the follow up Wrecking Ball could show just what Bruce thinks of the current administration just as it is about to start its campaign to be reelected. And if the title track does paint a big enough picture, song titles like Shackled and Drawn, The Depression, and Death to my Hometown (which gives allusions to his Born in the U.S.A. track) should.

With the painfully bad last album, things did not sound much better with the release of the first single We Take Care of Our Own which sounded as lackluster as much of the last album even though it sounded slightly angrier. Thankfully the rest of the album gets better after the song kicks off Wrecking Ball. Where We Take Care of Our Own was a huge swing and miss with Bruce going for one of his anthemic songs along the line of Born to Run, Born in the U.S.A. or The Rising, the rest of the album sounds like Ghost of Tom Joad if it were backed by his Pete Segar Sessions players. Songs like Death to My Hometown and Rocky Ground would not have sounded out of place on the Segar Sessions. Well Rocky Round does also include an inexplicable rap at the end of it which thankfully was not provided by Bruce himself.

Aside from some of his previous work, some of the songs on the new album are reminiscent of the recent The Nightwatchman album by Tom Morello like Shackled and Drawn. So it should be not much of a surprise that Morello actually shows up and contributes a guitar solo on two songs that you do not even need to look at the liner notes to tell that it is Morello on the guitars. But the album is not all doom and gloom for the 99%, near the end of Springsteen breaks out Land of Hope and Dreams, a song that date as far back as The Rising era which draws from the classic The Impressions tune People Get Ready. The song also features one of the last sax solos ever recorded by Clarence Clemons which is a fitting end to his career with the E Street Band.

Song to Download – Land of Hope and Dreams

Wrecking Ball gets a on my Terror Alert Scale.

Previewing My Crazy Obsession

Teenage girl fanaticism has been highlighted for years, from Justin Bieber today all the way back to the days of The Beatles and Elvis Presley. Over time, the girls either go onto someone else (remember the Jonas Brothers; it has only been three short years since they were on top) but eventually they grow out of the pin up boys, getting job and marring guys who would never date a girl with the Backstreet Boys plastered all over their walls. Sure us guys had our own obsessions in our youth that we had to grow out of from baseball cards to Garbage Pail Kids to Playboys (okay, some have not grown out of that last one).

But there are a very few select adults who never grow out of their obsessions. I cannot confirm nor deny that a member of my family has an entire room dedicated to My Little Pony. Seriously, wall to wall, shelves completely fill with nothing but little plastic toys and other memorabilia. Naturally that is straight to where my mind went I heard TLC created a show called My Crazy Obsession which premieres tonight at 10:00.

The first episode features a married couple with over 5000 Cabbage Patch Kids. Let that number sit in for a while. The addition to their mobile home that houses their dolls (excuses me, they consider them their own kids on par with their own biological daughter) is as big as the mobile home they live in. They have figured they have spent over $1,000,0000 on their kids in the past twenty-five years and about $1,000 a month in malignance.

Then there is a woman who is obsessed with the color pink. Seriously, her entire apartment is shades of pink. And when I way everything I mean everything down to her dog. The only non-pink I was able to spot was the beak of a pink flamingo and the keys of her mini pink piano. That not crazy enough for you? Well she takes pink food dye with her to restaurants so she can order pink egg salad just in case the restaurant does not have any on hand. Throughout the episode, there are no confrontations or innervations about their obsessions from family, friends, or professionals (are you telling me Dr. Drew was not available?) and any comments of how crazy the people are by acquaintances are done confessional style away from the crazy people.

At the end of the episode it tells you to head over to tlc.com/casting if you know anyone with a crazy obsession who would like to share their story, but after watching the episode I no longer think the family member who may or may not have a My Little Pony room is not nearly crazy enough to be on this show. In fact I am ready after one episode to declare My Crazy Obsession the scariest show on television. Yes, even scarier than The Walking Dead or The River. Seriously, if the Cabbage Patch Kids people are not the basis of the next Chucky movie, I will be severely disappointed.

My Crazy Obsession airs Wedensdays at 10:00 on TLC. Check out a clip below:

It's All Working Perfectly Sutton, Just as We Planned

 
Pretty Little Liars hit television as one of the guiltiest Guilty pleasures of all time so it was not much of a surprised when ABC Family ordered up another television show based on another book series by the person who wrote Pretty Little Liars. Sure, at the time the book version of The Lying Game had not even hit selves yet but Hollywood is not known for its patience. What was surprising was in its original run, they did not pair The Lying Game with its predecessor. That was remedied when the show returned earlier this winter to finish out its first season.

That was not the only change in story for the second half of the season as Annie was replaced on the show, except instead of the old soap opera trick of announcing the new Annie would be now portrayed by Charisma Carpenter, but as it turned out she is an different character, yet shared most everything with the other Annie that we learned in the first half to the point it was clear that they could get an actress with name recognition to play the role and just shoe-horned in a new character instead of just replacing the old actress.

Ironically just as her aunt showed up Char was shipped out of town, trimming some of the fat off the show. She started off what seemed like the comedic relief, but that really did not go anywhere and the character. Also gone from the second half (and really most of the first) was Nisha which seemed for the best because Alec was a much better antagonist from the beginning.

The big mystery from the first half, who is the twins’ mother, took a backseat to two mini mysteries: who was in the proverbial backseat when Sutton took the plunge and who killed Derek. Neither turned out to be all that compelling because it was pretty easy to figure out who was the culprit: Alec by proxy and Alec respectively. That is the problem with only one bad guy on the show, everything bad that happens, you always point to him and always turn out to be right. We have seemed sparks of it so far this season, but hopefully Sutton goes full evil sometime next season, kind of like how she sounded to act before the show began, to spice things up. Or at least bring in another foil or two.

But the last ten seconds gave us a reason as to why the search for the mother went on the backburner the last couple episodes when Sutton greeted Rebecca with, “Hi mom” which already made a potential second season much more interesting than the first one. Now the question is what do they know and when did they know it. And what is their master plan? Presumably we already saw part of it go into motion when Alex was hauled out of his wedding (conveniently right after it was made official) for the murder of Derek. And the dissolving marriage of Ted and Kristen may be another piece.

Even though I just said how Alec was the obvious suspect to the Derek murder, but after the last ten seconds I am not entirely sure. Maybe Rebecca was correct when she told Emma that the photo was doctored, and am now suspicious that Rebecca was the one that murdered him. Those ten seconds put a lot of my previous assumption in doubt (except Ted is totally the father). Just prior to the finale I was talking to someone who mentioned how evil Sutton can be, but I complained that the show would be much better if Sutton went full evil and it looks like she finally did and the second season should be much better because of it. Now if only How I Met Your Mother can have a reveal of the mom as awesome as The Lying Game did.

The Lying Game 1.x gets a on my Terror Alert Scale. You can stream recent episodes on Hulu. You can also download The Lying Game on iTunes.

The Voice Post-Blind Auditions Power Rankings

I did not realize just how many Blind Auditions were sat through until I sat down to work on a Power Ranking, almost fifty and that does not even count all the people that did not get anyone to turn around (what the heck happened to Ducky?). Since the coaches will be chopping that list in half during the battle rounds, I decided to just do a top 25 for the power ranking which is how many will make it to the Live Shows plus a bonus person just for a nice round number. So without further ado, here is The Voice Top 25 Power Ranking with a quick thought about each of them:

1. Tony Lucca – The beardless Ray Lamontange

2. Jesse Campbell – A better version of Javier Colon

3. Lindsey Pavao – A less polished Dia Frampton

4. Jamie Lono – Can make me a sandwich any day

5. Whitney Myers – I have not been able to confirmed it just yet, but I am pretty sure she is actually Becky Sproles after dying her hair

6. Nicolle Galyon – Potentially this year’s Dia Frampton, not the most memorable Blind Audition but is poised for a breakout moment if she makes it to the Live Shows

7. Mathai – A much better Raquel Castro

8. Lex Land – A less adventurous Rebecca Lobe

9. The Shields Brothers! – Because America does need to be punched in the face with Rock n Roll

10. Geoff McBride – A funkier version of Jesse Campbell

11. Naia Kete – A dreadlocked Xenia

12. The Line – Thompsons Sisters with more testosterone and talent

13. Charlotte Sometimes – Had a record deal and was on the Warped Tour much like Blake’s finalist last year Dia Frampton

14. WADE – Are we sure this really wasn’t Kevin Hart?

15. Jamar Rogers – The male Vicci Martinez

16. Sera Hill – Better than any female RnB singers from the first season

17. RaeLynn – A sassier version of Casey Weston

18. Angel Taylor – A good voice and all but broke the Cardinal Rule of karaoke contests, never, under any circumstance, try to out-Adele Adele

19. Jermaine Paul – Strong voice but should stop singing white female teen pop songs

20. Lee Koch – He might make dough but do not call him Doughboy because shotgun bullets are bad for your health.

21. Orlando Napier - I did not realize he was playing Waiting on the World to Change when he auditioned and after rewatching it a couple time, I am still not entirely sure

22. Juliet Simms – An edgier Vicci Martinez

23. Jordis Unga – Needs to stop squatting mid performance and do not needlessly change the lyrics

24. Cheesa – If she meant to sound like a boy while performing If I Were a Boy, it was genius, if not, this shot probably went to someone else

25. Chris Cauley – A younger Tim Mahoney


Even though this is advertised as a battle between coaches, they do not actually go head to head until the finals so ranking the teams is kind of silly, but just for fun, I assigned a number to each contestant to see who had the strongest team and here is the Power Rankings for each Coach (which I included all 48 singers). Basically I have one point for the worst singer and forty-eight for the best and here is how strong each team is (in parentheses is the number if you just count my top 25 which surpisingly split evenly between the teams which was not something I did on purpose):

1. Adam – 324 (99)
2. Christina – 320 (93)
3. Blake – 269 (65)
4. Cee-Lo – 263 (68)


So right now it looks like a battle between Adam and Christina for the top and a race to the bottom for Cee-Lo and Blake. Even though I hated the second chance round last year (recognizing the voice defeats the purpose of a Blind Audition), here are the top five singers that did deserve a call back:

1. Ducky – What the heck happened to Ducky? If he had made it to the Battle Rounds he would have been in the top ten of my Power Ranking. If he is not invited back for season three that would be a crime against humanity.

2. Preston Shannon – C’mon, how could Christina not pick him to bolster her Old Black Dude team?

3. Eric Tipton – Much like Adele, it not a good idea to try to match yourself to Daryl Hall, but still solid enough he should have earned a spot

4. Erik Macek – Solid song selection, good voice and still better than a bunch of the tomato cans that were pick

5. Neal Middleton – It is a shame there are no real rock coach on the show

Be sure to return after the Battle Rounds (which I think will be sometime in August) for the next Power Ranking. Until then here is a sneak peak of a Battle Round you can (presumably) look forward tonight featuring Cheesa and Angie Johnson taking on Total Eclipse of the Heart. Only Cee-Lo would think to have someone sing Bonnie Tyler on national television.

57 Channels and Only This Is On - 3/4/12

The Walking Dead: Let’s stop pretending that Rick is actually going to kill the kid (who looked like he had two legs, I thought they had to amputate that), if he is not going to leave Shane to be eaten in the school bus, who is a bigger threat to his family than the kid, he is not going to kill the ked. And seriously, who is going to go back to that group of people that left him for dead to kill the people who risked their life to save him? This is a stupid debate; you always side with the people who saved your life. But of course the writing is so bad, they will probably have Rick kill him making Rick no better than Shane.
You can stream recent episodes over at amc.com. You can also download The Walking Dead on iTunes.

The Voice: I was seriously disappointed Christina Aguilera did not push her button for Preston Shannon, which would have bolstered her old black dude team even more than it already is (which looks to lose a member Monday when Jesse takes on Anthony in the Battle Round). But this really felt like a leftover show because after Whitney Myers got everyone to turn their chairs around there where very few multiple chair turns with the exception of Lex Land who was lucky enough to hit her worse note after she got all the boys to turn around (Christina gave a big Gas Face to the iffy note).

But the naturally the most noteworthy audition went to The Shields Brothers. My first thought when they came on screen was I thought The Voice did not have any “joke” auditions. My second thought when they started to sing was if these two do not make it to the Live Shows where they can sing We’re Not Gonna Take It then make it another round for the prerequisite power balled (preferable Tesla’s Love Song) I’m gonna be very unhappy. Get ready to be punched in the face America because the Shields Brothers should be here to stay.
You can stream recent episodes on Hulu. You can also download songs from the episode using the widget at right.

How I Met Your Mother: I did not think anything was more offensive to the suburbs than Suburgatory until I show Robin’s montage to the suburbs. Seriously, it is not that bad.
You can stream recent episodes over at cbs.com. You can also download How I Met Your Mother on iTunes.

The Lying Game: Oh snap! Emma slapped Sutton in the face! I almost wish the show would turn Sutton 100% evil like a WWF heel turn where she bashes someone in the back with a folding chair for no reason.
You can stream recent episodes on Hulu. You can also download The Lying Game on iTunes.

Castle: “Seriously, a bow?” My thoughts exactly.
You can stream recent episodes on Hulu. You can also download Castle on iTunes.

The River: Wow, the Spanish chick did not know the tale of the ghost ship going in. A bit surprising. I was more surprised that the skivvy cameraman did not sacrifice himself for the hot chick’s father. Seemed like it would have been a fitting ending to his storyline.
You can stream recent episodes on Hulu. You can also download The River on iTunes.

Justified: Some more chess pieces shuffled around this episode in the four person match between Ray;an, Boyd, Limehouse, and Quarles and it looks like next week Quarles will be eliminating another pawn as I get the sense he is going to kill Wynonna’s (ex?)husband and pin it on Raylan. I’m still waiting for when all four of them show up at the same place at the same time, or at the least three of them.
You can stream recent episodes on Hulu. You can also download Justified on iTunes.

Parenthood: Even with all the obstacles throughout the season, I never thought that the season would end with Julia not having Zoey’s baby. But a heartbreaking end to the most heartbreaking storyline in the show’s history. For a second there I thought next season they would end up adopting Drew and Amy’s kid they conceived at the wedding. And I am not optimistic with the her adopting a grown boy of an incarcerated woman, I do not see that ending well either. The most absurd moment goes to Adam ripping up the $2 million+ offer at a wedding. What I do not understand is why not sell a share of the Luncheonette? Adam gets his money, Crosby would still be the engineer and the general public would get more Dwayne Wayne next season. That is what they call in the business a win-win-win.
You can stream recent episodes on Hulu. You can also download Parenthood on iTunes.

Survivor: One World: Kat v Troyzan should go down in the annals of time as one of the greatest duel ever in the history of time. I am just disappointed they went to a montage, there was so much filler in the episode, they could not show the whole thing? Hopefully the duel in its entirely show up on ESPN Classic sometime soon.

On the flip side, Colton is really giving Russell Hantz a run for the most annoying contestant ever title and it is only three episodes. Hopefully his island of misfits alliances turn on him soon, and soon enough to split the vote to smoke out the immunity idol. It is hard to think he will be long for this world because he is managing to play an even worse strategic game than Russell (and that does not even encompass his ghetto trash comment). The longer Colton stays in this game the worse this season is going to be no matter how entertaining Kat’s stupidness is.
You can stream recent episodes over at cbs.com.



Suburgatory: Apparently it was croquet week between Suburgtory and How I Met Your Mother and as the McGavin family reigning champion, I was annoyed how they got it wrong, you do not have to swing between your legs and George’s golf swing is actually better. And their wickets were too far apart at the beginning of the course. Seriously, Suburgatory, if you need a croquet technical advisor, shout me a holla.
You can stream recent episodes on Hulu. You can also download Suburgatory on iTunes.

Revenge: I was a bit surprised that they went ahead and told us who killed the rent boy (Mr. Miyagi was very high on my short list anyway) but I guess the big question that is supposed to drive the rest of the season is not who killed him, but who will take the fall. The show sadly did not pull the trigger by having Daniel end up being the dead guy from the series premiere so I wonder if they will actually put him or Jack behind bars. If we are lucky, Decland will end up taking the fall for his brother.
You can stream current episodes on Hulu. You can also download Revenge on iTunes.