Bonus SNL: Best Ever Cast Members

Since I am still in my SNL frame of mind, I'm going to list what is, definitely, the best list of cast members the show has ever had. Let me set a few ground rules:

First, this is a list of those who performed best on the show. In other words, you won't see Robert Downey, Jr. Ben Stiller, or Sarah Silverman just because of their later success. If you didn't do it between 11:30pm and 1am, it doesn't count.

Also, this person might have gone on to have a flop of a career after SNL, but that doesn't weigh into my list. Which, by the way, is absolute gospel.

Also, this might not necessarily mean THE funniest (although I think most of them are) but sometimes the best role players or utility players. Some of them might not have been the primary focus of a given sketch, but they could be counted on more times than not.

Also, there are going to be some omissions here, and some might chalk it up to sexism or racism, but to me it's a matter of talent and performance. For example, some might think Amy Poehler is a no-brainer here, but aside from some early strong seasons, she got a little lazy with her impressions. (See: Clinton, Hillary; Grace, Nancy)

I am also going to put them into categories: Show-Stoppers, Utility Players, and Impressionists. The Show-Stoppers are the ones who could make a skit hilarious (regardless of writing) with just their charisma and humor. The Utility players could be relied on to do any role needed, despite the quality of the skit. (They were the ones you never realized you would miss so much when they left.) And the Impressionists were good enough to actually make you forget the performer's name.

Here we go...

SHOW-STOPPERS

• Bill Murray - The original "alternative comic" on SNL
  
• Eddie Murphy - Carried the show for 4 years by himself
  
• Gilda Radner - Oozing with charisma
  
• Jimmy Fallon - Despite his constant cracking up, his energy carried the show
  
• Kristen Wiig - The most talented female the show has ever produced
  
• Mike Myers - See Fallon above
  
• Will Ferrell - The heir apparent to Bill Murray

UTILITY PLAYERS

• Dan Aykroyd - The Swiss Army knife of the first cast
  
• Fred Armisen - Can play any race, always finds the funny part of the character
  
• Jan Hooks - The most versatile female the show ever had, and a great actress
  
• Joe Piscopo - Don't laugh, the guy was Eddie Murphy's only wingman
  
• Maya Rudolph - The female Armisen (or Armisen is the male Rudolph)
  
• Molly Shannon - Woefully underrated
  
• Phil Hartman - Never had a bad performance. Ever.

IMPRESSIONISTS

• Bill Hader - The best technician in show history
  
• Dana Carvey - No one did a better job of getting to the heart of the character
  
• Darrell Hammond - Sometimes phoned it in, but brilliant

WILD CARD

• Tina Fey - Didn't perform much, but re-energized the show

CONSPICUOUSLY ABSENT

• John Belushi - I just never got him.
  
• Chevy Chase - I thought he did the same schtick over and over
  
• Chris Farley - Sometimes brilliant, but sometimes just over the top
  
• Amy Poehler - Got a little too impressed with her own talent

UNDERRATED

• Chris Parnell
  
• Will Forte
  
• Abby Elliot
  
• Jon Lovitz
  
• Jason Sudeikis

And the worst five cast members in SNL history:

5) Melanie Hutsell - One-note
4) Rob Schneider - The brainless "Richmeister" was his only notable character
3) Adam Sandler - One note (Opera Man, Cajun Man), and usually just juvenile
2) Keenan Thompson - Bad actor, terrible impressionist, always the same
1) Horatio Sanz -

First Post of the 2010s!

It's been a while since I blogged, so I thought I'd weigh in on three things that are really annoying me right now. I have OPINIONS!

1) Yes, I admit that the Tonight Show with Conan O'Brien hasn't been very good, and most of that has to do with Conan's (excuse the cliche) losing his edge. The day Conesy lost me was when he had Paris Hilton doing a Bob Hope-style walk-on, complete with golf club. It wasn't spontaneous, her jokes were not particularly funny, and worst of all, it let Paris Hilton in the club.

The thing that was great about Conan's old show is the way that it allowed all the nerds in. Those of us who were never the "cool kids" were able to relate to a guy like Conan -- although his self-deprecation is often too belabored. People like Paris Hilton were the target ... they shouldn't be allowed in the clubhouse. When Conan legitimized this talentless tart, I realized that he wasn't one of "us" anymore, he was one of "them."

Now, I do give him a little slack. It's not like I hate Conan, or think he's a true sell-out. But I was no-longer compelled to watch his show, because he wasn't getting the laughs. But I had expected Conan to find his groove ... eventually. After about a year or so, he probably would have found his new voice -- a la David Letterman, who holy shit will have been on the air twenty years in 2013.

But it looks like Conan won't get his chance, because for some reason, NBC seems to think that Jay Leno is the answer. Jay Leno, who milked Bill Clinton and OJ Simpson jokes for well over a decade, but somehow inexplicably trounced Letterman in tv ratings. (Well, actually, it's very explicable... Americans are fucking idiots.) So now, as if he was some sort of automatic ratings machine, NBC is going to move him back to 11:35, and then Conan to 12:05. Keep in mind, Leno has been ON TV FOR THE LAST SEVERAL MONTHS. Maybe people got tired of Leno, and you have to give them just a tad bit more credit than to think they would have forgotten he existed just because he was on at 10pm.

So after the Olympics are over, Leno is going to be on again AFTER the local news instead of before. And my hope -- as well as my prediction -- is that the public realized from the 10pm experiment that Leno is old and stale, and just not that damn funny, and that Conan bolts for another network and can do his own thing again without having to live up to the "Tonight Show" brand. Because at this point, who gives a shit.

2) The "Rooney Rule" is the rule in the NFL that all teams must interview minority candidates before they can make a hire. The idea is very noble: to get exposure for more minority candidates so that they will have more chances at jobs. It is affirmative action, yes, but it's also been proven to be very effective. (The Steelers, to their credit, put their money where their mouths are, as they hired Mike Tomlin, a black coach who led them to a Super Bowl championship last season.)

But this past week a pair of Washington teams -- the Redskins and Seahawks (see what I did there, football fans?) -- hired high-profile coaches without following the spirit of the Rooney Rule. The Skins did a cursory interview with their assistant coach Jerry Gray, and the Seahawks did a sham interview with Vikings defensive coordinator Leslie Frazier. Both teams knew they were going to hire established coaches, which makes the interviews of the minority candidates seem especially hollow, and condescending.

But you can't really blame the teams for hiring who they did -- two of the most well-known football coaches of the last fifteen years. Back in 2003, the Detroit Lions fired their coach because recently-deposted 49ers Steve Mariucci became available, and they knew they wanted him. The Lions got fined because they didn't interview a minority candidate. (The Cowboys, incidentally, did not, even though their sham interview consisted of a phone call with Dennis Green.)

But think about it, why force these teams to interview a minority when they know with 100% certainty that there is no chance that any of the minority candidates have a chance... not because they aren't qualified, but because the teams had pre-existing coaches in mind. But you can't just throw the Rooney Rule out, can you??? There's got to BE a better way!

I have the solution, and I'm not the first to come up with it, but I'll tell you about it. The Rooney Rule should be this: if you only interview ONE candidate (eg. Pete Carroll, Mike Shanahan), you don't have to do a phony interview with a minority candidate. This would allow these teams to expedite their hirings and stop with the phony bullshit.

If your team does MORE than one interview, however, that team has to interview at least as many minority candidates as they do white candidates. This, you might think, is also a sham, but it shouldn't be. A wider net cast would mean that teams would open up their searches anyway, so the more exposure the better for all. If they just implement this in the Rooney Rule, all will be well.

3) Mark McGwire is a selfish asshole and I hope he never gets into the Baseball Hall of Fame. I have never liked him, because of what an arrogant cock he was in 1998 when he broke the then-home run record and went on Letterman talking about what a service that he and Sammy Sosa did for the country. Not for the NL Central, not for Major League Baseball. For the COUNTRY. He can shit in his hat.

It's interesting that when he didn't get immunity in the 2004 baseball steroid hearings, he decided to pull his "I'm not here to talk about the past." And then he remained silent about the matter for over five years.

But today, he decided that he wanted to fess up about it. Why? Because his conscience was weighing on him? Because the truth needed to be told? Because he wanted to tell kids not to do it? No, of course not. It's because he wanted another job in baseball, and this was the only way that anyone was going to let him do it. If he wanted to take credit for saving the nation 11.5 years ago, he can take the heat for being a sack of shit.

4) I read a Facebook group called "I Shouldn't Have to Press '1' so Speak English!" Of course, this is blatant anti-immigration racism in the guise of pro-America populism. It's horseshit. If you don't like brown people, just admit it. Stop acting like somehow you are a more legitimate American just because you speak English. Remember, America has NO official language, and that's the way the Founding Fathers wanted it.

Of course, when you go onto the site to read the comments, there is a lot of "go home to your country" and "learn to speak English!" and other such nonsense. But do you know what's so ironic? Spanish speakers are not ruining the language in this country: English speakers are.

If you've ever listened to a NASCAR-loving hillbilly speak, you can tell that they don't have what we might call a "command" of the English language. Not only do they mix their metaphors, but they usually leave the "g" of gerunds, such as "learning," "talking" and "eating." They use phrases like "that dog don't hunt," and "git er done!" but somehow get upset about Ebonics. (Also, they are under the borderline retarded notion that Ebonics was something proposed to be TAUGHT in schools to students. It wasn't: it was meant to be taught to TEACHERS so that they could more effectively communicate with their students.)

Also, can we agree that even common language is dying? And it has nothing to do with people from other countries trying to usurp our linguistic dominance. It has everything to do with lazy Americans (blacks AND whites both) who don't feel like learning the correct ways to say things, instead relying either on what "feels" right, or what they thought they heard once.

The best example of this is "irregardless." I'm sure that a bunch of these shit-kicking hicks have used this combination of letters. But the truth is, there is no such word. It came about by some numbskull combining "regardless" and "irrespective." Before "Bennifer" and "Brangelina," there was "irregardless."

But do you want to know the infuriating part? Some dictionaries actually recognize "irregardless" as an actual word. Basically, the least educated of our society has somehow come to dictate language, and infiltrate the intelligent, correct-spelling world with their stupidity. If these "I hate pressing '1' to speak Inglish" people had any integrity at all -- or any LEGITIMATE respect for the English language, as opposed to using it as some kind of patriotic wedge issue -- they would be storming the offices of Webster's and demanding that such heresy be stricken from the books, to PRESERVE OUR LANGUAGE!

But no, these cro-magnon faggots will flip over their Bill Engvall cassettes and LOL whenever he says "Heerrrrrrrrrre's yer sign!"

Ahhhh... I feel so much better now. Happy New Year!

You're Simply the Best!

And This Guy Used to Trounce Letterman?

Do you think anyone will ever have the balls to tell Jay Leno he's the corniest comic working today?



Well at least his employees are laughing.

HIMYM, Save Thyself

I hope you'll indulge me, hyperanalyzing a TV show, but it helps keep my brain sharp. Plus, HIMYM is a good show overall, and I'd hate to see it end with a whimper like other promising shows (Samantha Who?, My Name Is Earl) that lost their way after only a few seasons.

The show How I Met Your Mother has been one of my favorites over the last three or four years. I have enjoyed the writing, the characters and the dialogue. But like all things I like, I fear for it.

This past season was classic pre-Jump the Shark behavior. There were more than a few episodes that weren't just sub-par, but godawful and contrived. ("Ten Sessions," "The Possimpible.") But it's not beyond repair, and the way that it can be saved is by diagnoising its fatal flaws, and fixing them pronto. Let's take a look:

1. It's Too In Love With its Own Gags. A few seasons ago, HIMYM unleashed a wonderful little gag known as the "slap-bet." It goes like this: you make a bet, and whoever wins gets to slap the other one across the face as hard as they want. It was a hilarious little wrinkle in the plot. There was also a payoff seven full episodes later, which is one of the best "walk-off" endings in the show's history.
   
   But then they got greedy. What was at one time a rather ingenious little subplot to the "Let's Go To the Mall" episode then became "Slapsgiving" (season Three), in which the entire episode was a countdown to the third and final slap that Marshall was finally going to give Barney. The slap itself was fine, but then it ruined it. Rather than ending on that note or having a brief denoument, Marshall had to sing a song called "You Just Got Slapped," with Barney joining in on the chorus! Gone was any tension that had existed up until then, and all the time they had put into the slap-bet concept went from TV lore to tepid and instantly forgettable.
   
   This show has a tendency to become infatuated with its own humor, such as when Marshall was wearing a nightshirt, and Barney let off a rapid fire litany of jokes -- none of them funny -- about the attire. (Which, by the way, is a lazy tool of comic writing: make someone's appearance foolish, and then make other characters make comparisons or say "You look like the grandfather from 'Willy Wonka.'")
   
   The show has to learn to glide gracefully past even its more ingenious jokes. When it spends too much time on them, it makes it look like it's trying too hard. Just make the joke and move along now. Don't wallow in your own supposed comic genius.
   
   
2. The Sentimentality of Ted. More often than not lately, the show has relied on ending on some kind of a dramatic or sentimental note. Now, from the first episode, Ted's character has been a kind of, for lack of a better word, pussy. He told Robin he loved her in the first episode, and is always talking about this ideal of "true love." That is, after all, the point of the show ... the backstory of how he met his future wife.
   
   But the problem is that these elements, which worked so well because they were the subtext, have become the ... well, text. Instead of Ted just being, we are constantly told what he is, by other characters and by voice-overs. A hopeless romantic, someone looking for a soul-mate, etc. All right, we get it.
   
   Problem is, Ted spends so much of his time fucking moping around and searching for this "true love," that it loses all of its power. There was an episode early on where Ted fell for a girl named Victoria at a wedding. They agreed they would never speak again after the wedding. Later on, when he finally tracks her down, the catharsis worked, because it wasn't telegraphed.
   
   Now, we have contrived pap like "Ten Sessions," in which Ted very consciously tries to wear down the woefully miscast and thankfully jettisoned Sarah Chalke over the course of ten medical treatments. This might have worked if it weren't so goddamn phony and contrived. And that two-minute date they had at the end of the episode was about as authentic as a 1980s porno. (Unfortunately, this was also the episode that Britney Spears was in, which means it was the one that most newbie viewers were exposed to.)
   
   Let's get the fun Ted back out there, the one that is sarcastic and doesn't take himself or his life too seriously, or come off as a "cool guy." (He might be the protagonist, but sometime's Ted is a borderline douchebag.) Because when the show validates his character, yet his character is doing something wussy/unlikeable/dickish, it undermines the whole framework of the show.
   
   
3. Barney's Radical Character Shift. I shouldn't have to tell this to professional TV people. When you take the funniest character on a show, and make him a sentimental ass, or too vulnerable, you take away the best part of a show. They did the same thing with Chandler Bing on Friends right before he got married to Monica, before thankfully re-installing his testicles by the time the show ended. Scrubs was also in grave danger of doing this with Perry Cox, the show's resident misanthrope. His seriously-toned, "he's really a good guy after all!" monologues -- which were initially a nice dab of humanity in an otherwise cynical character -- became all too frequent, before the show's switch to ABC restored his balls as well.
   
   For the better part of three seasons, Barney has been the one standby. If Marshall is the innocent in Ted's life, then Barney is the devil on the other shoulder. This dynamic opposition has given the show much of its needed tension. Barney could always be counted on to act selfishly and with complete nihilism. He would always be in control and always be one step ahead.
   
   But at the end of Season Three, inexplicably, the writers made Barney fall in love with Robin. First of all, can you think of a worse match? Who the hell decided "we have to get these two together!"
   
   Barney should never be in love, not while the show is still on. And God forbid he ever does, it should be with someone conniving, mean ... borderline evil. Anything less would seriously compromise the character that this show has so successfully built into its best asset.
   
   
4. Stella. She needs to move away to a distant city never to be seen or heard from again. Sarah Chalke is fine on Scrubs; she was abysmal on this show. Cousin Oliver crossed with that asshole who was Rory's boyfriend on Gilmore Girls. (So I watch a lot of TV, fuck you.)
   

So anyway, I think this show has the potential to be a so-called "klassic komedy," and would hate to see it go the way of "Andy Richter Controls the Universe," "Joey," "Life on Mars" or other shows with decent concepts that shat the proverbial bed.

Letterman

I like Conan, but Dave was really the man back in the day...

If The Office Had Been On In the '70s

A Moment with Kenneth

He is probably the best character on sitcoms today, so enjoy a little Kenneth Purcell



I only wish they could have added my favorite line of his: "I'm a good sex person, I do it in ALL the ways!"

Awesome Show Alert: Summer Heights High

To call Summer Heights High (on HBO for 8 episodes) an Australian version of the British version of The Office wouldn't be doing it justice. On its face it sounds like kind of a gay idea: have one guy play three different characters that attend one school, and see what happens.

It sounds like a bad Mike Meyers project, I know. But trust me, this show is goddamned hilarious.

The three characters are: Mr. G, a super-effeminate music and theater teacher who is as oblivious as The Office UK's David Brent but maybe even more selfish; Ja'mie (pronounced ZHA-may), a transfer student from a ritzy high school who tries to ingratiate herself with the "cool kids" at the new school; and Jonah, a Tongan thug who hangs around with other Tongans and gets into all sorts of trouble.



If you didn't know better, you would think that Mr. G was gay, Ja'mie was a real girl, and Jonah was really 13 years old. But what makes the show isn't the parlor trick of having one person play all the parts, Peter Sellers-style. It's the writing.

For example, the third episode featured a junior student dying of a drug overdose. Mr. G responds by writing a musical about the girl's life called "One Girl, One Pill." Most of the songs talk about how the girl was a slut and a drug addict. I couldn't possibly do it justice. In the first episode, one particular line made me laugh for about 5 minutes: all I'll say is "Tsunamarama."

I use the Office UK comparison only to give an idea of the style of humor, since it's very subtle, with no laugh track and lots of quick jokes that hit you and then immediately switch to another scene, just like Ricky Gervais's masterpiece. Though it's Australian, it bears little-to-no resemblance to Flight of the Conchords, but is more like a Christopher Guest miniseries.

So even if you can't stand Australians, comedy, actors playing multiple parts, high school or Tongans, give this show a shot. You know you can trust me.

Sherri Shepherd is a Sh-thead

Women have really come a long way in the last 50 years. They have made all myths of their mental inferiority disintegrate and blow into the wind.

So why would a show called "The View," which is supposedly intended to get the disparate views of intelligent women and have a dialogue. But apparently there is something that compels the producers of "The View" to add a complete idiot to their midst.

Sherri Shepherd is probably as dumb and uneducated a human being as I've ever seen. She was asked if she thought the earth was flat or round. See here...

I like how she says "I never really thought about it, but I do think about how to feed my CHILD!" She should probably have her child and all sharp objects removed from her.

Enjoy this discussion of dinosaurs and Christians...

Why are the other "View" hosts afraid to call this woman the drooling fucktard that she is? If anything, this proves that "all voices" do not necessarily need to be heard, especially when those voices come out of the mouth of this dope.

Mitch Hurwitz Should Act

For those of us swooning over the news that Arrested Development (aka The Greatest Show in the History of Television) is going to be made into a feature-length movie being released in 2009, here is a little something to whet the proverbial appetite.

It's a Clark and Michael episode featuring genius Mitchell Hurwitz as Michael's sleazy agent. It's long, but it's worth watching for at least the first four minutes, where Mitchell shows just a hint of why he is the foremost comic mind in comedy today. (Take that Judd Apatow!) If Mitch could only get a TV project or two off the ground.

"It wasn't that there wasn't talent in the writing of it, because there wasn't. It wasn't that the characters weren't there, and they weren't. It was because it was offensive to Chinese. You know how she knows? She's Chinese."

American Idol - SEASON 7 LIVEBLOG!

I know that liveblogging is rather passe these days. Or is it, I'm not even sure. I've been without a computer for along time and I'm woefully out of touch. But now, I'm back up online -- and with a laptop no less -- so I figure why the heck not try it.

And what should I liveblog? Well, of course, American Idol. Not only do I have a love/hate relationship with this show, but it is such wonderfully fertile fodder for snarky quips and salient observations. This season, my feeling for the show has been much more hate than love. The contestants have been (although arguably the most talented) certainly the most bland, the songs and celebrity mentors have been mostly lame-o (although they did mercifully not subject us to the wax-faced Barry Manilow again this year), and my hatred for the mush-mouthed Randy Jackson has reached a fever pitch. Combine that with the fact that last night's Idol finale between David Cook and David Archleta was the worst on record (not in terms of the singing but in terms of the show's production value), and I think I'm ready to finally release a torrent of cathartic venom on this capsizing ship. Lord forgive me (or at least Javen forgive me).

Plus, I am going to drink while I'm doing it. Times are Eastern Standard.

Let's blog it out.

Beer #1: Ommegang Abbey Ale out of a tulip glass. Yes, a tulip glass. Oh how I love to put my lips on a tulip glass. Despite the fact that I am liveblogging American Idol, I am still heterosexual. But then again, the show is two hours long, and who knows what could happen.

8:00. Okay, this boxing/gladitator/Rocky IV thing has got to stop already. Last night it was Jim Lampley and Michael Buffer speaking in lame-ass boxing metaphors. Tonight, the show opens on the Davids both dressed in pure white, staring each other down under a hot spotlight. Don't they realize that these two are both colossal pussbags and can't look intimidating not matter how hard they stare at each other? Give it a rest, Idol; Jon Heder looked more intimidating in "Blades of Glory."

It seems like they are going to do a repeat of last night, where it was less a celebration of music and the contestants -- as it had been in the past -- and this attempt to make it more "confrontational," even though I've seen more machismo in "The Birdcage." If this was between Syesha and either of the Davids, at least we would have been spared this faux-intensity.

8:01. Was that Lori Laughlin in the audience??? Have mercy! Wait, how the hell did she score tickets?

8:02. Randy Jackson is dressed like Austin Powers, Paula looks pretty good. Simon still dresses like Tom Jones (the singer or the Albert Finney character, take your pick). Randy is the king of false jocularity, shouting "Boo!" when they announce Simon's name. He's so playful and not at all forced.

8:03. Mikayla Gordon and Matt Rogers are reporting from Kansas City Moe and Salt Lake City, respectively. The one in SLC looks like an Aryan youth rally. Relax, I only mean because there are so many white people there. And they probably do all hate black people. Except Karl Malone of course.

8:04. The Idols come out in matching white outfits and perform "Get Ready" by either the Four Tops or the Temptations. I am totally gay for these performances, even though they always end up looking like an Up With People performance. I see Syesha is pulling a Haley Scarnato and showing off her legs. Too little too late, Syeesh.

It is weird to see all the Idols who got booted off. I had just assumed they all went into some sort of exile. It's nice to Brooke White back, dancing incredibly awkwardly. I've seen a more natural arm motion on Rick Allen.

8:10. Fine, so I'm actually digging the version of "Hero" that the Davids are doing. Their harmonics are actually working for me. Maybe all the song really ever needed was less Chad Kroeger. If Cook sang this last night, he would have won for sure. (Current Gay-O-Meter: 7/10) Jesus, they are really gonna milk the shit outta this show aren't they? It's only ten after.

8:12. I can already tell this Guru Pitka business is going to be a Mike Myers mug-fest. Ok the Sitar Hero thing kinda made me laugh. Crap, that was actually kind of amusing. I hate laughing at corny shit. Archuleta said that he didn't have any idea what the Guru was talking about; I just realized he was born in 1991 or 1992 (Wikipedia says just a few days before New Year's of 1991). Holy shit I am old; certainly too old to be liveblogging American Idol. Well, either way, within the next few days Archuleta will be swimming in teenaged ass.

8:18. Syesha and Seal. Syesha looks hot. So does Seal! I've moved on to Beer #2 Middle Ages ImPaled Ale. It looks like Syesha has really tried to shed the Bohemian look in the last few weeks, letting her curly hair go straight. It's gettin' the job done, although I still don't like her self-satisfied smirk. I just saw Joel McHale from The Soup. How can he make fun of this show if he's there?

8:21. So Jessica Alba is in that "Love Guru" movie eh? And Stephen Colbert?? And Jim GAFFIGAN??? I'm so effing there.

8:25. Seacrest says that interviewing Jason Castro was "lit'rally like pulling teeth." Was it? Really? Jason's version of "Hallelujah" is actually pretty good. Come to think of it, he could do pretty well putting out albums that sound like Jeff Buckley. Hopefully he doesn't jump into Wolf River and drown.

8:28. The obligatory "best-of" the behind the scenes of the Idols just havin' fun on the sets of all their Ford commercials. Just pallin' around, making faces and having a wonderful time.

8:29. These two pricks each get a hybrid car? Got-dammit. Archuleta's mom is not bad looking for whatever her age might be.

8:30. No human being has ever looked more out of place than Amanda Overmeyer looks singing Donna Summer. That little 4'6" Ramiele Malubay is so damn cute; I just wanna put her in my pocket like one of those little Tamagotchi pets. Donna Summer not looking too awful for her age, although she does look pregnant. Better than Gloria Gaynor at least. Eesh. Good lord Seacrest was just dancing. I have moved onto Beer #3, Middle Ages Swallow Wit Belgian White. Paula stands and claps, and I think I just saw Fantasia Barrino with fire-truck red hair; and I thought she couldn't get less attractive.

8:36. The preview for "The Incredible Hulk" is showing. Okay, here's my main issue. They improved a lot it seems: better actor playing Bruce Banner (Edward Norton this time, although Eric Bana is no slouch), looks like more action and less brooding psychobabble. But they have the SAME STUPID-LOOKING CARTOON HULK. They couldn't find a way to make the Hulk have a realistic-looking face this time?! It's like they took the same damn special effects and just shifted them over to this movie. The Hulk from the Ang Lee version didn't work because the Hulk -- the actual creature -- never felt real. It looks like a CGI graphic with a cartoon face. If you are gonna reboot the damn franchise, reboot the damn avatar while you're at it too. No wonder Ed Norton isn't doing any promotions for the movie. Pee break!

8:39. Angering Lou Dobbs, Pat Buchanan and xenophobes everywhere, here's Carly Smithson and Michael Johns! Singing, "The Letter." These goddamnm foreigners are stealing our Vietnam anthems now? They're probably too hopped-up on Vegemite and Guinness to notice. They can sure both belt it out though.

8:43. Why does Jimmy Kimmel always look like the sun is directly in his face? I mean I'm a squinter too but I'm not on national TV. I like that they at least let him do a mini-roast, although it would have been nice to see him skewer Randy's stupid ass.

8:45. Goody, it's time to "rock out." With .... fucking Bryan Adams?? Die...all of you just die with this sentimental "I got my first real six-string" poppycock. I guess for American Idol, Bryan Adams is as close to "rocking out" as they can get. Oh. I get it. He's actually there at the theater. Well this song he's singing is garbage, must be from his new album. He must be making a comeback, since they mentioned him on "HIMYM" the other night. I need Beer #4, Middle Ages Beast Bitter. You may soon witness this normally-erudite blog's descent into incoherency.

8:53. I kinda liked that Joe Torre State Farm commercial, if only for the fact that I don't have to hate him anymore now that he's with a boring, inoffensive team. Boy, Grady Little must hate him for so many reasons.

8:55. Jordin Sparks talking about The American Idol Experience at Disney World. Oy. And no, David Cook, performing with Z.Z. Top still doesn't take the focus off of your horribly unkempt facial hair. (I know, I know, pot-kettle-black and all that. Quiet Tracie.)

8:59. Wow, Graham Nash and Brooke White singing "Teach Your Children." This song always reminds me of my mom. Their harmonics aren't quite up to CSNY-snuff, but not horrible. Brooke White should have at least put on shoes, because her protruding right foot looks as if she's been walking across hot coals and it's frankly distracting me. I want to know what the hell Crosby and Stills were too busy doing to be here for this joyous and momentous occasion. Brooke remembered all the words which is a bonus.

9:03. Oh good, the "Sex & the City" movie. A film about four aging sluts. My hatred just brought my gay level back to normal. (Gay-O-Meter: 3/10.) Pee break!

9:06. Seacrest said, "They need no intro, here's [inaudible female fan screaming]." Apparently they do need intro because I have no idea who the fuck they are. Is it Menudo? Wait, let me take a guess. [Wild guess on Wikipedia.] Yup, the Jonas Brothers. I'm glad there are kids here to pick up the mantle that Blink-182 left behind. The floppy-haired super-Menudo-looking one is wearing the shiniest silver suit I've ever seen. And I've seen a lot. I'm sure that song will really hold up a few years from now. I just saw Justin Guarini.

9:09. A "worst-of" montage from this season. Some of the freakshows of the early rounds, including the "Let my pipple GO-O-O-O!" guy. Also, the "I Am Your Brother" guy in the plush Mercury hat. Please show Milo Turk, please show Milo Turk... The USC marching band comes on for the "I Am Your Brother" guy. I would have much preferred to hear "No Sex Allowed." Wow that Marching band fiasco got so bad they had to give it the Bill Conti "play off" music and go to commercial.

9:18. Wander Republic? Juan's Republic? I have no idea who this is. Okay, I guess it's OneRepublic. Since I only listen to space radio, I have no idea who this is but I'm sure they will be a huge, Coldplay-level band within the next 6 months based on this appearance. It worked for Rascal Flats. This song isn't terrible, but definitely fits into the Keane /Coldplay /Aqualung /James Blunt motif. This is the kind of music Archuleta is going to be making. This or Josh Groban.

9:21. Former Idol contestant (and current hair-regrowth pitchman) Matt Rogers says "the biggest party in Utah is happening right here." That's like saying, "The biggest orgy in the Vatican...." Archuleta's dad is there; seems like a sweet old man but he clearly raised a real prick for a son.

9:23. Jordin Sparks singing in a large shiny gold dress. I'm sure this song is popular but it sounds like any crappy Kelly Rowland song and she is way the crap off-key. At least I don't have to look up Blake Lewis's nose for this portion of the show. Speaking of which, I wonder if all the previous six Idol winners will be there. So far I've seen Reuben, Jordin and Fantasia. Kelly, Carrie and Taylor Hicks are heretofore conspicuously absent.

9:27. Wow, another manchild Adam Sandler movie. Glad to see how much he's evolved as an ACK-tor. I wonder if he will beat up someone in the movie who was mean to him earlier in the movie.

9:31. Ben Stiller, Jack Black and Robert Downey Jr. as the Pips. I'm not sure how funny this actually is, but there is something great about seeing a method actor like Robert Downey, Jr. slumming it. He looks amazing in that new "Tropic Thunder" movie, by the way.

9:35. Ahh, here comes Carrie Underwood. And speaking of showing a little leg! I hope TMZ has a cameraman standing in the front row. You gotta hand it to Carrie for staying loyal to Idol. I know why Kelly Clarkson has beef with the show, but for pete's sake, just show up once a year. For the fans, Kelly, the fans! Like ME! (Gay-O-Meter: 10/10.) Pee break!

(On to Beer #5, Southern Tier Uber Sun. I am representin' Upstate New York tonight, my friends!)

9:42. A cool preview for a TV show upcoming, apparently on Fox. I just saw Lt. Daniels from "The Wire" (ie. the greatest show in the history of television). Apparently it's called "Fringe" and it looks kind of awesome.

9:43. "Faith" by George Michael. Huh. How 'bout that. And Kristi Lee Cook leading it off no less. It's about time she started shaking her moneymaker. Amanda Overmeyer's voice sounds like when Maya Rudolph used to be that character on Saturday Night Live who called a Hyundai a "Hy-UN-Die-ay." Uh-oh, Michael Johns is singing "Father Figure." Could George Michael (the singer-songwriter) be in the house????

9:44. Wait for it..........

9:45. Here comes "Freedom '90." (Gay-O-Meter: still 10/10.)

9:46. Oh please, George Michael, be there. You were on the "Extras" Christmas Special, surely you can slum it for just a few minutes.

9:47. BOO-YAA! He's still a ladies man! Although he's dressed strangely like a cross between Bono and a priest. Boy his voice sure sounds off though. Paula is crying. PAULA IS CRYING!

9:53. Okay, we have the new American Idol coming up.... after the break. Break out the confetti and tears and Paula's arhythmic clapping.

9:57. Final thoughts of the year by the judges. Randy: you dudes brought it down to the wire, you're both winners. Paula: I'm honored, you two are truly amazing. It's the beginning of the destiny of your career. Simon: It wasn't so clear cut as we called it. I don't really care who wins, I think you've both done terrific.

9:58. The pencil-pusher with the results. And the winner is...

10:00. Of course, my DVR stops about 5 seconds before they announce the winner. Goddamn fucking Fox. Oh well, I guess there's no way to find out now.

Well, whoever won, they are both winners in my book. I hope you enjoyed taking this little journey with me. I'm not sure if I'm gonna be able to watch next year. Not without a ton of alcohol. Oh well, it's onto Beer #6, The Duke of Winship. See ya next year!

Buzz Bissinger is an Aloof Douchebag

There have recently been seeds of discontent planted in the realm of sports news and sports journalism, and hopefully they will grow into a vine that chokes ESPN and Fox Sports and all the other "Gasbags on Parade" (Al Michaels's words) that have wrecked the way that the media has presented sports over the last half-decade.

If you have HBO and like sports a little bit, you may have caught the special CostasNow episode which explored sports media in America today. It discussed five topics: sports talk radio, the internet, sports TV, the relationships between journalists and athletes and -- of course -- race.

During the second segment about the internet, a galvanizing exchange took place betweeen Friday Night Lights author Buzz Bissinger, and Will Leitch of Deadspin.com (full disclosure: Deadspin is my favorite sports/humor website and they were even kind enough to link me once). Bob Costas moderated the discussion, with a clear initial bias against those dastardly "bloggers." Cleveland Browns WR Braylon Edwards was there and was about as interesting as the logo on the Cleveland Browns's helmets.

If you haven't seen the clip, you simply must. Click here to view the video and get a little bit of context, but then promise me you'll come right back. I'll wait....

So if you've watched the video, the gist coming from the esteemed Mr. Bissinger was this: bloggers aren't fit to carry the pocket protectors of "real" sports journalists. Blogs are lowering the discourse. Blogs are vile and mean-spirited. [Side note: I was amused that Buzz Bissinger talked about how he had "spent the last 40 years of my life trying to perfect the craft of the written word" and then uses the phrase "this really pisses the shit outta me." Well-crafted, Buzz. Well-crafted.]

There were a couple of somewhat valid points. Many bloggers are just crap writers out to shock with lots of filthy language. In some ways a "trained writer" such as Bissinger does have more credibility than the iconic "guy sitting in his underwear in his mom's basement." (By the way, that is becoming the most hackneyed, tired cliche since "If I told you I'd have to kill you." Everyone knows that I write this in my grandaddy's outhouse.) And maybe there is something to the idea that posting camera phone pictures of Matt Leinart with a bunch of college beach bunnies is somewhat irresponsible.

But within Bissinger's hissyfit were some staggering misconceptions and misdirections. Costas was worthless in trying to moderate the debate, and as much as I think he is a pioneer in internet writing, Will Leitch didn't quite get to the guts of the reasons why I believe Deadspin and other so-called "mean-spirited" sites exist in the first place.



To wit:

• Deadspin can be extremely crass, and because it exists in the Wild West that is the internet, it often goes to the extreme. I wouldn't be surprised, in fact, if some of the more profane bloggers somewhat took Bissinger's comments to heart and concentrated less on being "edgy" and actually attempting to write better. Having said that, Buzz set up a straw-man by picking a particularly absurdist piece to be "representative" of what blogs really are. Anyone who reads Deadspin can tell you not only that Will Leitch is a gifted writer (and one with a centrist's conscience among the many goons that the internet lures), but that the commenters and comments themselves can be some of the cleverest, most side-splittingly hilarious items on any internet site, professional or not. Deadspin is not popular because it is vulgar, it is popular because under the vulgarity lies a wit that can sometimes be unparalleled on the internet. (Please note, I am not a Deadspin commenter -- although I've tried to be -- so this observation is not some sort of clandestine patting of my own back.)
  
  
• If there is one thing that YouTube has taught us, it's that Regular Folks can often come up with ideas that are as creative or more creative than so-called "creative professionals." You can find four-minute clips on YouTube that are funnier than two of the last three Will Ferrell movies. (Movies suck in general now, but that's a topic for an upcoming post.) Amateurs are getting it right, and as Leitch said in the interview, the internet is a meritocracy. Things get noticed on the internet, by and large, because they are worth noticing. (Not always of course: for everything worth seeing there are 50 "Leave Britney Alone" ladyboys.) It's the reason The Onion and Funny or Die have gained followings; and you're telling me that some of the writers on Kissing Suzy Kolber or Fire Joe Morgan aren't at least as funny as some of the hacks they trot out on VH1 every few months?
  
  My point is, you don't have to be professional to get it right. And if we have learned anything in the last few years about journalistic integrity, it's that ESPN doesn't have any. Not only have they turned SportsCenter into an unwatchable laser light show, but they have picked up the torch of pundits-yelling-at-each-other that used to belong to Hardball and Crossfire and any other similar (and since-subdued) political show, and made it more absurd by having Woody Paige and Skip Bayless yell at each other at full volume about a fucking pro football game. Honestly, when you really step back and think about it, you should calm the fuck down.
  
  And as for being a "professional journalist," I don't buy for a second that Will Leitch doesn't have every right to be heard on the same level as a terrible, race-baiting writer like Scoop Jackson. Or that just because some blogger doesn't have a press pass that his or her opinion isn't just as valid as Mike Lupica.
  
  Why isn't Buzz Bitchinger decrying the death of REAL media? Fox News is a GOP mouthpiece, run by Roger Ailes, the guy who created the Willie Horton ad campaign against Michael Dukakis in 1988. Why does Bill Fucking O'Reilly get a free pass, but A.J. Daulerio is questioned on literary merit. Why has no one called into question the journalistic cred of Bill Cunningham? Apparently you just have to be on TV, on radio, or have your work sold on a newsstand to be considered legit. I know the show was about sports, but Jesus, Bissinger, save that level of vitriol for a worthy target and not "Big Daddy Balls."
  
  
• Finally, the real reason I think that Deadspin, Kissing Suzy Kolber, Fire Joe Morgan, Awful Announcing, The Big Lead and any other number of eminently readable blogs exist is because of four letters: ESPN.
  
  ESPN used to be a sports fan's utopian dream. Sports all day and all night. For people who could literally not get enough sports, it was a godsend. And for the better part of 20 years, ESPN held up its end of the bargain, with great sports coverage and thoughtful analysis. But somewhere along the way, ESPN tried to make ESPN the central focus. Their anchors started overusing stupid catchphrases, rather than insight we started getting shrill "point/counterpoint" segments, and they began overhyping EVERYTHING, from Danny Almonte to Yankees-Red Sox to 19-0 18-1*
  
  When an entity gets so big and hubristic, it requires a reaction. Some thought it was going to be Fox Sports, but they became even more shrill and even more hellbent on cementing their own brand name. The reaction came from the internet.
  
  We (and when I say we, I mean ordinary folks) got sick to death of ESPN overhyping itself, of discontinuing criticism of "untouchable" athletes. We tired of Stuart Scott and Ahmad Rashad fighting over which would get to ingest the last drop of Michael Jordan's precious bodily fluids. We abhorred Chris Berman's once-clever but now tortured nicknames. We lamented the fact that SportsCenter -- which we could easily, and often did, watch the same repated episode multiple times in a row -- became a loud, empty shiny object.
  
  Mike and Mike became a brand name. The SportsCenter anchors started giving Belichick and Bobby Knight a free pass. Stephen A. Smith and Woody Paige became talking heads and no longer writers. What was once the greatest man-channel on the planet was now putting out a show called "ESPN Hollywood" and putting actors from "Desperate Housewives" in the booth on Monday Night Football.
  
  Deadspin and other blogs have taken the luster off and the bluster out of ESPN. What was once the de-facto king of sports has now taken on criticism from those of us who remember what it once was. No longer are we forced to accept "Quite Frankly with Stephen A. Smith." ESPN no longer makes decisions without having to deal with the consequences, which they did for so long. When you have an Evil Empire, you will have a rebellion. Deadspin is that rebellion.
  

For those of us who can't stand what ESPN or sports writing (Peter Vescey, Peter King, Mike Lupica, Rick Reilly) have become, we need the communities of Deadspin and the like to react. Those who have become too big for their britches, and too comfortable among the rarefied air of the celebrites and athletes they were once charged with reporting on, are being called to task. And if it's done with dick jokes, then so be it.

Celebrity Fight!

And look at these two steaming piles of asshole go at it:

I Don't Mean to Be Rude But...

The next time Simon Cowell starts to act snooty, I'm going to think of this clip from Sale of the Century, a 1990 British game show. Unfortunately, some prat didn't want YouTube to embed it. It's about 10 minutes long but kinda funny if you think Simon can be a bit arrogant at times.

Why Do You Bastards Tease Me???

They have been saying this for a year and a half now, but ...

Item!

'Arrested Development' Movie Plans Close to Completion?
By WENN | Tuesday, December 04, 2007

HOLLYWOOD - Plans for a movie adaptation of sitcom Arrested Development are getting closer to completion--after a number of meetings with the show's key figures.

Arrested Development star Jason Bateman met with series creator Mitch Hurwitz over the weekend, further fuelling speculation that the film version of the show is in the pipeline.

Earlier this year, Michael Cera, Bateman's costar, insisted he would be keen to sign up for an Arrested Development movie if it ever came to fruition.

Yeah, it's probably bullshit, but oh well. You can still watch the episodes online here (my suggestion would be "Pier Pressure," Season One, Episode 10). Enjoy.

Givin' Him the Business

Remember this from '86?



And holy crap did I laugh my ass off when I saw this:

Awesome Show Alert: The Wire

I am about five years too late on this, but I have just discovered the HBO series "The Wire." And hold on to your hats, because I am going to make a proclamation. Get ready. Are you ready for it?

The first season "The Wire" is better than every season of "The Sopranos" except maybe "The Sopranos"'s first season. And I would say it is as good or better than that. In fact, not since "The Sopranos" have I been more compelled to have a DVD marathon, and done the old "Okay, ONE MORE episode and then I'm going to bed." And then I watch them until it's time to get up for work.
What's so great about it? First of all, the structure is set up like a crime novel, as opposed to the usual crime procedural. Each episode is a chapter, and each episode has a beginning a middle and an end. Now, that sounds very rudimentary, but how many shows -- dramas and comedies -- make their living off cliffhangers? "The Wire" has no such manipulative endings in any episode, and yet it is one of the most compelling shows I've ever seen. It makes me want to kiss the person who invented the "TV on DVD" format. Even if that was a dude.

The show is never slow, but it never hurries a plot point; it takes due time to get to where it's going. (The "wire" of the title, for example, doesn't show up until episode 6.) And unlike that Mafia drama listed above, there is never a wasted episode, or a wasted scene for that matter.

What else? The characters. They are all likeable and unlikeable. All a lot good and a little evil, or vice-versa. Crime Kingpin Avon Barksdale and his nephew D'Angelo both have some likeable qualities, and many in the police bureaucracy are despicable. You root for the cops not because they are the "good guys" but because you like them as people. And you don't hate all the criminals, because many of the criminals are three-dimensional, and have a sort of code of honor of their own. (The entire catalyst for the investigation hinges on an event in which that code was broken.) There are more characters than a Stephen King novel, and much more plot, but it's incredibly easy to follow due to great writing and good direction.

The plot itself (I'm only on the first season but I can already tell how great this show is) is incredibly compelling. It's not so much a mystery: everyone knows what happened. It's more about how the detectives can collect the evidence, prove what happened, and cut through the maddening red-tape that awaits them at every turn from the politicians and law enforcement structure.

The show explores all sides of law enforcement, from the ivory tower offices of the department bigwigs, to the pencil pushers, to the cops in the basement doing the wiretaps, to the undercover guys, to the drug-addicted informers. It also shows the structure of the criminal Barksdale organization, from the top down. It works remarkably like the Mafia, with different levels and a chain of command. We see that there are some incredible similarities between the cops and the criminals, and in some ways, the criminals have more integrity at times.

The dialogue is fast and loose (I do have to turn the captioning on once in a while to catch it), and it not only assumes the viewer has knowledge of cop-speak, but also gives the same realism to the sometimes inpenetrable ghetto dialogue of the drug-dealers. The dialogue is funny, but also meaningful.

It combines all these elements into one, uncontrived masterpiece of television. I am a little embarrassed that it took me this long to get into the show, despite what I had heard about it. I should have been following McNulty and Bunk instead of Tony and Christopher for the last couple seasons.

I would say give it four episodes, but you really only need to give it one. I got hooked immediately. Go out and rent it or put it on your Netflix. You know you can trust me.

Awesome Show Alert: The First 48

For the most part I hate reality TV. Ever since so-called reality has been infested with games which encourage people to backstab each other and self-absorbed a-holes, I had kind of written the genre off.

But I found myself getting hooked on a police procedural called "The First 48." The concept follows the maxim that if the police don't get a good lead on a homicide within the first forty-eight hours of a crime, their odds of ever solving the crime is reduced by half.

I've only seen a few episodes, but I am hooked. The show follows several homicide detectives in different cities (I have seen mostly Miami, Memphis and Dallas) for the first 48 hours of their investigation, from the time they get the call, and the 48:00:00 clock starts, until the clock hits zero.

The show has a few really good things going for it. First of all, it's real. Like really real. These homicide cops deal with the dregs of society. They get the call, check out the body (with lots of blood and often dismemberment), and try to find out what happened. It doesn't go too deep into the detectives' lives, but rather stays on the case itself (much like "Law & Order"). It has a very tight narrative spine. The show takes on two cases per show, so if one of the cases doesn't interest you, the other one surely will. Also, although the show recaps what you have just seen, it doesn't do it in that repetitive, annoying "reality TV" way (see "Age of Love," "Unanimous" or "The Surreal Life" for examples of what I'm talking about). They give you the basic facts and move ahead.

Secondly, the police procedure is fascinating. We watch how the cops attack all different sorts of techniques, from interviewing witnesses, to forensics, to anonymous tips, to computer searches, all the way to interrogations and charging criminals. These are true needle-in-a-haystack cases, and though they don't always get a suspect, their track record for hits is pretty remarkable. You gain a whole new respect for law enforcement.

Thirdly, the drama is great. Watching the perps get collared and interrogated is riveting to me. Also -- though it's very macabre -- the scenes where they tell the loved ones about the deceased are intense. Also, scenes where perps are trying to lie and stall are great, because the interrogators just wait and wait, and try all sorts of techniques, and some of these crooks start singing like birds. This isn't "Cops," where you sometimes feel sorry for the poor, stupid drunks or losers the cops have to detain. These are murderers, flat out. And though the title card at the end of each show says "Suspects are considered innocent until proven guilty," there is usually little doubt in my mind.

"The First 48" is a true reality show, with the ugliest sides of some of our biggest cities put front and center. Give it like two episodes. You know you can trust me.

Amer'cans Are Idiots

Ok so don't get me wrong. The United States of America really is the greatest country in the world. I'm not saying that because I live here or out of some sense of false national pride. I truly believe that it really is the Promised Land. It might not always be that way -- in fact it may cease to be as such in my own lifetime -- but right now we are that shining city on the hill.

But goddammit are Amer'cans fucking stupid sometimes.

Much like obscenity, I can't define an Amer'can (as opposed to an American), but I know one when I see one. I can name some famous ones: Toby Keith, Jerry Bruckheimer, Adam Sandler, Jay Leno. Maybe when it comes to doing something important or innovative or original, an Amer'can will always chicken out and take the easy, safe, lowest-common-denominator way out (see, respectively: that "boot up your ass" song, movies with lots of car crashes, formulaic man-child fart joke comedies, Jay Leno).

Art, and the appreciation of art, is one arena in which Amer'cans suffer. Whereas it seems that other countries tend to have at least a modicum of understanding about art, Amer'can tastes are much more poorly refined. If you look at the highest grossing movies of the last couple of years, you will see lots of crap, whether it's an Ice Cube kid's comedy or another bullshit horror movie, we tend to gravitate to what's easy. We don't challenge ourselves. I am certainly not above this at times. I do watch crap like American Idol and listen to Journey. Of course, Journey is awesome, so they don't really count. Forget I mentioned them, bad example.

Movies in Amer'ca are a very sore subject for me, because I am a tad on the snobby side when it comes to cinema. I watch a lot of indie stuff that looks like it was shot with Abraham Zapruder's camera, and a lot of long foreign stuff. A lot of that stuff sucks too, but I think I have at least the breadth of experience to know what is good and what is utter garbage.

So flash forward to last week. Right after American Idol, there was a show called On the Lot, which is sort of like ... no it is exactly, American Idol for aspiring movie directors. I'm a sucker for all things movie-related. I'm the kind of guy who watches those movie retrospectives at the Oscars (where they always show clips from Singin' in the Rain and Casablanca and Dog Day Afternoon) and actually tears up a little. Yeah I'm wicked queer.

So I am already pissed off at myself for watching the first 10 minutes of this stupid show because I know I'm gonna get hooked on it and have to watch the whole stupid thing. So one thing should have tipped me off that I was going to hate 90% of the "directors" on this show. The judges are Carrie "Princess Leia" Fisher, who hasn't done much as an actress but is actually one of Hollywood's best "script doctors," Garry Marshall, who hasn't made a good movie since ... um ... and Brett Ratner. Now in my opinion, Brett Ratner, along with the likes of Michael Bay and Brian Robbins, has helped ruin Amer'can cinema. Ratner was a music video director who ventured out into feature films. He made a couple of really mediocre action/comedy movies like Rush Hour and Money Talks, and because the former was a hit, was offered "serious" projects. He made a decent Hannibal Lecter movie in Red Dragon, and then completely capsized the "X-Men" franchise by making the very below-average "X-3: The Last Stand."

Bottom line: Brett Ratner is the knee-jerk, go-to "commercial" director, even though his skills as an auteur have been in question from the get-go.

So what is the first thing one of the "film makers" says when he sees who the directors are? "Wow, Brett Ratner!" said one bespectacled douche with a soul patch, "That's exactly the kind of movies I wanna make, commercial movies!" I thought the point of finding a film maker was to find someone with an original voice, rather than a helmer-for-hire that can point a camera at something and then yell "cut". Anyone could go to film school and learn to be a director. We shouldn't be having a talent show for trained monkeys.

Anyway, I'm a little off-topic. On Monday, they had the 18 finalists show their one-minute comedy films. There were maybe three or four legitimately well-made and/or funny films, but most of it was mediocre film school -- or worse, Bud Light commercial -- pap. Not really hateable, but nothing that blew my skirt up. (Why I was wearing a skirt has nothing to do with this story so just leave it for now.)

There was, however, one so-called quote-unquote "filmmaker" that did catch my eye. His name was Kenny Luby, and he happens to be from Owego, New York, not really all that far from my own hometown. Kenny had been portrayed on an earlier episode (this show's version of "Hell Week") to be a bit of a prima donna who probably shouldn't have made it as far as he did. Still, he's a local boy, and he didn't go to film school, and I thought maybe if this kid could make something good, I might have to root for him. He submitted a film called "Wack Alley Cab." I viewed it and was simply astounded.

This is one of the most stunning pieces of pure excrement ever committed to celluloid. It is loud, the dubbing sucks, the writing is shit, the acting is beyond worthless. I've seen funnier stuff in Schindler's List. It was as funny as a snuff film. Nobody laughed, the three judges -- including the too-nice guest judge DJ Caruso, director of the underrated and excellent The Salton Sea -- all took a dump on it. There was no narrative point whatsoever. The characters were annoying and loud. There was not one real thing about it. It was made by a simple-minded hack job for a bunch of other simple-minded moviegoers. It was like the worst Time Warner Cable ad being viewed while on crystal meth. Utterly without value or merit. [Update: here it is]

At the very least, I thought, this young quote-unquote "filmmaker" would be exposed to the nation for the no-talent that he is. The market, I trusted, would bear this out to be a rotten concoction. Even the phone-voting public would be able to pick this turd out of the mud pit and fling it back from whence it came.

But I forgot: this is Amer'ca.

Not only did this sub-Ed Wood douchehammer get a single vote, but he was not even eliminated! That means that at least three people got less votes than he did. That means that someone out there saw his 60 seconds of bile and actually said to themselves, "Wow, that was pretty good. I'm gonna vote for that guy," and then returned to eating vaseline and punching himself in the genitals. I had no idea there were that many vaseline-eating genital punchers out there. Small world.

I have no more faith in the Amer'can public, not after tonight. This would be the equivalent of William Hung making the final 12 on American Idol, and not as a joke. I mean, could this be a joke? Is Amer'ca really that cinematically illiterate that they can't tell that this farce of a short film is the equivalent of a kindergarten finger-paint?

Sadly, I suspect that it is. I'm not really offended by American Idol because it pretty much caters to a certain audience, and let's face it, the music industry is in disarray as it is. But when you put the voting public in charge of cinema, you are treading dangerous ground. There was very little that I saw in the short films they screened that made me laugh more than any sketch (even the weak ones) on "The Whitest Kids You Know." Let's get these kids to make commercials for beer companies or blue jeans. For the love of Robert Altman, keep them out of theaters.