Friday, April 11, 2008
Seacrest and sighs
CHARITY! American Idol, ITV2, 9.00 & 11.00pm Labels: American Idol, ITV2, TV
It seemed like an odd idea last year: for a show like American Idol that's always felt to be unashamedly about generating extra sources of revenue for record companies to suddenly develop a conscience - especially after foisting Taylor Hicks on an unsuspecting universe the year before - and devote an entire programme to raising money for charity felt weird, somehow. As though we were constantly expecting Ryan Seacrest to announce the whole thing had been an elaborate wind-up and all the donations were going to fund Clive Davis's next annual bonus instead. But no, they raised over $70 million to help fight poverty, and the whole thing was such a success, they're going to do it again this year, and make it bigger. Ah, now that feels like American Idol.
While the whole thing might sound like a rather cringe-worthy effort, there's enough corporate muscle behind the whole thing to pull in some seriously A-list stars, including the likes of Brad Pitt, Mariah Carey and Bono (it was inevitable that he'd turn up, wasn't it?), alongside some slightly less amazing but still bankable stars like Fergie, Celine Dion, Vanessa Hudgens and Miley Cyrus (who, we're sure, was just bein' Miley), as well as Idol alumni such as Fantasia, Elliott Yamin, DAUGHTRY!!11!, and Carrie Underwood.
Last night, the Idols sang "inspirational songs" to gain public support (and really, David Archuleta, 'Angels' inspires us to do a lot of things, none of them good) and following the charity event, there's the inevitable results show. Last year the overwhelming sense of charity so touched the heart of the Idol producers that they decided they couldn't possibly have an elimination on charity night - but will they pull that trick again this year? Or will they decide that the truly charitable thing is to put one of this year's contestants out of their misery and send them home? Either way, we'll find out later.
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Friday, March 28, 2008
Nobody sees the show, not 'til her heart says so
MUSICAL! The Passions of...Girls Aloud, ITV2, 10.00pm Labels: ITV2, The Passions of Girls Aloud, TV
We rather deliberately let the first couple of episodes of this series pass without a mention on the front page. Not because we weren't interested in Cheryl learning the art of street dance, or Sarah getting the hang of playing polo, but just because we wanted to wait until we could talk about the episode we really wanted to see. Now it's finally arrived, so we're lifting our embargo, and we're getting very excited at the prospect of watching Kimberley audition for Les Miserables.
The reason that we're so excited about this one is not because we're a bunch of jazz-hands loving theatre gays (honest), but more because Kimberley's our stealth favourite member of Girls Aloud, by virtue of being the one you could imagine yourself being mates with and hanging around down the pub without too much of a stretch. She (and also Nicola, to a similar extent, and in the interests of fairness we're also very excited about next week's show in which Nicola launches a range of cosmetics for fair-skinned people) is the one who's maintained a pleasant sense of normality despite being in a very good and successful girlband, and for that reason we're utterly entranced by her.
So we've got every available digit crossed in the hope that Kimba's journey, involving her working with the best trainers that musical theatre has to offer, not just in London but also in New York, is a successful one. Although hopefully not so successful that she drops out of the band to spend the next three years playing Eponine, obviously. Then we'd be the miserable ones.
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Thursday, March 27, 2008
Hot gossip
XOXO! Gossip Girl, ITV2, 10.00pm Labels: Gossip Girl, ITV2, TV
"Hey Upper East (of the internet) Siders, lowculture here. Spotted: hot new US import making itself comfortable with the new neighbours on ITV2. Our spies say they saw her cosying up with new gal pal Bionic Woman, and we're just dying to know what C and her Real Women are making of it all. You know you love us. XOXO, lowculture."
Okay, fine, so we couldn't quite keep it up to write the entire entry in salacious gossip blog speak, but don't let that put you off: Gossip Girl is our new favourite show. (And yes, we're aware we say that on a regular basis, but we really mean it this time.) It's from the creators of The OC (who have apparently learned their lesson, since Mischa Barton is nowhere to be seen) and based on the teen novels by Cecily von Zeigesar, but this is all irrelevant background in relation to the fact that it is a soapy teen drama with possibly the hottest ensemble cast we've ever seen. Seriously, there is not a faulty gene anywhere on this show, and you could cut glass with the cheekbones. Someone give the casting director a medal. And what makes it all even more satisfying is that despite the occasional smell-the-fart moment from Chace Crawford (and please ignore his bad hair in the opening episode - it gets infinitely better in episode two, at which point he becomes so pretty you might actually cry), the acting is right on the money as well, especially Leighton Meester as queen bee Blair Waldorf.
In case you're wondering why you should care about any of this, here's the plot rundown: former wild child Serena van der Woodsen is spotted at Grand Central Station after fleeing without explanation some months hence, much to the delight of Nate Archibald, who's been nursing a crush on Serena since forever, but to the chagrin of Nate's girlfriend and Serena's former BFF Blair Waldorf. Meanwhile, Dan and Jenny Humphrey are meant to be impoverished even though you could fit the whole of lowculture towers into their kitchen, and Chuck Bass is the person of whom you see a picture if you look up the word "skeezy" in the dictionary, but is no less awesome for this. (He is possibly less awesome for his predilection for rape, mind.)
You may be wondering where the Gossip, and indeed the Girl, come in. That's the best part: since the lead characters are, for the most part, the ridiculously moneyed offspring of equally ridiculously moneyed socialites, they are minor celebrities in their own right, and their every move is chronicled by a catty blogger known only as Gossip Girl, never seen, but voiced to perfection by Veronica Mars's Kristen Bell. Seriously, we can't think of another actor who can put as much life into the signoff "XOXO" as she does.
What's refreshing about all this is that the characters are all surprisingly empathetic, despite being richer and prettier and all round generally better than us. Sure, we wanted to smack Dan with a brick for the first few episodes when he wouldn't shut up about the social injustice of being moderately less well-off than everyone else he knows, but he calms down eventually, and we predict future lowculture icon status for bitchy, needy, insecure Blair. And if you need any more reasons to tune in, the episode titles are all mini works of art in themselves, including such inspired puns as "The Wild Brunch", "Bad News Blair" and our personal favourite, "Hi, Society!"
You know you love us. XOXO.
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Thursday, March 13, 2008
The devil makes work for Idol (stage)hands
NEW SET! American Idol, ITV2, 8.00pm Labels: American Idol, ITV2, TV
How peculiar - we'd assumed that the Idol-on-Thursdays thing was temporary, for the auditions, at first. Then we assumed it would be just while the semi-finals were on, to save trying to screen everything until the wee hours of Saturday morning. And yet, what fuckery is this? ITV2 are carrying it on right the way through to the competition proper, with the main performance show on Thursday and the results on a Friday. Not that we object to getting the main show a day sooner than we're used to, since we're usually champing at the bit by this point anyway, but it does rather play havoc with our tradition of coming back from work on a Friday night, ordering a takeaway and collapsing on the sofa for an excess of American Idol. Nonetheless, we must learn to adjust.
There are many things to be excited about on Top 12 night (which is tonight, by the way):
- After aeons of trying, the producers have finally secured the rights to the Lennon/McCartney back catalogue. Um, yay?
- There's a new set, which is apparently so elaborate that it only just fits into the studio; the hardworking tech people have done their utmost to get it in and working to a punishing deadline, and apparently are now fretting how they're going to get it out again for the Grand Finale in May, which is held elsewhere.
- Season five runner up (and lowculture favourite) Katharine McPhee is appearing on tomorrow's results show, having been somewhat snubbed last season
- Someone always forgets the lyrics at this point every year - in season five Melissa McGhee ended up singing "hope my redeliction nishes" to Stevie Wonder's 'Lately', and last year Brandon Rogers and Haley Scarnato fell victim to marblemouth disease. Where will the virus strike next?
Obviously we don't get a say in the voting, but that doesn't mean we don't get a say in who sucks and who rocks. And handily, the lovely and talented forum poster al has compiled this cut-out-and-keep* guide to the Top 12 of 2008, where we've added a few thoughts of our own:
"The auditions, the Hollywood juncture, and the ever-peculiar Top 24 episodes have been and gone, and we’re down to the live finals. And the final list has thrown up a few surprises, or more fittingly, surprise omissions. Mind you, Danny Noriega’s finger-snapping and Valley Girl cadence were never going to trigger dialling-induced RSI around the Bible Belt, whilst Asia’h Epperson frankly paid the price for displaying the revered American institution of nonsensical forename apostrophe use normally reserved for Ricki Lake guests.
So what are we left with? According to Ryan Seacrest, the most talented Top 12 in the history of American Idol. Meh. What does he know? Hey, fancy a significantly less obsequious rundown of who to put your money on..?
Ramiele Malubay
Aiming to go one better than fellow Filipina finalist Jasmine Trias (you remember her, all Hawaiian flowers and twee), Ramiele’s quite the belter, and more importantly, managed to get Simon Cowell on side early on. But then again, so did Raquelle from Hope, and it’ll be a dowdy day in Sinitta’s wardrobe before we hear from that one again.
David Cook
Pseudo-rocker whose inexplicably thick neck makes him appear deceptively fat. Having already gotten Cowell’s back up with a textbook “I’m not doing this for you, I’m doing this for America! Yeah!! U-S-A! U-S-A!” retort, it looked unlikely that David’s brand of watery McRawk would take him very far, until a surprisingly decent take on Lionel Richie’s 'Hello'. No, really. (Though he really needs to finish following Chris Daughtry's example and get rid of that awful combover by shaving his damn head altogether. - Steve)
David Hernandez
Barman and go-go boy (if the internet is to be believed – and when has it ever been unreliable?) from Arizona, it seems Middle America is experiencing a second dose of Antonella Barba Syndrome and are up in arms at the mere idea of previous nudity. Nonetheless, it’s difficult to detract from an admirable confidence and impressive vocals (though the overplucked eyebrows go some way to managing it).
Brooke White
Wholesome, virginal Disney princess with a substantial talent. As happy to bang away at a piano or strum a guitar as she is trilling like a nightingale, Brooke musically bridges the gap between Karen Carpenter and Alicia Keys. And as her in-show USP was that she’s never seen a porno, she’s got the Christian vote if nothing else. A strong contender for the Top 3. (And for what it's worth, she's my favourite contestant this year, which means that she almost certainly will not win. - Steve)
Carly Smithson
Tattoo parlour proprietor from Cork, who has had America’s gums flapping over the fact she released a major label album in 2001, a chunk of which went on to be recycled and caterwauled by Kelly Clarkson. Apparently, this also means she’s been shagging all three judges, founded freemasonry, and shot JFK. Still, ‘controversy’ aside, Carly displays the most impressive pipes in the contest. Cailín maith!
Chikezie
Serial auditionee who finally made it to a stage where anyone begins to give a crap. Powerful voice and killer stage presence are nullified by atrocious velvet suits, and that’s before you even consider Simon Cowell’s ongoing habit of calling him “Jacuzzi”. Accidentally, of course, and not for the purposes of contrived televisual hilarity.
Kristy Lee Cook
Dainty country ‘n’ western songbird with little else of note. Simon has already decreed Kristy will be hard pushed to make it beyond the Top 10, so we shouldn’t have to endure her quarter-arsed LeAnn Rimes schtick for much longer. If only the same could be said about the blubbery scutter bellowing 'Love Machine' in the Chicago Town sponsorship bumpers.
Amanda Overmyer
Somewhere between Amy Winehouse and Janis Joplin as performed by Cheryl Baker, nurse Amanda boasts a seasoned rock growl, comedy scat vocals, clumsy stage-trudging and hair like a petrified skunk. By far and away the most unique contestant, but America would be more likely to deport Oprah than crown Amanda their next Idol. (And I'm waiting for just the right occasion to crack an "Overmyer dead body!" joke. - Steve)
David Archuleta
Channelling a particularly squidgy compound of early Gareth Gates and a Labrador puppy, make way for a nation of females reaching screenwards to pinch his cheeks. In fairness, he also possesses one of the competition’s best voices, so expect a landslide victory followed by a lukewarm second album and a lengthy spell in drug rehab.
Michael Johns
While Carly flies the Irish flag, the considerably-gifted Michael Johns is the second contestant threatening to be a non-American American Idol. Hailing from Australia, Randy’s already likened him to Michael Hutchence. We’d have dismissed this as a lazy comparison relating solely to geography, though given it came off the back of a Simple Minds cover, it seems Paula’s been sharing her sweeties around the judging table.
Jason Castro
Dreadlocked muso who’s previously snuck into the spotlight as co-bumper-of-uglies with tweenage Lilith Fair fodder and MTV reality urchin, Cheyenne Kimball. Jason certainly displays a sizeable talent behind the mic, yet appears incapable of stringing a sentence together. Still, seeing Ryan Seacrest try to cope with the awkwardness of a one-word answer guarantees a few chuckles.
Syesha Mercado
Claims to be an actress, though a glimpse at her CV suggests she’s been as much of an actress as Jordan has a recording artist. Nevertheless, Florida native Syesha boasts a genial quirk, a decent pair of lungs, and one hell of a barnet. Additionally, she’s already got a hefty online army of supporters calling themselves “Faneshas”, which may well be the most gag-inducing name for a collective since “Fearne & Reggie”."
*lowculture accepts no responsibility for damage caused to your monitor or other technological equipment by foolishly attempting to cut out a page of the internet. We mean, really.
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Tuesday, March 11, 2008
Jaime (Moi Non Plus)
RAINY! Bionic Woman, ITV2, 9.00pm Labels: Bionic Woman, ITV2, TV
Trying to talk up this remake of the classic 1970s sci-fi series isn't easy, considering that by the time it arrives on our screens, it has already been cancelled by NBC in America following disappointing ratings. And given all the hype by the British media when our very own Michelle Ryan, formerly Zoe Slater in EastEnders, of course, landed the lead role, this gave a perfect opportunity for the always pro-women's lib Daily Mail to write an article implying that the entire failure of the series was Michelle Ryan's fault, without ever saying that in as many words. (We'll admit, it must take talent of a kind to write such an utterly disingenuous article as that while simultaneously repressing the urge to punch yourself in the face. Perhaps they all have bionic arms too - it would probably make such a feat easier.)
Having had a sneaky preview of the first episode, we'll admit it has its flaws, but Michelle Ryan is not one of them: she copes well with a fairly thankless lead role (prior to going bionic, Jaime Sommers displays season seven Buffy levels of sulky self-loathing), and once you've adjusted to the accent and stopped expecting her to bellow "You ain't my mum!" at Jessie Wallace in the next scene, she's a surprisingly assured leading lady. The problem is more that the show seems incredibly dated - all of the Creepy Non-Specific Scientific Institute scenes read like something out of Dark Angel, although thankfully minus the hip hop slang. And unfortunately, there really aren't many pages of the Big Book o' Sci-Fi Clichés that are left unturned - we cringed as we watched Jaime zipping through some woodland on her bionic legs while the camera cut to a precocious child in the back of a car driven by an uninterested parent, which was the cue for the old "Mommy, mommy! Look at that fast running lady!" "Now dear, what have I told you about making up stories?" exchange. (Also slightly questionable is the way the show follows this up with the moppet smiling and saying that she "just thought it was cool that a girl could do that", suggesting the show has delusions of feminist relevance.)
It's not a total write-off, mind - the last 15 minutes or so are pretty fun, as Jaime gets to grips with her bionic bits during a rooftop battle (at night, in the rain, of course - according to this show it never stops raining in San Francisco) with the first bionic woman - played by Battlestar Galactica's Katee Sackhoff, who steals every scene she's in as the unhinged prototype. There's probably not too much point in developing an attachment to the show, for obvious reasons, but it's still worth a look. At least by watching you can pretend you're sticking two fingers up at the aforementioned sneaky tabloid, which seems like reason enough to us.
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Friday, February 22, 2008
They're the Kids in America
WARBLE! American Idol, ITV2, 9.00pm, 10.00pm Labels: American Idol, ITV2, TV
This week American Idol moves from the audition stages to the 'final 24' stage. We realise this stage actually started last night, but the front page was pretty chocka yesterday. The 'final 24' stage of this show always strikes us as a bit bizarre: it's not the official public voting stage, yet the singers perform and the public vote. Maybe we are a little dense, but we don't fully get its purpose. We never fully got the audience voting rounds in Pop Idol either, to be honest. Still, it's nice to actually get to see some of the good singers in action before the very last stage, unlike in certain shows we can mention, X Factor.
It's probably too early to pick favourite contestants at this stage of the game because you run a very serious risk of having your heart broken, but certain people are already standing out for users of the forum including 'Proud Mary' (Danny) and Carly.
We wouldn't be so foolish as to predict winners and losers at this stage of the game, but let's just say there are way too many Daves and Davids that got through to the final 24, so we don't expect all of them to make the cut.
We don't know yet whether this will be a classic series. Certainly there have been a lot of good people that got through, but we're not sure anyone truly spectacular stood out. Perhaps that is the problem with this show in a way. There are so many good singers that it can sometimes be hard to find those who could be stars. Discuss.
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Friday, February 01, 2008
Box of Delights
The life of being a previewer for your favourite website is not easy, you know. Sometimes we look at the next week's TV listings, full of despair because there is nothing good to talk about that we haven't already previewed. And yet like buses, the law seems to be that you wait for ages for something exciting to come along, then it all comes along at once. Tonight sees such a ridiculous embarrassment of riches on the box that Steve and Rad needed to collaborate together (in a move that hasn't been seen since, oooh, Christmas) to get it all in. So get a cup of tea and a biccy and plan your evening with us.... Labels: Alan Carr's Celebrity Ding Dong, BBC1, BBC2, Channel 4, EastEnders, Hey Paula, ITV2, jam and jerusalem, Later..., Myleene Klass, Paula Abdul, The Choir, The Law of the Playground, TV
RETURNING! EastEnders, BBC1, 8pm
It's good to see that Gemma Bissix's lucrative career of playing scheming bitches called Clare didn't end when she finally bowed out from Hollyoaks last year (and boy, does the show miss her. It's never the same without a good villain, and no, Jake Dean certainly does not count), as she reappears tonight in the TV alter ego we all knew before Clare Devine ever set foot in Chester: Clare Bates (née Tyler), in EastEnders on BBC1 at 8.00pm. Having been last seen as a rosy-cheeked schoolgirl heading off to Scotland with adoptive dad Nigel, she makes her entrance tonight in fine style - being thrown out of a car while wearing a skimpy dress and not looking not wholly unlike archetypal soap bitch-with-a-soft-centre Izzy Hoyland. Clare quickly reconnects with Dot, who's in dire need of a project at the moment, and then sets her sights on Ian, as everyone in the Square eventually does. Seriously, even the gays are going to be after him in a couple of weeks. When will this madness end?
ENDING! Jam and Jerusalem, BBC1, 8:30pm
We know that this series is never going to go down in the comedy annals in the same way that Absolutely Fabulous or The Vicar of Dibley have. However, we still love it, and it's a darn sight better than recent episodes of French and Saunders. This gentle, warm and still pretty darn funny series ends tonight when we see whether Tash will marry Spike. We'd like to see a Jam and Jerusalem wedding, so let's hope she says yes, eh?
SINGING! The Choir: Boys Don't Sing, BBC2, 9pm
We loved The Choir last year and we're very pleased to see it back. For the uninitiated amongst you, the series featured loveable, geeky and slightly hot choirmaster Gareth Malone (who has a touch of the Tennant about him, we think) in his attempts to transform a bunch of inner-city 'yoofs' into a choir to sing at the World Choir Olympics (if only they would integrate that into the ACTUAL Olympics, we would be so into that). This year, he's trying to repeat the same trick, only the 2008 twist is that it's an all-boys choir and they're competing in something at the Albert Hall instead. So there's a few echoes of The History Boys there, too. Only, we hope, without all the slightly creepy sexual undertones. This is your standard life-affirming fare, but none the worse for it.
JAW-DROPPING! Hey Paula!, ITV2, 10pm
Someone over at ITV2 has clearly broken into our top-secret personal diary, the one where we write our topmost secret telly wishes. While they couldn't quite see fit to give us "The Paula Abdul and Janice Dickinson Crazy Medicated Bitch Channel", they've done the next best thing, and got hold of Paula's very own reality show Hey Paula! to play directly after American Idol at 10.00pm. It doesn't take a genius to guess that the Paula in this show is Idol Paula, with the car-crash level upped by a factor of 20, so it will either be the greatest programme ever or the absolute worst. Possibly it will somehow manage to be both at once, thereby snapping the space-time continuum cleanly in two and killing us all where we stand. But let's hope not, eh?
COMPETING! Alan Carr's Celebrity Ding Dong, Channel 4, 10pm
If you're not a Paula Abdul fan, get the hell out of here and never come back. Sorry, that should read: "why not try Alan Carr's Celebrity Ding Dong on Channel 4 at 10.00pm instead?" - our mistake. We've read an interview with Alan Carr, seen a few trailers and looked at the listings, and yet we're still not really sure how on earth this show works, except that it pits celebrities versus civilians (no doubt inspired by Liz Hurley's famous clanger about the vast chasm between the two species) in a series of zany questions. It's got legs, certainly, but we'll wait until after the first episode before our final judgement.
REMINISCING! The Law of the Playground, Channel 4, 10:30pm
There was a time at the end of the last decade and the start of this one when you couldn't turn on your telly without a bunch of talking heads babbling on about the wonders of growing up in the 70s and 80s. Which was fine, because we all know that any conversation between 20 or 30 somethings always turns to the things of our childhood in the end. But there are only so many conversations you can have about all things retro before you get all meta and starthaving retrospectives of the retrospectives and the aforementioned space-time continuum comes and gets us. So what we are trying to say is that we are quite surprised to seeThe Law of the Playground returning for a second series. Perhaps Channel 4 decided it had been long enough without a nostalgia-fest that they could get away with it (or perhaps they were just desperate for some cheap filler whilst they wait for new episodes of Ugly Betty). The usual suspects are here: Justin Lee Collins, Vic Reeves, and, ooh, look who it is! Myleene Klass! Who'da thunk it, eh?
JAMMING! Later...200, BBC2, 11:35pm
The institution that is Later... With Jools Holland returns for a new series, and kicks off with its 200th episode. Although there is often a bit too much boogie-woogie jamming for our liking, the series is always guaranteed to pull off a few corkers from established artsists and is renowned for launching some great talent to boot. Tonight the big draw is a set from Radiohead, but there are other goodies to be had as well, including Cat Power, Dionne Warwick, Mary J Blige and Feist, a booking that will make at least one lowculture user very happy indeed.
So there you have it. Phew. We're going for a nice lie down now.
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Sunday, January 27, 2008
Brothers in harms
WINCHESTERS! Supernatural, ITV2, 9.15pm Labels: ITV2, Supernatural, TV
We almost missed the return of our favourite hot-brothers-hunting-demons series (a list of the other series in this genre is available upon request*) because ITV seems to have been running the same generic "coming soon" trail for ages without really specifying what they mean by "soon". Unless they've replaced it with a more definite trail recently and we've just not seen it, in which case: sorry for unnecessarily besmirching your reputation, ITV. But we do watch your channel a lot, so if we didn't see it, lots of other people won't have, so just think about that, eh?
Anyway, Sam and Dean Winchester are back for a third (albeit somewhat brief, due to the US writers' strike) season, despite having solved their ultimate quest at the end of last season. To the surprise of everyone who thought this arc was going to go until the very end of the show, the dashing brothers Winchester managed to slay the Yellow-Eyed Demon that killed their mother (and also Sam's girlfriend, and also, indirectly, their father), but not before it managed to open the very literal gates of Hell and unleash all many of nasty-looking demons. So their work isn't quite over yet, because they've got to clean up the mess they made. Oh, and also, there's the slightly thorny issue of Dean only having a year to live, because Sam was a doofus and got stabbed in the back and died and Dean got teary in a manly sort of way and made a deal with a Crossroads Demon (who has nothing to do with Jane Asher, just so we're all on the same page), who agreed to revive Sam as long as Dean agrees to carp it in a year's time. Crappy deal, admittedly, but still probably better terms than most mortgages right now, so we can understand Dean's willingness to sign up.
Dean's dealing with his fate in very much the way you'd expect Dean would - by getting laid as often as possible. Disapproving Sammy is disapproving, obviously, and is secretly looking for some kind of loophole that will get Dean out of his deal with the Devil's lackey, because he doesn't want his big brother to die. Awww. Unfortunately, this first episode is not really up to the high standards this show set itself in season two - it's a bit plodding and obvious and a bit (dare we say it) Charmed. There's also the appearance of a stridently annoying girl with a magic knife at the end of the episode, who's obviously going to be very important this season. (Don't hate her too much, though; she gets significantly awesomer in a few episodes' time.) So ride this one out, because things improve significantly by around episode three, and episode five is fucking great. In the meantime, sit back and enjoy the pretty.
*No it isn't.
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Thursday, January 17, 2008
Idol pursuits
TALENT? American Idol, ITV2, 9.00/11.00pm Labels: American Idol, ITV2, TVFinally. Let's banish the unpleasant spectre of The X Factor and that whimpering chap who won it for good (or at the very least, until the end of August) and get back to where it's really at: the granddaddy of them all, American Idol. No groups. No over-30s. No judges doubling as mentors. And best of all, absolutely no Louis Walsh. No wonder this is the singing contest we can watch without developing stress lesions.
Last year's Idol was memorable, but for perhaps a lot of the wrong reasons. Unlike most years, where there are one or two extremely strong contestants who are always a shoo-in for the victory, last year's Top 12 was a mixed bag, most of which were above average but few of which were exceptional, leaving the race to victory wide open until fairly late on. And there were the controversies, of course: those sordid pictures of Antonella Barba leaking onto the internet. Sanjaya Malakar's hair. The most hilarious lovers' tiff yet between Simon Cowell and Ryan Seacrest (including Seacrest memorably snapping "don't call me sweetheart. We don't have that kind of a relationship."). Ashley Ferl, the crying girl. Sanjaya Malakar turning to Teflon and sticking to the competition longer than anyone thought possible. The moment when Chris Richardson and Blake Lewis were in the bottom two together, leading to the most tearjerking goodbye of the season, and also the gayest moment in six years of an already highly-gay show. Early favourite Melinda Doolittle bowing out in the semi-final. Eventual winner Jordin Sparks's album being the lowest-selling debut from an Idol winner ever. See, that's not even scratching the surface, and even like that it's already a zillion times more exciting than The X Factor.
So, it's a new year, and these are things we hold true: there will be many, many auditionees. There are 24 studio-singing places to be filled by the various hopefuls. At least one good singer will get kicked off unexpectedly early. At least one bad singer will still be here long after the joke has ceased to be funny. Paula Abdul will make at least one surprisingly coherent comment. Randy Jackson will continue to use the non-word "pitchy" to describe any vocal that is out of tune, and will call all the contestants "dawg", regardless of gender. Simon Cowell will get booed every time he phrases a comment in such a way as not to be pure, unsullied praise. Ryan Seacrest will wear a lot of expensive suits. And we will get completely hooked, and start scouring the internet for places where we might find MP3s of our favourite performances, because we are absolutely that lame. This...is American Idol.
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Thursday, November 08, 2007
Streets ahead
DATING! Streetmate, ITV2, 9.00pm Labels: ITV2, Streetmate, TV
Perhaps this is just the telltale signs of our old age, but we can't remember if we've already written about this one or not. We know we wrote about it a few months ago by accident, having got it confused with Holly and Fearne Go Dating (two shows about dating, both on same broadcaster, both presented by Holly Willoughby - easy mistake, obviously. The sort of thing that could've happened to anyone. *cough*) but we had to erase that when we realised our error, and we don't remember ever getting around to "doing" this properly, so here we go, in the great spirit of better-late-than-never.
The original Streetmate was a personal favourite of ours, back in the days when it was on Channel 4 on Friday nights, presented by a pre-shouty Davina McCall, legging it around the streets of our great nation in the hopes of matching two singletons and helping them find love through the redemptive power of early examples of reality television. But as all good things must come to an end, so did this: it got a bit too popular for its own good, getting to the stage where people would be running up to her in the street going "ooh, Davina! Are you doing Streetmate? Can I be on it?", which sort of defeated the point of the programme a little bit.
But several years later, ITV2 have had the rather inspired idea of resurrecting it and giving it a new host in an attempt to revive the format, and from what we've seen of it so far, you can barely see the joins at all. Holly's got that early McCall sense of playfulness about the whole thing which works very well, even if she is frankly a bit rubbish at running down busy high streets in a way that Davina wasn't. And the format's still plagued by the same problems it always had (person agrees to go on date with stranger, person realises later off-camera what the hell they've just agreed to, person backs out when the cameras aren't there to capture it, presenter and original contestant have to start from scratch), but that's all part of its charm. This week, Holly's in Exeter and Edinburgh, but don't go up to her whatever you do. Just let her come to you, otherwise you'll get the show cancelled again.
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Tuesday, October 23, 2007
Rather have a piece of toast and watch the evening news
SPOOKS! Ghosthunting with McFly, ITV2, 9.00pm Labels: Ghosthunting with McFly, ITV2, TV
It doesn't seem like very long ago that we were writing about Ghosthunting with the Dingles; indeed, a quick perusal of the lowculture calendar tells us that it was more or less a month ago to the day. Which, let's be honest, suggests that the Dingles didn't do a very good job, if there are still ghosts out there waiting to be busted by McFly. Clearly, you should never send a soap star to do what is obviously a pop star's job.
Our experience of the McFly lads suggests that they seem far less easy targets for a good spooking than Girls Aloud, so we don't imagine they'll be spending quite as much time shaking and crying - although in fairness, if they were to do that, it would still make for excellent television. The fact that they will spend most of the show in near-darkness, however, is less good news for all those planning to tune in purely for the totty factor.
It would appear as though the boys are anticipating success since they apparently have not one but three ghostbusting locations lined up: a haunted forest (presumably there would be little point in sending them to a non-haunted forest, given the premise of the show), a creepy old castle and an underground mine. Wooo! Scary! And look, we made it all the way to the end of the preview without inserting a cheap and tawdry joke about them giving each other the willies. (Oh, shit.)
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Thursday, September 27, 2007
Pay the Piper
HOOKER! The Secret Diary of a Call Girl, ITV2, 10.00pm Labels: ITV2, The Secret Diary of a Call Girl, TV
If you'd come up to us a year ago and said that at this point in time we'd be eagerly anticipating the start of a new drama on ITV2, we'd have laughed so hard a little bit of intestine may have come out of our mouths. It's funny how things change, isn't it? Thanks to a killer concept and some canny casting, here we are, eagerly awaiting the debut airing of Billie Piper's adventures as a prostitute, based on the notorious blog of apparent real-life call girl going by the name of Belle de Jour.
Obviously with a premise like that, media attention for the production has hardly been what you'd call lacking, and you can't turn sideways any more without seeing another interview with La Piper talking about how it gave her a taste for fancy lingerie, or how hard she had to think about taking the role. And fair play to her, it probably is the sort of role that would give you pause for thought (we'd be more concerned about appearing on ITV2 than playing a dominatrix, but that's just us). It does, however, leave us wondering what we can say about it that hasn't been committed to print a million times already.
There's a good chance the whole thing will make the world of prostitution seem surprisingly glamorous (as opposed to how it appears on, say, EastEnders, where it means you're addicted to crack and will probably have to sleep with Ian Beale or similar) and we're not even going to touch the whole responsibility/ethics aspect of that with a ten-foot pole, since our knowledge of prostitution is roughly the same as our knowledge of astral physics (despite what may have been written about us on certain corners of the internet). But given that it's based on a true story we've got to admit we're really very curious, however sanitised and late-night-TV-friendly this version may be. Plus, there's Dame Billie, as mentioned before, and also: Cherie Lunghi. It's not really like we even have the option of not watching, is it?
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Tuesday, September 18, 2007
I ain't 'fraid of no ghost
SPOOKY! Ghosthunting with the Dingles, ITV2, 9.00pm Labels: Ghosthunting with the Dingles, ITV2, TV
It perhaps discredits our status as bible of all things pertaining to culture that is low to admit this, but we still haven't seen Ghosthunting with Girls Aloud. We know it was hilarious, we know it's readily available on YouTube, and yet we still haven't quite got around to it. We feel suitably shamed, and we will attempt to redress this at our earliest possible convenience. In the meantime, here's that format again, this time starring Emmerdale's ever-growing Dingle family.
Partaking in the festivities - alongside seasoned ghost hunter Yvette Fielding, naturally - will be Mark Charnock (Marlon), Joseph Gilgun (Eli), Lucy Pargeter (Chas), Hayley Tamaddon (Delilah) and Verity Rushworth (Donna). It is unclear at this stage if they've reached an agreement over which member of Girls Aloud they all want to be the comparitive number to - i.e. the Nadine, who's too scared at the prospect to even turn up for filming, or the Cheryl, who veers between belligerently challenging the ghosts and then having a bit of a cry later.
We're a little saddened that the best Dingle (Belle, obviously) won't be taking part, but she's probably a bit too young for this sort of thing. In the meantime, watching vaguely famous people getting spooked is usually a laugh, and they can probably get a few tips from Adele Silva, whom we think we remember seeing on I'm Famous and Frightened not that long ago. Clearly the ghosts + celebrities format is a winner, whatever you call it.
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Tuesday, July 31, 2007
So it's come to this: a lowculture clipshow
Labels: 101 Sexiest Celebrity Bodies, BBC2, Cape Wrath, Channel 4, e4, ITV2, Sensitive Skin, TV, What About Brian?
Don't you just hate it when you sit down to watch one of your beloved (usually American) TV shows, only to discover that you've been cheated out of a new episode and given a bunch of rehashed and re-edited clips passing themselves off as fresh or occasionally "unseen" footage instead? Well, you're probably not going to like this then, because due to circumstances beyond our control (we got unexpectedly dragged down the pub last night when we were meant to be writing this), we're going to briefly flit across a handful of programmes that are on tonight, rather than look at any particular one in depth, and steal as much of this writeup from the messageboard as we possibly can. Sorry. Normal service will be resumed tomorrow.
Of note tonight, then: the final episode of Sensitive Skin at 10.00pm on BBC Two, which despite featuring the lovely Joanna Lumley and therefore pretty much automatically qualifying as highculture, has been widely appreciated on the boards, leading groopie to declare "I think I'm going to live on a boat" (there was probably some context for this within the show that makes more sense of it), while Cherubic commented: "I love this programme. I'm not very good at being positive, so that is all." High praise indeed.
Elsewhere, the excessively-trailed What About Brian? continues at 9.00pm on E4, but at least the trailers aren't as soul-crushingly annoying as the ones for Skins were, so we'll let it off. Most of the focus on the boards is on the fact that the show features Sarah Lancaster from Saved by the Bell: The New Class, but we gather she's not actually in this week's episode. Boo. At 8.00pm ITV2 will be exploring the 101 Sexiest Celebrity Bodies, but only down as far as number 81. Swizz! And Cape Wrath continues on Channel 4 at 10.00pm in the face of widespread public befuddlement, with comments such as "it's not really living up to its promise" from Nurse Dunkley and "I was really looking forward to this too, but it's lazy and boring" from cathybradford. Interesting how that's in the same timeslot as Sensitive Skin, the show everyone seems to love. Not that we're trying to make your viewing decisions for you. At least, no more so than usual.
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Wednesday, July 11, 2007
Pick Flick
FILM! Election, ITV2, 9.00pm
We don't usually write about films on the homepage, but every now and then we like to make an exception. To be perfectly honest, our motives here are not entirely altruistic, because this is one of those films that people frequently tell us is awesome, and we've never actually seen it - so we thought if we wrote something about it on the day it aired, we'd be far more likely to remember to tune in. Hopefully some of you will tune in as well, so it's good for you, it's good for us, it's good for everyone. Perhaps we can turn this into some kind of pay-it-forward movement, as long as it doesn't involve the rubbish movie of the same name or anything.
ANYway, this has been heralded as one of the great teen movies of the modern age, although we always assumed that it was a proper grown-up movie with lashings of satire and irony that just happens to be set in a high school and therefore is more easily marketable to a teen audience (it's a great tactic; it worked for Mean Girls too). For the uninitiated, Reese Witherspoon plays overachiever Tracy Flick, who's running unopposed for class president until teacher Mr McAllister (Matthew Broderick) decides to coach blunt-edged jock Paul Metzler (Chris Klein) to run against her, partly as a wider lesson in democracy but probably mostly because Tracy rather gets on his nerves.
This has been on TV about umpteen million times and yet we still happen to fall into the small handful of people who've never seen it, so we're planning to change this unfortunate state of affairs. Why don't you join us? Only, don't actually come round to our house or anything. We haven't got enough biscuits for all of you.
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Thursday, July 05, 2007
Back with the flava of the year
PRENATAL! Katie and Peter: The Baby Diaries, ITV2, 9.00pm Labels: ITV2, Katie and Peter, TV
Possibly breaking a record for shortest absence from our screens ever, it would appear that Katie and Peter are back, back, back! as Smash Hits used to say, if only for a two-part special. That's pretty impressive though, considering it seems like only about two weeks ago we were lamenting the end of their last series. Obviously they just couldn't bear to stay away from us. It's rather sweet, really. Awww.
While we've all seen the news reports and pictures of t'new babby (congratulations, by the way, Mr and Mrs Andre!) and therefore this series is rather robbed of some level of dramatic tension, assuming it would have had any in the first place, there's probably still going to be a lot of fun to be had from watching the alarmingly candid couple interact in the run-up to the birth. We still haven't quite recovered from Peter saying "why do you want to bleach your arsehole? It's not like you let me anywhere near it" in the last series. Perhaps we're just out of touch with what qualifies as flirtatious banter these days, though.
Anyway, we're not sure if the entire pregnancy is compressed into two episodes or whether there are more, as yet unscheduled, on the horizon, but we're promised to be there from the conception (not the literal point of conception, because ewww) right up to the birth, with all the ups and downs and overshares along the way. If the previous series are anything to go by, it should be horribly compelling.
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Wednesday, July 04, 2007
Stars in their minds
PARANORMAL! Sally Morgan: Star Psychic, ITV2, 11.30pm Labels: ITV2, Sally Morgan: Star Psychic, TV
We scoured the Radio Times for something to write about today, and found ourselves coming up rather short. There doesn't seem to be anything that we haven't already covered recently that we could muster up any any interest in, so we found ourselves scraping the bottom of the lowculture barrel and resorted to things airing late at night on digital TV that sound quite easy to make fun of. We don't feel proud about it.
We have a faint recollection of catching a smattering of this once while we were waiting for something else to come on, presumably one of the holy triumvirate of Supernatural, American Idol or Katie and Peter. We remember the opening sequence of it involving the titular Sally going up an escalator and looking quite smiley, and featuring a testimony from that week's celebrity, the lovely Kym Marsh Ryder saying how uncannily accurate the whole experience had been. Hmm. All this smiling and positivity is making it harder for us to poke fun. We don't like to take the piss out of nice people, just the ones who deserve it.
Anyway, we're presuming that Sally is a star psychic in the sort of way that Victoria Newton isn't, and her predictions don't involve just saying things like "the Sugababes will split" repeatedly for three years just so you can say that you predicted it by the time it eventually happens. After all, if she predicts the sort of thing that we can all guess from reading Heat magazine, there's probably not much point to the show, so we're guessing she gets to some gritty, well-hidden celebrity secrets. Sadly today's featured "celebrities" are Phil Tufnell and Lady Victoria Hervey, who probably don't have anything interesting to hide anyway, but you never know, do you?
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Friday, June 29, 2007
That's entertainment. Apparently.
VARIETY! America's Got Talent, ITV2, 8.30pm Labels: America's Got Talent, ITV2, TV
Sigh. We miss American Idol. Even though it wasn't a particularly vintage year this year, our Friday nights just don't seem the same without it. Besides, even a substandard season of Idol still shits on the national embarrassment that is The X Factor from a great height. As we were discussing with a friend just yesterday, compare the relative final rankings: Blake Lewis vs. Ray Quinn. Melinda Doolittle vs. Ben Mills. LaKisha Jones vs. The MacDonald Brothers. (Jordin Sparks vs. Leona Lewis is more of an equal match, so we'll let that one pass, but you see where we're going this.) Frankly, it's enough to make you consider emigrating.
Anyway, the point of that seemingly random rant is that we miss that transatlantic talent show slot on a Friday night, so ITV has rather cannily decided to plug the gap with the original US version of the Got Talent format, since the UK version recently pretty much stomped all over the competition on ITV1, and let that nice opera-singing man make a few records (funny how even when it's an all-comers talent show, the winner is still a singer, eh?).
Judges for the US version are Piers Morgan (boo! hiss!), David Hasselhoff and Brandy (who, due to various personal problems that we're sure you're all aware of, will be replaced by eternally useless plank of wood Sharon Osbourne in season two, although we'll give her the slight benefit of the doubt and speculate that she might say something useful when she hasn't got Louis Walsh's hand up her back, if she can find time in between throwing beverages at people and berating quiz show hosts). No Cowell, but we're sure Piers Morgan can fill that role quite happily. Acts for your delectation tonight will include clog dancers, yodellers, extreme jugglers and - most intriguingly - a contortionist archer. We have no idea how that works, which is probably exactly what they're banking on to get us to watch. Damn, they're cunning.
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Thursday, June 07, 2007
Petered out
ENDING! Katie and Peter: The Next Chapter, ITV2, 9.00pm Labels: ITV2, Katie and Peter, TV
Something very strange has happened to us. We sat down one week and happened to catch an episode of this show. We were feeling lazy and couldn't be bothered to find the remote, so we watched all of it. And then, a week later, we made an active decision to watch it. And then we got kind of addicted, to the point where we looked forward to seeing it each week. Now that's just not right, is it?
There is something curiously likeable about these two, though. It could be their absolute lack of boundaries (sample quote: "why do you want to bleach your arsehole? It's not like you ever let me anywhere near it"), or the fact that they don't seem to care that the cameras are on them when they have their numerous petty squabbles, or perhaps they're actually just quite empathetic people on their own terms. No, that can't be it. Although this show does make us rather protective of Peter Andre, a man for whom the word "henpecked" could've been invented.
So, last week was Peter's meningitis scare and subsequent near-death experience (ie. the tabloids said he was dead when acutally he wasn't), and this week he gets out of hospital, but lowculture's Favourite Celebrity Offspring Harvey is none too ecstatic to see him. Team Harvey for the inevitable conflict! Also, Katie has a scan and sees her new baby's face. Um, lovely?
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Wednesday, June 06, 2007
Shannenigans
SHANNEN! Breaking Up with Shannen Doherty, ITV2, 8.30pm Labels: Breaking Up With Shannen Doherty, ITV2, TV
First of all, a big thank you to richdidnt on the messageboards for drawing our attention to the fact that this show is finally airing on UK television, because otherwise it would've passed us by entirely. It was on two weeks ago, which may have been the series premiere, but then it wasn't on last week because of the Soap Awards, so this is the first time we've actually been able to talk about it. Curse erratic schedulers everywhere!
Anything that brings Shannen Doherty back to our screens is good in our book, especially since we're still smarting over the fact that Brad Kern was too much of a chickenshit fucking hack to invite her back for the series finale of Charmed. While this doesn't give her a chance to flex her acting muscles, it does allow her to be uniquely diplomatic in that so-very-Shannen way of hers, by finding couples who need a little help in splitting up and giving them a few pushes in the right places.
While we can't imagine what sort of headspace you would need to be in to decide "I can't break up with my boyfriend - I'll get Shannen Doherty to do it for me! What a brilliant and utterly foolproof plan!", we're more than happy to sit and watch the inevitably bitchy fallout. In fact, we're still kind of hoping that one of her clients will turn out to be Alyssa Milano's current boyfriend, but maybe that's too much to hope for. Also, the opening titles are ace, just in case that matters to anyone.
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Friday, May 25, 2007
Crossing Jordin
FINALE! American Idol: The Finale, ITV2, 8.30pm Labels: American Idol, ITV2, TV
And so another season of American Idol draws to a close. But before we run off to scribe missives to the heads of ITV and 19 Television informing them precisely what torture we will exact on their treasured family pets if they recommission those hateful, vacuous Cat Deeley inserts for next season's coverage, we need to find out who won this year. And although the plethora of spoilers on the internet will make it easy for anyone who wants to know now, we should point out that at the time of writing this, the results are yet to be announced.
While this is probably unlikely to go down in history as a classic season of Idol, and the likes of Melissa McGhee and Ayla Brown are probably kicking themselves for not hanging on 12 months and entering this year where they could conceivably have wiped the floor with half of these people instead of finishing 12th and 13th respectively, it hasn't been without its moments. Let us pray silence as we remember: the Sanjaya Monologues, where the world's shiniest teenager continued to astound us every week with his latest hairdo; the Mysterious Mystery of Melinda Doolittle's Rapidly Vanishing Neck; the Equally Mysterious Mystery of Haley Scarnato's Rapidly Vanishing Hemline; and of course the epic love story of Blake Lewis and Chris Richardson that was brought to a cruel and premature end when Chris was voted off in fifth place, leading to officially the greatest hug in television history (which was edited out by those BASTARDS at ITV in favour of the Cat Deeley Redundancy Corner, so God bless YouTube). Good times:
After last week's shock elimination of the awesome Melinda Doolittle, it's Blake versus Jordin Sparks in the finale. Our money's on Jordin, except in the very literal sense where it's actually on Blake, but we made that bet several weeks ago when his victory looked a lot more likely, and also we stood to make more money on his odds than we did on hers. Regardless, this is the first finale in ages where we've loved the top 2 equally and don't mind who wins. Either one of them will make a fine replacement for Taylor Hicks's hideous spazzing face on next year's opening titles, so it's all good.
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Thursday, April 19, 2007
A whole new series
CELEBS! Katie and Peter: The Next Chapter, ITV2, 9.00pm Labels: ITV2, Katie and Peter, TV
Upon reading this news story a few weeks ago, we felt that some equilibrium had been restored to the universe. After all, America has provided us with lots of great shows: Desperate Housewives, Lost, Ugly Betty, Veronica Mars, Heroes... we could go on listing them for hours. So it's only fair that we give them some of our best quality output: three series of Jordan and Peter. Score!
The three previous series (When Jordan Met Peter, Jordan and Peter Laid Bare and Jordan and Peter: Marriage and Mayhem) will be billed under the nice neat title of Katie + Peter on E! in the USA, so perhaps the slight change in naming for this one is an attempt to neaten up the franchise. Speaking from an anally retentive point of view, we approve of this measure.
This opening episode features our favourite celebrity offspring Harvey having an accident at home (which we assume is the infamous New Year accident), and Jordan/Katie discussing post-natal depression. Doesn't quite sound like the rollercoaster of whimsy that we were hoping for, but we'll take what we can get.
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Friday, April 13, 2007
The Sanjaya Monologues
SANJAYA! American Idol, ITV2, 8.30pm Labels: American Idol, ITV2, TV
Pray tell, what camp were you in last year? Were you a paid-up member of Soul Patrol? Were you a McPhan? Perhaps you were a Yaminion? This year, there's one fan campaign that's taking the internet by storm, and it's not the Blaker Girls. Oh no: this year, it's all about the Fanjayas. And believe it or not, that's not a euphemism for a lady's mimsy. At least, not yet.
In case you've been buried under a rock for the past few weeks (or in case you've just been driven away from this show by Cat fucking Deeley, in which case we entirely understand), Sanjaya is the floater in the toilet of American Idol, the one who we all assumed would be long gone by this stage. But something appears to have gone very wrong this year - Sanjaya, along with fellow fodder candidates Phil Stacey and Haley Scartissue -- sorry, Scarnato -- has a chokehold on the contest and is refusing to go away.
The internet, it appears, loves Sanjaya. He's the candidate of choice on Vote for the Worst, and whether at their behest or independently, a lot of rock music mailgroups on the internet are sending out mailshots to get people to cast their votes Sanjaya-wards. (This makes more sense when you realise that this show actually uses toll-free numbers for its votes, which is why such a plan would never work over here - who'd waste 25p a vote trying to sabotage The X Factor when it does such a good job of sandbagging itself?) There's even a specialist website called If Sanjaya Wins, where you can pledge -- or threaten -- what you will do if he manages to outlast everyone else.
There's something rather endearingly car-crashy about Sanjaya - particularly when he gets into I Don't Give A Fuck mode and embraces his status as a national object of ridicule with renditions of The Kinks' 'You Really Got Me' or No Doubt's 'Bathwater'. Tonight's Latin night, and heck knows what he'll pull out of the bag, but we're sure it'll be memorable. The particularly obsessed amongst you will already have looked up on the internet to see who went this week, but in the interests of staying spoiler-free, we'll just say that if it was Jordin or Blake, we may have to kill someone.
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Wednesday, April 04, 2007
The write stuff
MAGAZINE! Deadline, ITV2, 10.00pm
It's almost as if ITV2 abhors a reality show vacuum, isn't it? "Quick, WAGs Boutique is finishing in a few weeks, we need to commission something else! With celebrities, in an alien environment, competing!" This time former magazine and newspaper editor Janet Street-Porter is enlisting ten celebrities to turn around a weekly celebrity gossip magazine. We're assuming like heat, only more vacuous, if such a thing is possible. It's a terrifying thought.
The official website sadly gives us no clues as to which celebrities we can expect to appear on the show (fingers crossed for Mariah Carey, everyone), but we're fairly certain that if nothing else they'll have been chosen for their total inability to go five minutes without wanting to slap each other silly. There will also be two non-celebrity executives on hand to drive the whole shebang in the right direction, and no doubt they'll be doing their fair share of pearl-clutching and eye-rolling. Not that we're suggesting reality shows are getting predictable, or anything.
Now: there'll be a biscuit for anyone who can correctly guess what kind of reality show will follow this one when it nears the end of its run. Carol Vorderman running a team of celebrities who will try to be chartered accountants for six weeks? Jade Goody mentoring a group of celebrity dental nurses? Actually, we'd probably watch that one, if only for the racial slurs.
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Friday, March 09, 2007
The demon Barba of Fellate Street
SCANDAL! American Idol, ITV2, 8.30pm Labels: American Idol, ITV2, TV
Oh, American Idol. Just when we thought you were going to be quite dull this year after all, you find a whole new way of entertaining us. Every year there needs to be a contestant with the faint whiff of controversy about him or her, and this year that role will be filled by the delightful (read: snotty and rather obnoxious) Billie Piper hookerlike, Antonella Barba. Wave hello to Antonella, everyone!
If you pride yourself on knowing your celebrity gossip, you will have seen Antonella about recently. Perhaps sitting on the toilet and grinning at a camera. Or wearing a wet t-shirt and posing at a monument of historical importance. Perhaps even wearing acrylic nails and fellating some random bloke. Except the fellatio pictures have been widely denounced as fakes, particularly by Antonella's BFF and fellow Idol auditionee Amanda Coluccio, who claims that Antonella has never, ever worn acrylic nails, and isn't that the real crime here? Oh, and she said that Antonella's "the least slutty person I know". Presumably right before all of her other friends got their righteous indignation on and started pelting her with cans of hairspray.
Anyway, lest we forget, this is a singing competition (ha ha!), and word from Idol HQ is that despite this personal tragedy, Antonella will not be forced to leave the show unless the viewers choose to decide as much with their votes. But since Antonella is currently the female candidate of choice on Idol-smiting website Vote for the Worst, she may not be going anywhere just yet. (And to be honest, we're not sure we want her to go just yet, because we have this curious affection for her that we can't quite explain.) Tonight is the moment of truth for the candidates, since the last quadruple cut of the semifinals is being made and the Top 12 will be decided tonight. Idol aficionados may remember this point from last year as the moment where presumed shoo-in Ayla Brown fell at the last hurdle and was usurped by plucky underdog Melissa McGhee, who promptly undid all her good work the following week by forgetting the words to Stevie Wonder's 'Lately' ("I have many, many wishes / Hope my prediliction ishes...") and getting sent on her merry way home.
Will one of the assumed "worthy" candidates take a last minute faceplant as The Notorious A.N.T.O.N.E.L.L.A. rushes headlong into the final 12, despite having given two very questionable performances in the semifinals, and the odds on a third of similar quality being very high? We'll find out tonight as the dashing Ryan Seacrest (fuck off, we love him, we don't care what anyone says) announces America's Top 12 contestants. There'll be tears, there'll be tantrums, there may be more scandalous revelations. The X Factor, eat your heart out. We love this show.
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Thursday, March 01, 2007
He's super, thanks for asking
RERUN! Smallville, ITV2, 6.30pm Labels: ITV2, Smallville, TV
In the time-honoured lowculture tradition, we would to draw your attention to something interesting approximately one week after it started. What? We had other things to talk about last week. And the rest of this week. We got around to it eventually, didn't we? Give us a break.
ANYway, ITV2 is continuing its love of all things Superman-related by replacing its reruns of Lois and Clark: The New Adventures of Superman with a from-the-very-beginning-innit run of Smallville. Of course, the beginning was actually last Friday, so if you haven't realised it's on yet, then you'll have to settle for watching it from the very episode five instead. But that's very nearly as good, right? There's still plenty of time to watch Lana whining about her dead parents, and we know how much everybody loves that.
We never used to be that keen on Tom Welling, but for some reason the promos that ITV2 have put together for this series make him look kind of adorable in a confused-puppy type way. We approve of that. Of course, the most important thing is that this gives us a chance to see the epic love story of Clark and Lex from the beginning, with all of those smouldering glances laden with homoeroticism. Mmm, tension.
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Thursday, February 22, 2007
Amber means go
VAMPIRES! Supernatural, ITV2, 9.00pm Labels: ITV2, Supernatural, TV
Okay, so recommending Supernatural again suggests a little lack of inventiveness on our part, perhaps. But we needed to write something today and frankly we didn't feel like writing about any of the other rot that was on tonight, so you're getting this again, like it or lump it.
Besides! This is a great episode, and there's a special reason to enjoy it in the form of former Buffy star Amber Benson, so if you missed the first showing on Sunday then we strongly recommend you catch it tonight. A spate of human decapitations and disembowelled cattle leads Sam and Dean to suspect demonic activity, so they head off in the Metallicar (which has been restored, by the way, and that first shot of her sweet, sweet chassis rolling over the hill is the very definition of feelgood TV) to investigate. Sure enough, they happen upon a sect of vampires (the leader of which is played by Amber, according to our memo from the Ironic Casting Division) and another hunter - but of course, not everything is as it seems.
Amber Benson is great in this episode playing an entirely un-Tara-like character, and if you're one of the people who tunes in for the horror and suspense rather than the plot and the mytharc and the fine physical presences of Jensen Ackles and Jared Padalecki, this is a good episode to watch because of some spectacular vampire death scenes. Seriously: blood everywhere. It's frickin' awesome. Also, if you're planning to watch the rest of the season, there are some very important ongoing plot details in this one to set stuff up for later in the season. Because believe it or not, there's depth in this show. Despite how much we go on about The Pretty. Depth and Pretty, in sweet cohabitation. It's a beautiful thing.
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Tuesday, February 20, 2007
WAG the dog
S-H-O-P-P-I-N-G! WAGs' Boutique, ITV2, 9.00pm Labels: ITV2, TV, WAGs Boutique
We've given this show a shameful lack of coverage on the site so far, which is really quite unfortunate considering that we have a feeling we were the precise target audience in mind when this show was commissioned. Although the fact that it was commissioned at all is still something of a mystery to us - not necessarily because it was a bad idea, but just because it seems a bit leftfield. "Everybody's talking about the WAGs since the World Cup - why don't we get some of the really non-famous ones to open rival shops?" "Brilliant - here's your money, now go and hire June Sarpong quickly before someone else nabs her!"
The fact that this is hosted by June Sarpong is just the icing on the cake for us (and every instinct in our bodies tells us we shouldn't, but we can't help liking her - there's something almost admirable about turning your complete professional incompetence into a virtue the way La Sarpong seems to have done). We were at least hoping for one "name" amongst the WAGs - we knew that a Victoria Beckham or a Cheryl Cole was too much to ask for, but we thought we might get someone we'd heard of. Or at least, someone who dated a footballer we've heard of.
To our great dismay, we've not spotted anyone trying to cover a baby in fake tan or accidentally setting alight to her breasts, so we have our suspicions that these ladies might still be imposters and not real footballers' wives at all. But watching them fall up the stairs with an armful of boxes is still quite amusing, so we'll let them off for now.
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Friday, February 02, 2007
Reasons to be cheerful
WINCHESTERS! Supernatural, ITV2, Sunday, 9.00pm Labels: ITV2, Supernatural, TV
Hello readers. For once, we're not going to talk about something you should watch on telly today, but rather something you should watch on Sunday. Normally we would have made a normal post today and another on Sunday, but we're going away this weekend so we're getting ahead of ourselves. Now, there are a multitude of reasons why you should watch season two of Supernatural, and we're going to list a few of them below.
1. Jensen Ackles is not exactly ugly.
2. Neither, for that matter, is Jared Padalecki.
3. And the car they drive around in (nicknamed Metallicar by the fans) is also a thing of beauty.
4. Mmmm, gun porn. In your face, Torchwood. (Yes, we know guns are not big or clever. But there's something deliciously wrong and yet ohsoright about watching Dean Winchester clean his arsenal. So to speak.)
5. Sam and Dean are on the hunt for the demon that killed their mother and also killed Sam's girlfriend, like this:
6. They also like to take out various other demons they might encounter on the way, because they're nice like that.
7. Being something of a completist, the demon also tried to kill Sam, Dean and their father John at the end of last season by smashing a bloody great truck right into Metallicar. (And even when we re-watch that scene knowing what's coming, it still makes us jump because it's incredibly well done.)
8. As a direct result, Jensen Ackles spends pretty much the entirety of the season opener dressed like this:
9. Basically, it's all macho, gun-toting, demon ass-kicking fun...
10. ...with a bit of a girly, touchy-feely and slightly homosexual subtext of angsty brotherly bonding.
And on the basis of that, who wouldn't want to be the filling in a Winchester sandwich? Hmm. It occurs to us that we've made it sound like a trashy show that's only worth watching for The Pretty. And while we'll admit there is the occasional dire episode that's only saved by the charm and acting talents of Messrs Ackles and Padalecki (and for two such handsome lads, they're no slouches in the acting talent department either, which makes a refreshing change), the second season is fleshing the show out nicely and developing some nice depth and mythology for itself. If you're anything like us, you'll find yourself glowing with pride and saying "oh, boys!" out loud in the misapprehension that they can actually hear you. You may also find yourself screaming "Just fucking HUG already!", because seriously? It's long overdue.
Anyway, picking up where season one left off, Metallicar is a crushed mess and all three Winchesters are currently looking like very pretty yet horrendously bloody corpses. Except, it's probably not a spoiler if we tell you that all three of them survived the crash. Problem is, there's something far worse in the hospital for them to contend with. Something that might well change everything. DUN DUN DAH! We don't want to say anything more detailed than that, lest we spoil it for you, but let's just say you need to see this episode if you're to understand the emotional arc of this season. See, we told you there was depth.
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Friday, January 19, 2007
Idol speculation
CONTEST! American Idol, ITV2, 8.30pm » Paris Bennett, the girl with the voice and soul of a woman about four times her age (who ended up finishing in a deeply disappointing fifth place). Labels: American Idol, ITV2, TV
Holy fuck, ITV2 schedulers! We realise that the Fox network in the States wants to celebrate the return of their all-conquering talent search for a sixth season with two two-hour specials, but did you really have to schedule them back to back on a Friday night, finishing at half past midnight? Just how obsessed do you think we are? Actually, considering we're still seething about the lovely Katharine McPhee losing to the asstastic Taylor Hicks last year, it's probably best not to answer that.
This does pretty much mean we're officially surrendering our Friday nights for the next five months, and no matter how much we might try to claim that we're really not that into it, or that we're not going to get sucked in again this year, we're pretty sure we'll end up hooked regardless.
Last year brought us some interesting moments, such as:
» Melissa McGhee fudging the words to Stevie Wonder's 'Lately' to the extent that from now on we will always sing it as "hope my prediliction ishes".
» Ayla Brown crying like a little girl when she just missed out on a place in the Top 12.
» David Radford looking like he was going to hurl the entire way through the two live performance shows that he actually made it to.
» Kellie Pickler wondering what a "ballsy" is.
» Lunchlady Ace Young wearing the world's most unattractive hairnet (in itself quite an impressive feat).
» And of course that brilliant moment in the final four elimination where Katharine totally thought she was going and we all totally thought Katharine was going, and Chris Daughtry clearly thought Katharine was going and that he would go on to win, only for Seacrest to announce that Chris had been eliminated and for Chris to completely forget his gracious loser face:
Awesome.
So! A new year, a new search, and plenty more moments to cherish. Possibly even the uncovering of a quite good singer, somewhere. You just never know.
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