Daniel's TV Blog

It's down to Fat Mama and Feedback. Tonight the winner is decided. It's been an emotional ride as the other 9 candidates were eliminated one by one. Feedback has a great character and a great costume but needs a new hairstyle. I hope he wins because he is so into the whole superhero things. Fat Mama is doing this for her kids and for fun but this is Feedback's life. I hope they bring back all the fallen heros tonight for the finale.

What a great episode of Runway last night. Jeffrey is such a jerk, but he makes great things. Kayne was a bit over the top. Hasn't he heard less is more? Crazy Vincent's outfit looked useless. But finally Angela got the boot. Michael Kors said she was going to look like a homeless person when she got off the plane and I think that was just about right. Now we just need to get mean old Jeffrey out of the show.

And speaking of Jeffrey, did he say he was going to make a "fish mouth" t-shirt? Is that sweeping the nation? I do agree with him that it's cool to have Tim Gunn pop into your life all the time.

I found a website today that lists the dates of all the premiers of shows this season. For the complete list, click here. I've included a list of shows that I watch or that I know my readers watch:

Monday, Aug. 21
8:00 pm Prison Break (Fox)

Sunday, Sept. 10
8:00 pm The Simpsons (Fox)
8:30 pm American Dad (Fox)
9:00 pm Family Guy (Fox)

Thursday, Sept. 14
8:00 pm Survivor: Cook Islands (CBS)

Sunday, Sept. 17
8:30 pm The Amazing Race 10 (CBS)

Thursday, Sept. 21
8:00 pm My Name Is Earl (NBC)
9:00 pm Grey's Anatomy (ABC)

Sunday, Sept. 24
9:00 pm Desperate Housewives (ABC)

Tuesday, Sept. 26
8:00 pm Gilmore Girls (CW)

Thursday, Sept. 28
8:00 pm Smallville (CW)

Tuesday, Oct. 3
9:00 pm Veronica Mars (CW)

Wednesday, Oct. 4
9:00 pm Lost (ABC)

Thursday, Nov. 2
9:00 pm The OC (Fox)

Tonight is the finale of the second season of 30 Days on FX. There were only 6 episodes this season. Tonight's episode follows the series creator and Big Mac enthuthiest Morgan Spurlock as he goes to jail for 30 days. The episode this season I enjoyed the most was the Abortion episode. A pro-choice worker goes to work and live in a home for single mothers run by pro-life people. It was clear the pro-life people had a huge number of misconceptions about the pro-choice people. The main woman made the profound statement that they could all live together for a thousand years and never change the others mind. It's so true which is why I've always tried to stay out of the argument my entire life.

The best episode of 30 Days wasn't even an episode but a segment on The Colbert Report. After being a guest with Stephen, he showed a average guy who had to sit in the Colbert audience for 30 Days. It was very funny.

Bravo seems to have this unlimited stream of L.A. based reality shows to air on Tuesday nights. After The D-List, they ran Work Out. That ended last week so we have the debut of Million Dollar Listing about Malibu and Hollywood real estate agents. I have a friend who is a real estate agent in Beverly Hills and he has told me the amount of homes for sale in the $1-3M range has increased significantly in the past year. The bubble is bursting in some markets in L.A., although here in Seattle it seems to be a steady climb like always. This show should be quite interesting.

I didn't watch the Emmy's last night becuase award shows are lame and self congratulatory. I am interested in who wins though. Here are my interesting observations:

• 24 is the only show to get two of the top ten awards (Best Drama and Best Actor)
• NBC picked up for of the top ten yet it is the lowest rated network
• Will & Grace is the only three camera comedy with a top ten award for Megan Mullaly
• Leslie Jordan won for best guest actor playing Beverly Leslie on Will & Grace
• The Oscar award ceremony won an Emmy, this is so stupid
• Why is there still a mini-series category? Nobody makes them any more
• South Park: Trapped in the Closet did not win. They lost to The Simpsons: The Seeming Never Ending Story.

I started watching the new MTV reality show today called Two-a-Days. It's about a high school football team in a small Alabama town where football is everything. If you don't show up to practice, you better not be able to walk. You have to give it your all. If you can walk off the field instead of crawl, you didn't work hard enough. The first episode was about a game between Hoover (the team on the show) and this team from Nease, FL. Apparently the game was on ESPN last year as these were two of the highest ranked teams in the country. Hoover won of course. I was wondering if they had footage of both teams and they only used the winning team to make the show about.

The main guy in the show is Alex whose girl drama over shadowed his big win over Nease. Then there's Max who got hurt and is playing safer since his surgery much to the coaches displeasure. Both these guys have the same bad hair style I had in high school. I can't believe it came back. I also liked the fact that they showcased Tyler who dropped off the team because the coach is too demanding. His brother was a star and now plays football for Auburn. I'm expecting this kid to come out of the closet show.

On Project Runway this season, Robert the Barbie designer was one of my favorites. I liked him, even if he didn't do anything great since the first couple weeks. It has been clear recently that he was in trouble. I knew he wouldn't make it to the end, But I had hoped he'd get further than this. This week he got the boot with a nice looking but boring tank dress and cape thingy. I felt Jeffrey did a worse job this week, but he has done better than Michael over all in the show. I think that was a fair way to decide who was out this week. Just because someone has one bad week as Jeffrey did designing for the heavyset mother of Angela, doesn't mean he should be out. It was great to see reality shows doing something fair for a change.

Anyway this challenge of designing for the everyday woman reminded me of an old Kids in the Hall skit called the Darcie Pernell show. This fake talk show had on this French designer who had a line of clothes for the ugly woman. Nothing is too horrible for the ugly woman. The two items I remember included a dress made from Fiberglas insulation and show which were boxes with broken glass in them. Maybe that will be next week.

Tonight is the season finale of Pysch. This has been a surprise hit for the summer. Tonight is the season final and the guys go to "GalaxyCon" which is really supposed to be ComicCon. George Takei guest stars as himself. I've really enjoyed the show this summer. I look forward to the return.

I watched the Prison Break season 2 premier and I have to say, I love it. The new FBI guy is a great addition. This show now has two good guys (Scofield and FBI/Sheriff guy) who have completely opposing agendas. I really want the FBI/Sheriff guy to win, but I also want Scofield and John Doe to get away also. I do want more than anything for Captain Bellick to die this season. I love the fact that everyone who was helping them on the outside is now gone since they are on the outside now. Sadly that's because most of them are dead. The president's presumed dead brother had to be recast since Dr. Phlox is now in a new show this fall called The Nine. I'm looking forward to that. I was happy to see Dr. Tandreci to survive her drug overdose. I'm excited to see how she gets out of the aiding and abetting charge. I hope this season we see more of Admiral Ro, Mike Hammer, Home Alone Dad, and the WB president from Nobody's Watching. I love all those characters. Wow, there are a lot of bad guys in this show. Here are the new storylines for the season:

• Will Scofield and Joe Doe make it to Utah, get the money and flee to Central America?
• What is the way out for the doctor that Scofield left the note about?
• Will they get LJ out of Prison also?
• Will T-Bag have his hand reattached? When will he be caught?
• What happened to Haywire?
• When will Scofield and John Doe ditch the others?
• What about Tweener?
• When will the President's conspiracies be exposed: killing the former president, faking her brother's death, embezzlement

I forgot Work Out is on Tuesdays. I usually watch it Wednesday with Project Runway. I picked up this show late. I was turned on to it by DTVB readers Matt and Ted, both whom workout more than I do. Here's the premise of this reality show. Sky Sport and Spa is the newest gym in Beverly Hills. They opened on the top floor of an old mid-rise office building. They have celebrity and non-celebrity clients. Jackie is the owner and a big lesbian. She has a bunch of trainers, many of whom are gay and probably want to be models or actors or something. It's a very gay show. The show is supposed to be about the trainers and their drama and the drama of the clients. But most of the recurring drama on the show is about Jackie and her annoying girlfriend Mimi. It's on tonight at 10:00 and then repeated several times during the week. Also, I love Doug, he is hot!

I've been watching this show on MTV called My Super Sweet 16 for a few weeks now. It is such a train wreck. It follows around rich teenage girls (and black boys) whose parents have way too much money and spend it on these lavish parties for their spoiled kids. Here's what usually happens in each episode:

• The birthday girl (or boy) introduces her/his fabulous lifestyle.
• The party theme is described.
• The invitations are handed out in the lavish way.
• Many are left with an invite.
• The kids have some blow-up with their parents over something very trivial.
• They fly off to New York or Paris to get their outfit(s).
• Something goes terribly wrong the day of the party, but gets resolved at the last minute.
• They show up in a stretch Hummer or something fabulous.
• The party is a huge success.
• Some kids try to crash the party but get kicked out.
• Some famous singer or group shows up to perform.
• The kid gets a super expensive car (or cars).
• The teenager quotes the cost of the party and the proclaims "I'm worth it."

Most of the time, the focus of the episode is a spoiled little girl, but I've seen a few episodes with boys. All of then were African American kids. I don't know what that is all about. I saw one this morning with the gayest teen ever, Bjorn. His party included a fashion show and took place in the mall after closing. I hope these kids enjoy their time in high school, because the real world is going to suck ass for them later.

Sometimes things happen that make no sense I just don't believe they can be true. Thus is the case with the recent news that the SciFi channel has cancelled its longest running show, Stargate: SG1 after 6 season (10 if you add in the 4 from Showtime). Ratings have slipped from last year, most likely since the moved BSG to the fall instead of keeping it paired with SG in the summer. The timing of the announcement makes little sense. Last Friday the show just celebrated it's milestone 200th episode. The franchise has been called the "Star Trek" of this decade. There have been rumors of a second spin-off. A couple days ago it was announced the episodes will be available on iTunes. And then yesterday, the show is cancelled. It would have made sense to end the show after the 5th season, when Abados was destroyed and Daniel Jackson ascended. Or in the 8th season when the Go'a'uld and the replicators were both eliminated. But now the new Ori storyline is going strong and needs at least one more season to play out. The SciFi channel was really short sighted. They should have worked out a deal to make the 11th season the last, pulling in huge ratings as the Ori storyline finished up. But instead they just cancelled it. One of the executive producers has declared the show will go on in some form. I'm hoping that will be a kick-ass mini-series to finish up the storylines.

Special thanks to DTVB reader David for the heads up on this news.

FOX gets a jump on the fall season with the return of Prison Break and the debut of Vanished. FOX often starts early so it can generate early viewership but mostly so it can get some shows up and running before shutting down for MLB in October. I find it funny that the first show of the season, Prison Break, was the last show I watched last season. I had sandbagged the show on my TiVo last season and watched it in June. There's just too much TV to watch. I found the finale to be a little weak. I cannot see how the escapees could possibly outrun the dozens of cops with trucks, choppers, and dogs. They only had a few hundred yards on them, plus they've been running all night. I'm excited about the new FBI guy who joins the show this fall. Last year he played Sheriff Guy on Invasion. Following that is the premier of Vanished. It's about the disappearance of the wife of a US Senator. From what I've read it's more than just a simple kidnapping. I'm looking forward to this one.

Stargate: SG1 hits its 200th episode tonight. The last science fiction show to hit this mark was the X-files. There was little celebration since the 204th was already planned to be the last one. Stargate has come a long way since it's initial four year run on Showtime. The pilot episode being on a premium channel had naked breasts. The 5th season finale was written to be a series finale with the death of Daniel Jackson. But the ratings on SciFi channel proved good enough to continue on and even do the spin-off, Atlantis. I was asked this morning what was my favorite episode. I've decided it is between A Matter of Time or Window of Opportunity. Of the Ori episodes I have to pick Beachhead. Tonight's episode is supposed to be fun and full of laughs. MacGyver returns for both SG1 and Atlantis episodes.

Tonight is the season finale of the hysterical politically incorrect comedy It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia. One of the things I love about this new season is their willingness to repeats jokes when they are really, really funny. Danny Devito keeps talking about his time in 'Nam and him daughter keeps reminding him that he went to Vietnam in 1993 to open a sweatshop. And his connections in 'Nam keep bringing the scary Asian gamblers into the bar. Tonight Dee and Dennis find out that Frank (Danny Devito) may not be their real dad. I'm hoping Anne Archer will be back as their mom. She's been wonderful in the couple episodes she's been in

Poor Alison never recovered from her weird square skit thing she threw out and got tossed out herself last night. I really liked her and was expecting her to make it. Non-gay Michael won for the second week in a row. But the honeymoon is over for the designers. Kayne and Robert got catty in the lunch room about crazy Laura. Laura went on about how crazy Vincent is, which he is. Jeffrey bashed Michael's winning design. I liked Michael's but Jeffrey's was better in my opinion. While being lightly critiqued by Laura, Kayne snaps and calls her character into question. Down boy. But the best was at the end when crazy Laura decides to point out how crappy Vincent is and he should have been kicked off instead of sweet little Alison. Mayhem ensued.

I've been watching Days of Our Lives since I left Microsoft 3.5 years ago. Of course I don't have as much time to watch an extra 5 hours of TV a week so I watch the compressed TiVo version. I watch the opening segment, up to the sands in the hourglass and then I skip to the 45 minute mark. Anything good happens at the beginning or the end. I can run through a week's episodes in about an hour. It's perfect television for folding laundry.

One thing I've noticed is the writers are extremely lazy. Jack Deveraux has been dying of a rare condition for the past two years or so. Ignore the fact that he already died twice since I started watching again, but both those were faked. The entire time he's been close to death they have never given his disease a name or described his symptoms. He just passes out occasionally. Then he gets into an experiential drug trial and what ever he has goes into remission. Would it be too much to ask that they make up a name for this rare but known condition, how about "Moyer Syndrome".

Also, the bad guys are just so uninspired. The current bad guy is only known as "the gloved one." We see a shadowy figure with a glove delivering blackmail notes and switching embryos but we never see who it is. This means (a) they haven't figured out who it is yet or (b) they don't want to pay the new actor yet or (c) both. While the motives for their dirty work are usually clean, revenge, their actions are just dumb and lazy. If someone with nearly unlimited resources and personal knowledge wanted to seek revenge, just kill people. Don't fake their deaths and keep the victims locked up on an island or a castle or an evil day spa. It's just lame.

The final method of laziness is forgotten storylines. Two years back, John was in the hospital and some shadowy figure was injecting him with the wrong medication making him worse. It turned out to be...Detective Tek. And then, nothing. John got better and we never found out why Tek was doing this. Lame, lame.

This morning I watched a few minutes of VH1 while finishing getting ready for work. It was an episode of Hogan Knows Best where Brooke was about to get her "big break". That actually describes half of the episodes. Mrs. Hogan was giving her advice and saying things like "this is your big chance" and "you've got to step up to the plate" and "don't eat that ice cream you fat cow!" It was the baseball metaphor that caught my attention. This phrase was used to death on The Apprentice in the last few season. Any time any one wanted to criticize the work of any one else, they would say "you didn't step up to the plate" or "we were expecting you to step up to the plate". Even Carolyn used that phrase. I realized today that everyone uses this phrase incorrectly and it's time to call shenanigans on them. What does it mean to "step up to the plate"? First one prepares one self by going on deck. Then they take they turn in a predetermined roster and try their hardest to do the job right. Everyone uses it as if there is no one waiting to hit the pitch out of the park and the entire team is just standing around looking for someone to take charge. Taking charge and doing unexpected exceptional work is not stepping up to the plate. "Stepping up to the plate" is doing a good job in your exact assign task at the exact assigned time.

I propose a new term, "Step up to the Mic". Imagine a audience at an open mic night and there is no list. Who is going to run up and perform next? Will you "step up to the mic?" It's sweeping the nation just like "baby fish mouth".

Last year I watched the last few episodes of the train wreck dating show Flavor of Love, where Flavor Flav tries to find his new squeeze. Thing didn't work out with the woman he picked last time so he's back for another season. Flavor is a bit insane himself, but the women he's picked this year are out of control. They weren't in the house five minutes when two of the women started fighting. And they were seriously fighting. The instigator was asked to leave and the poor other girl had to leave the show and go to a doctor. It was insane. And just when you thought that was as crazy as things get, later in the episode one of the women poops during the elimination ceremony. She wasn't eliminated but she should be next week. These women are a disgrace. You can watch some clips online at vh1.com.

So I've had DISH for about 5 years. The rest of my adult life I've had cable. But this week I've done something with TV that I've never done before: I ordered a pay-per-view movie. I don't have Logo but I do have Here! which is the pay-per-view gay cable channel. This week was the debut of the gay detective movie Shock to the System. I shelled out my $3.99 and watched it. It was quite good. I figured out "who dun it" but I didn't know why until the end. Chad Allen from Doctor Quinn, Medicine Women starred in it. He's one of those rare people who is really attractive, unless he smiles. He's got a strange smile. He was good and I hope there are many sequels. I'll pay for them all. It's playing all month or you could wait a year and get it on NetFlix. Either way, it's worth watching.

I'm loving Project Runway. This week the fashions were boring but the drama was stellar. Brandon continues to be useless and thus was the last picked for dodgeball, I mean the group competition. Angela continues to be crazy, but lucky. How she ended up winning is still a bit confusing. Kayne and Robert are so doing each other. They are always standing or sitting next to each other and Robert picked Kayne first to be on his team. Luckily bumping donuts is not against the rules but having fashion how-to books is a serious no-no. And that's why Tim had to kick Keith out. Also he snuck away and used the internet. What a dork.

But there was also drama over on Who Wants to Be a Superhero. After Cell Phone Girl got the boot for having no courage against the attack dogs, everyone got a costume make over and Ty'veculus looked LAME. He got to go back to his old costume. BTW, he is the only real-life hero since his secret identity is a firefighter. Way to go. But I can't stop laughing about what happened with The Iron Enforcer. After being kicked off by Stan Lee, he was invited to return as a super villain to make the lives of the remaining superheros hell. What a great twist. Isn't that how most super-villains are created? Formerly friends with the hero, they feel betrayed and they turn evil. I can't wait to see the others find out. Seven Heros remain.

In the before time, product placement was always viewed as unpleasant or unseemly. Why did it matter what cola the protagonist drinks, is that crucial to the story? Of course not. In the age of TiVo it is becoming an acceptable evil. Ford sponsors a commercial free episode of 24 and we expect Jack Bauer to be driving one. It makes sense even though we role our eyes as the camera lingers on the blue oval. But in the age of reality shows it is time to embrace it. There's really no reason to role our eyes, the sponsors have a role in these shows now. Over on Treasure Hunters they get messages on their Motorola phones and search the internet on Ask.com. These are part of the show and it would be odd if they pixalated the company names. But my favorite use of product placement is on Project Runway. It has reached an absurd level. A sample Tim Gunn line: "Now take your models to the Tresemme hair salon, the L'Oreal makeup room, and don't forget to utilize the Macy's accessory wall." It's brilliant and I laugh every time. Don't miss the new episode tonight.

Today is the 25th Anniversary of MTV. Of course we all know the network began with Video Killed the Radio Star by The Buggles. I don't think I've ever seen this video. Anyway, one of the biggest complaints I hear about MTV is they don't play videos anymore. This is untrue. All morning and throughout the night they play videos. But complaining about this is like complaining about Walmart. The original programming gets much higher ratings and so they play that during the day and prime time. Way back when I was MTV's target demographic, I used to watch it over at my friend Mike's house during the summer or after school. My parent's didn't get cable until after I left for college. I'm still bitter about that. So Mike and I would watch the video shows on MTV but mostly as background entertainment while playing Parcheesi. But when Remote Control came on, we had our eyeballs on the screen. I had a crush on Colin Quinn, he was so cool. This was the beginning of the end for the all video format and we have no one to blame but ourselves.

Recently I started watching The Hills and I noticed something. While the videos may have disappeared long ago, the music is still there. The theme some is Unwritten by Natasha Bedingfield and there is lots of current music used throughout each episode. Music Television is still an applicable name, only the music delivery system has changed.