Weekly TV Roundup: 10/17-10/21

Saturday, October 22, 2005

I figure when there's not enough time/inclination to give each show its own post, why not do a roundup? Easier and less painless for everyone involved.

Monday: yet again, Arrested Development is preempted by baseball, the world's most boring sport. Thank God I don't have to be subjected to it, for I married a man who couldn't give a flip. Actually, out of the three sisters in my family, two of us married men who don't watch sports. Rebellion against a childhood in which we had to suffer through every t.v. sport imaginable? You be the judge.

Tuesday: This is my t.v. night: My Name is Earl, The Office, Law & Order: SVU. When Scrubs and Fear Factor come back on mid-season, I'm there, baby. Earl continues to be really funny, although I have to say that I don't particularly care for his brother. He's just ahright. Who continually cracks me up is his ex-wife; she's just so dead-on white trash that every time she comes onscreen she's hilarity with a capital H. "What do you think? Cigarettes grow on trees?"

And on the show, she's married to the Crab Man (that constantly reminds me of Mr. Crab from Spongebob Squarepants), who elsewhere plays the Rubberband Man in the Staples commercials. I love that guy.

The Office was more of a downer than in this season's previous episodes (in which wacky hijinks have ensued; funny til now, but I can't take too much of it-- I watch the show to see the hilarity in the mundane). It's Halloween, and everyone's in their costumes: Pam the receptionist is a cat (as well as two other women in the office), Dwight is a Sith Lord, complete with $125 light saber, Oscar's a woman with a big blonde beehive, Kevin's Dunder-Mifflin Mr. Incredible (pre-weight loss), Jim's a three-hole punch (three black circles on his shirt), and Michael's the Two-Headed Monster. I swear, I kept having Rosie Greer flashbacks, and that's NOT a good thing, Martha.

Corporate wanted Michael to fire someone by the end of the day. Downsizing's always been a threat, since the first episode, and now we finally see that it's come to pass. The cringeworthy part was that Michael did end up picking someone to fire... and the guy talked him out of it and left the office. What was worse was that Michael told the next guy, the real firee, about it. I don't blame the guy for smashing a pumpkin on Michael's Sebring.

And the tiptoeing romance of Pam and Jim continues. I'm not a shipper. Nope.

SVU: Well, whatever. It was pretty good but I want to see the old format back. You know, Stabler and Benson, Munch and Fin, investigating as two teams... remember those times? Yeah, back when I used to walk five miles to school. Uphill. In a blizzard.

Wednesday: Funny how I've completely lost interest in... Lost. Maybe it's the constant hype, maybe it's Evangeline Lily's dead fish eyes. Maybe it's that I'm more interested in the tasks on The Apprentice: Martha. Yeah, I think that's it.

The problem with two Apprentice shows is that I can't keep the contestants straight. I keep getting who's on what mixed up. One contestant that stand out on Martha's show is Jim. Big fucking psycho blowhard.

The task this week was to develop a dressing for Wishbone and sell it for one day in what appeared to me to be a high-end supermarket. The teams were switched up because the "creative" team couldn't win the treat in a Cracker Jack box. So, the new "business" team developed an Asian dressing/marinade. My two cents: don't cater to a select crowd when you want to sell to a mass market. I don't think some of the flavors Bethenny, the "whole foods chef" put in there are very tasty, and I'm not as picky as I used to be. The new creative team first came up with something that was green, but tasted good. But they complained about the color. These are sophisticated people who've never seen pesto, methinks. Anyway, Marcela, the "cooking teacher" next came up with a raspberry (and another flavor that escapes me) dressing/dip/marinade, and they were good to go.

Jim was put on the sales team: hawking the product near the display stand. He said things like how the dressing would "cure bunions". Um, why the hell would I want to eat something that cures bunions? He said he was injecting humor, but that's just injecting nausea. And then he dropped the F-bomb... in earshot of customers. Who complained to the manager. Who, in turn, said if that ever happened again, they'd all be removed from the store. Heh.

Anyway, back in the boardroom, we learn that the creative team pulled off the unthinkable and actually won the task. They got to go on a schooner. Big whoop. I don't like deep water. I think the rewards this year on the whole have sucked.

Anyway, psycho Jim, who throws his weight around, left his pregnant wife to go on a game show just before she was ready to give birth (I would... uh-uh, let's not go there, not a happy place), carries around his Voss water bottle like it's a third arm, threatens the other contestants... was not sent home. Instead, the PM was, because she failed to pull Jim from the floor when they were warned because she was afraid his head might explode if she did. Well, that's not what she said, but you know she was thinking it. Blood pressure and all.

Law & Order: I missed most of the damn show. YD told me it was a better one. Damn.

Thursday: It's Survivor time! They've brought back two contestants from last year: Stephenie and Bobby Jon. I love Bobby Jon. He seems slow, but polite, Southern... wow, nice belly. Stephenie... I loved Stephenie last season. She was the last one left on a team that was completely pulverized. She was a trooper. Now, she has a sense of entitlement the size of Texas. She whines and moans and calls people who celebrate "gay" and idiotic behavior "retarded" and acts pissy when people don't follow her direction and cries about how she's always stuck with losers. Hey, Steph? Why don't you just be grateful you got a second chance and shut the fuck up? My goodness.

I won't even give much space to Judd, the doorman from NY. He reminds me of one of those gorillas who thumps his chest repeatedly and howls. He's a bully, too, and pretty big and intimidating, and asks people if they like him, and if they don't answer within a milli-millisecond, he lays into them. He's an asshole and I can't wait for him to be blindsided with a vote out.

The Apprentice: I often wonder why people will read a word and add in an extra letter or two when they pronounce it. For instance, my name is Athena, and yet I've been called Anthena. Um, where the hell are you getting the idea that "Ath" is pronounced "Anth"? Such was the case with tonight's PM, Jennifer, who pronounced the name "Zathura" "ZENthura". And she did it with a big, ignorant smile on her face. Um, yeah. Her team lost the task.

But it was the Reese Witherspoon lookalike, Kristi, who was voted out. You see, this year there's a clique, a blonde clique to be exact (complete with an ex-stripper, ya'll!), and she was its ringleader. She had a voice like Robert Shaw's nails down a chalkboard. And there seems to be no end to the women on here who think that they're singled out because "other women are intimidated" by them. Uh, whuh? Anyway, she's gone, and she proved her bitchiness out in the hall after the boardroom when Jennifer tried to offer her condolences. "Shut up, Jennifer. I don't even wanna hear it", complete with folding her arms over her chest, rolling her eyes and pouting. Oooh, that's professional behavior for you.

ER: Now that Goran Visnjic's first in the credits, we can all enjoy him for the god that he is. But now that all the Noah-Wyle-leaving crap is out of the way, the stories have gotten better. Now John Leguizamo's on the show for a 12-ep arc. I enjoy him. I especially enjoyed that Luka-- Goran's character-- had the top two buttons of his shirt undone. Yes, I'm shallow. I make no apologies. Everyone in the house knows it, and I'm allowed to drool between 9 and 10 Thursday nights.

Friday: I keep forgetting to watch Threshhold. I may not even know how to spell it. I need to start remembering that Friday night has t.v. shows.

Syndication: Of course I watch The Daily Show, Judge Judy. I've also been watching last year's Couples series on Fear Factor. I'd forgotten how fun it is to watch Ken and Barbie, complete with silver spoons and matching shirts, win four cars, $30,000, a trip, and finally a million bucks. Oh, I mean, NOT.

Stay tuned til next week, kids, when I present the tally of how many times I gagged while watching the gross food challenges! And may I say, rats are not anywhere near as gross as people think. They're such sweeties. Folks need to get a grip.