Showing posts with label television. Show all posts
Showing posts with label television. Show all posts

Wednesday, December 1, 2010

The Replacements

It’s that time again ~ Mid-Season Mania, that is, when the Tube shakes up its old, tired programming with some shiny new, tired programs*! Here’s just a few of those new kids on the block.

60 Minute Makeover (CBS, Sun.) – Your Nana’s cranky old TV news-magazine dinosaur (60 Minutes, natch) gets a lift-and-tuck with this weekly one hour real-time extreme makeover event. This week – Kim Kardashian tackles Leslie Stahl. (Still features a last word from Andy Rooney – and looking good!)

Wiki-Wow! (FOX, Fri.) – Watch spicy re-enactments of each week’s massive online info-revelations and revel in America’s dirty laundry. This week- Hillary disses somewhere called India, and the Obamas’ chef sneaks in a non-fat substitute for Ben Netanyahu’s fave creamy Thousand Islands salad dressing ~ ooh, snap!

Antiques Roadhouse (PBS, Fri.) – Toss a few back to raunchy, rural spinoff fun, as poor, drunk hopefuls get their chance to trot their worthless old wares down to the local juke-joint for a rowdy appraisin’. Don’t agree with that city-fied appraiser’s take on yer family heirloom? Why not settle it like a man? That fake Tiffany lamp still smashes skulls right good!

Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell! (ABC, see local listings) – It’s a game show now! Perez Hilton hosts this weekly battle of wits, as contestants compete for cash & prizes by earning 3 chances to ask a panel of 3 servicemen/women their sexual proclivities. They must eliminate both the phony gay (planted as distraction), and real homosexual to reveal the last honest, hetero American soldier! USA.

S.A.I.S. (Salvation Army Investigative Squad) (NBC, Fri.) – Thought you got rid of that semen-stained sofa scot-free? Think again, perp! If you’re like most folks, you didn’t know every branch of your local Salvation Army thrift store houses a crack forensic investigative officer stationed in its garage, monitoring each 'donation.' Watch each week as the regional squad teams up to follow a worthless object into ever-deeper and dingier mysteries.

*Cops, America's Most Wanted and Two 1/2 Men will continue to air in perpetuity.

Monday, November 8, 2010

Get More Real!

Even More Exciting Reality TV Prospects on the Horizon ~

Extreme Foreclosure (Home Edition) – Strapping young bank execs from coast-to-coast compete to see who can lay the boom on the biggest money-pits, with prizes spanning a private jet, time-share in Tuscany- even each other's wives. From small potatoes ranch houses to McMansions, everything must go!

Filibuster! - With a divided Congress, there has never been a better time to watch our elected representatives in (in) action. Marvel in fascination as another bill to raise the minimum wage to a poverty-acceptable level is blocked for weeks by determined blow-hards, even though it’s attached to an arms deal for Saudi Arabia. They’re gonna need a lot of cots!

Everybody Must Get Stoned - No more “Take two years probation and call me in the morning” American justice here! Each week, a U.S. criminal (sometimes your fave celebrity!) is randomly chosen to be subjected to a foreign crime-appropriate ‘barbaric’ primal punishment. Internet Stalker? Goodbye fingers! Rumored Witch? Hope you can swim! Adulterer? Well, you won’t be needing that!

The Great Anchor-Baby Race – Three immigrant families compete to plant roots and lay their path to U.S. citizenship through the ‘funnest’ way possible – reproduction! Who can make their tots legit the fastest? (Quick – before the buzz-kill Republicans close this Constitutional ‘loophole’!)

Pimp My Bunker – Cutting-edge urban interior design teams invade rural America’s growing rural survivalist strongholds, anxious to lend their underground shelters a touch of ‘zing.’ Who says camo’s the only way to go, girlfriend?

Thursday, August 19, 2010

Get Real

The New Slate of Promising Reality-TV Shows

Rape House – Five college coeds are sequestered under one roof for a month, denied modern amenities, such as cell phones, the internet, or TV. The twist ~ one is a serial campus rapist. Can alliances help you now? Dehumanizing violence followed by comic vigilante justice will ensue.

So You Think You Can Bake? Kitchen shut-ins from across the land compete for the honor of the next great American pastry chef. Celebrity judges from IHOP, Friendly’s and House of Pies will cast a discerning eye over their flaky creations.

Last Plumber Standing – A fleet of America’s best pipe-men tackle a slate of ever-more- complex plumbing nightmares, including an 18th century Druid castle. Who will be left high and dry when this shit settles?

Suicide Watch – Closed circuit surveillance technology places us directly in the cell of an accused criminal, placed on that most grave status as a danger to his or her-self. Stare 24-7 along with the trained authorities to see if you can spot that hidden shoelace!

America’s Got Problems – From white supremacists to cult-mavens to amputee-fetish enthusiasts, everyone gets their 15 minutes in this new showcase musical-variety competition. Who will make it all the way to Vegas and into our nation’s heart?

Thursday, June 17, 2010

OBSOLETE SHEET: What to Watch!

A selective peek at the upcoming TV season:
(Consult your local listings for specific showtimes)

Thanks – I’m Welcome!
(Sunday, ABC)
It’s after the Apocalypse, but Chuck Heston’s got nothing on funnyman Rich Little as the Last Man on Earth. Tune in each week as he goes slowly insane trying to order a meal, pretending to be stuck in traffic while listening to his own impressions, and fending off the flesh-eating undead.*

Robots-at-Law
(Monday, NBC)
In the Near-Future, the hard-hitting android attorneys at the class action firm LX32, Zt1P & Stein take no guff while standing up for the little guy. Who says a microchip can’t cry?

The Hoover Files
(Tuesday, CBS)
Legendary FBI honcho J. Edgar Hoover hits the streets in this hard-hitting Stephen J. Cannell action series based on the agency’s actual case files of notable Americans. Ep. 1: The Frisky Fed infiltrates lefty actor Paul Newman’s weekend fondue social, and crashes a ‘stag beach party’ in Key West to nail ‘light-in-the-loafers’ crooner Jim Nabors.

Sanford Forever
(Wednesday, NBC)
Yep- It’s finally happened. Crusty junkman Fred Sanford (Redd Foxx) has croaked and reunited with his beloved wife ‘Lizbeth’ in the afterlife. Their son Lamont has joined the LAPD, and together they tackle nasty ghetto crime with some help from some ‘not so divine’ intervention!

That’s Improbable!

(Thursday, ABC)
Shrug in mild amazement each week as the show scours this great nation to bring you the notable achievements of everyday Americans, such as the oldest grocery bagger or most efficient postman - then slowly fall asleep.

TJ & The Dragon
(Friday, CBS)
Trucker Tony Danza drives the big rigs coast-to-coast, along with his trusty companion Kato, the Komodo Dragon. The pair gets into some scrapes but has some good-time guffaws along the way.

It’s Ziggy!
(Saturday, NBC)
Everyone’s favorite sad little nebbish jumps straight from the Sunday funnies to his own show. Each show consists of a 20 min. still shot of that week’s hilarious single-panel cartoon, interspersed with special messages from sponsor Prozac.

T-Court
(In Syndication)
It’s T-Court, Fool! 3rd Circ. Mag. Judge Mr. T presides in a small-claims courtroom, hearing the gripes of Joe Six-Packs and Judy Punch-Clocks just like you & me. Only he can decide which fools to pity most.

*Soon to be a Major Motion Picture starring Steve Carrell

Don’t touch that dial!