Erik - The Most Stupidest Survivor Idiot Ever
Wow! I must admit I enjoyed the episode of Survivor 16 in Micronesia last night in which Erik fell prey to the ladies who suckered him into giving up his immunity.
 |
Erik was blindsighted and voted off last night.
Is anyone other than Erik suprised??? |
As the last remaining Survivor girls were scheming last night, I kept thinking to myself how no one could be so stupid as to give up immunity. They were guilting Erik into making a gesture to show the jury he was redeeming himself for his lying and manipulating by giving his immunity necklace to Natalie.
Even Natalie didn’t believe Erik would fall for it - but Cirie helped push him over the edge saying she needed to see a gesture in order for her tochange her vote to get rid of Amber.
Erik fell for it.
The odd thing is he had immunity - what purpose could changing the vote to Amber make in his quest to be in the final 4???
And to makie matters worse - Erik has been had in the past when he was convinced to do something in return for not getting votes. They were ready to slam him before.
Paradise Hotel is back? Holy Molee!
Fox Reality Channel and MyNetworkTV are upping the ante and bringing back one of the all time greatest reality tv shows - Paradise Hotel!
Get ready because Paradise Hotel will premiere on Monday, February 4 at 9PM ET on MyNetworkTV with a steamy creamy version showing on Fox Reality later the same night. (read more…)
2008 TV
2008 TV by Roxanne McDonald
 |
God and Goddess willing the writers’ strike can be over and new seasons, new shows, and new episodes will bring back the joy |
Pretty pitiful state of affairs when one would rather go outside and shovel like Sisyphus rather than put up with the ersatz crap taking over while the writers fight for their much deserved compensation and rights.
But somewhat promising is the winter TV lineup, complete with spinoffs, spoofs, and series specials.NOTE: Actually, this list is incomplete, being one comprised of most of my favorites [or favorites-to-poke-fun-at]. For a more unbiased schedule, see The Futon Critic.
JANUARY
Tuesday, January 1
“The Biggest Loser” Season 5 NBC
“Real Housewives of Orange County” Season 3 Bravo TV
Wednesday, January 2
“Wife Swap” Season 4 ABC
Thursday, January 3
“Celebrity Apprentice” [Season 7] NBC
Friday, January 4
“How to Look Good Naked” NEW Lifetime Television
“Matched in Manhattan” NEW Lifetime Television
Monday, January 7
“Paranormal State” NEW [this winter] A&E
“Dance War: Bruno vs. Carrie Ann” NEW/SHORT [spinoff of “Dancing with the Stars”]
Tuesday, January 8
“Boston Legal” Season 4 [continues] ABC
“Parking Wars” NEW A&E
Wednesday, January 9
“Ghost Hunters International” [offshoot of “Ghost Hunters”] SCIFI
Thursday, January 10
“Make Me a Supermodel” NEW Bravo TV
Sunday, January 13
“I Love New York 2” Reunion Special Vh1
“Scott Baio is 46…and Pregnant” Season 2 [after “Scott Baio is 45 and Single”] Vh1
The Good, the Bad, and the Boring
The Good, the Bad, and the Boring by Roxanne McDonald
 |
Fall’s TV lineup brings a few nice surprises and lands a few duds at the same time. |
For a good percentage of the population, fall is a time to stay inside more and get cozy with TV programming
targeting just such persons. Those who have been out getting some exercise and natural sunlight are primed for some quality TV. Those of us who stay inside year-round and are hooked to our sets by an invisible umbilicus are primed for new and maybe even better shows.
Eh. Some wishes fulfilled, some not so much.
“Tori and Dean: Inn Love” is one of those surprisingly engaging shows. For me, anyway. I had ignored the first couple of episodes thinking it was going to be another Jessica and Nick look-at-my-celebrity life kind of show, but Tori has such a cutesy sense of humor and an ambitious presences and Dean is industrious and equally well-humored, so the half-hour Lifetime TV segments really do have a gentle pull.
“The Reaper” I just accidentally fell into as it airs on the WB after “Beauty and the Geek”. So I gave it chance. It’s quirky and at times tries too hard to deliver the buddy-pic characters as innocuous everyman and best friend bozo with the yuck yucks. But it also has a quasi- “Charmed” or “Buffy…” meets “Smallville” appeal I bet will draw the teen, tween, and twenty-something demographic…with not only its youthful feel but its fairly original premise.
Lovin’ the Fall 2007 Reality TV Line-up
Lovin’ the Fall 2007 Reality TV Line-up by Roxanne McDonald
 |
So excited are we who have our shows to look forward to within the next two weeks and beyond. |
Now I understand when my grandmother, who worked some three jobs, would halt everything to watch what she called “my shows.”
Sure, they were the soaps, “The Guiding Light,” “As the World Turns,” etc., but her shows became my shows and then “my shows” took on a new meaning, from “The Brady Bunch” and “The Partridge Family” to “All My Children” and “General Hospital” to “Seinfeld” and “Boston Legal” to the reality TV line-up we are so graced by and addicted to.
Yay! New cycles begin, and those of us trying to come up with something to get fixated on, to no avail in the interim of finales and the premiere of long-standing programming, can rest assured our shows will stabilize us once again:
(read more…)
New Shows that Fill in the Programming Gaps
New Shows that Fill in the Programming Gaps by Roxanne McDonald
|
It’s that time of year when finales of favorite shows leave us wanting, yearning, begging for the new season line-up to begin and dreading what we will do in the down time. |
I have a whiteboard calendar, a two-foot blank four-week board I write in my TV-viewing lineup for each day. A few weeks ago, the board held the names of about seventy shows, the majority of them reality-based.
This week, it is with a tear in the eye that I erased more than I left alone or replaced: “Age of Love,” “On the Lot,” and “Hell’s Kitchen” are long gone from the Mondays. “America’s Got Talent,” “Pirate Master,” and soon, “Big Brother 8″ had/have to be removed from Tuesdays. You get the idea. So what does one do while waiting?
Sure, during the interim, between seasons, we get to catch up with TiVoed shows, watch sports galore [which pre-empt our staple shows such as Seinfeld, argh], or indulge in some repeats on the LMN, Lifetime Movie Network that are ironically about women who are battered, beaten, lied to, challenged, and whacked.
The options are not all that exciting. But the alternatives are less than appealing, as well.
Let’s see. “Kid Nation”. Now that promised to be a lawsuit in the making. “The Two Coreys.” Yeeuh. The Two Snoreys, is more like it. “The Pick-up Artist.” Eh, a well-intended spinoff of the geek-themed shows, but more obnoxious a “mentor” and more humiliating for the participants.
No Big Brother & TV Show Spoliers Allowed!
The TV Robot web site is a SPOILER FREE ZONE! No spoilers are allowed! (read more…)
Sorry but Pirate Master Sucks
 |
Sorry but Pirate Master Sucks by Mike Liebner
The show blows and has got to go… bye bye says Tivo! |
OK, so it seemed like it might be a good Summer replacement for Survivor seeing that it comes from the same people associated with reality tv giant Mark Burnett.
I tried to give it a fair shot, but the last episode put me over the edge and I have now officially removed Pirate Master form both of my Tivos. It simply is not even worth watching in fast forward mode. Now that sucks!
Go ahead and blame it on the awful casting if you want, but I think the concept is what is really flawed big time, as setting the show on a creaky old pirate boat and having the contestants play, er, pretend, er contend as if they were real pirates is a concept with less merit than Jackass (any version). Not even the best actors would be fun to watch pretending they were pirates in a reality tv show, much less the motley crew of dorks they have on the show.
Like I said before, I do respect Mark Burnett, but sorry my man - you have let me and the peoples down big time - again.
Pirate Master is not just lame - it sucks!
I am so tired of the lame foot races where they’re racing to find a puzzle piece and bag of fake coins. It’s not clever. It’s not even a competition. It’s a freakin’ foot race with make believe pirates… how lame is that?
They run… they fall… they complain… duh… to base a show around a weekly foot race for a fake pirates chest is an insult to reality tv watchers.
Zanzibar and mutiny and cutting them adrift may be clever bullet points for a 6th grade art class or drama project, but prime time tv demands much more than make believe reality tv. Is that what tv execs really want to fill the airwaves? Is that what people really want to watch? (read more…)
Hey - On the Lot - Are you kidding me???
Hey - On the Lot - Are you kidding me??? Rant by Mike Liebner
 |
On The Lot is NOT HOT!
I mean come on! This amateurish variety/reality tv show is about filmmakers producing material and being judged and criticized. It really should not suck - but it DOES! BIG TIME! |
From the first episode to the most recent, ON THE LOT looks like it was produced by the rejected “directors” who did not make the cut! The ejected amateur directors certainly could have done better than this train wreck of a primetime tv show.
Come on - Steven Spielberg - Mark Burnett - were either of you anywhere near the show to give a nod of approval??? Have your “assistants” or “PA’s” even previewed the episodes before they aired to make sure your levels of quality had been attained? I do not think so!
Let me get this out of the way - I went to Cal State to study film and tv and was a Radio TV Major and got my B.A. degree. I made films and learned from some of the best people in entertainment. I may not be producing tv shows as a professional, but I still know enough about the industry to say this show has been neglected in so many many ways production and writing wise.
On the Lot is a GREAT CONCEPT with so much promise! It could be the KING of REALITY TV SHOWS - not the boring poorly paced dud of a show it has been.
On The Lot has been a major disappointment for me from day 1 and I tell ya I really wanted to like this show. I still want to like it, but whoever is producing the show and calling the shots has no clue about what compelling tv is all about. As the episodes drag on I urgently want to tell TIVO to delete… but I can’t… when the episode ends I get angry I wasted my precious time when so much GREAT TV is on my hard drive waiting for me.
Just because the names Spielberg and Burnett are attached does not make a good show. I’m a big fan of Survivor, the Apprentice and even like Pirates but On The Lot is an amateur production.
So - why do I keep watching? I really want to like it and have been curious if anyone important was watching and if the feedback might cure some of the ills.
So - what exactly is pissing me off so much about this show??? (read more…)
CBS Season Premiere of Survivor Fiji Islands on Feb. 8
CBS Season Premiere of Survivor 14 Fiji Islands on Feb. 8 by Mike Liebner
Are you ready for the season premiere of Survivor: Fiji on February 8, 2007?
 |
I am ready for Survivor 14 Fiji! In fact, I have been craving Survivor more than ever! |
Over the Christmas holiday while visiting family I finally removed the plastic off the DVD and watched every single episode of the first Survivor!
Which one was that… oh yeah… Survivor Borneo Season One.
I must admit I tried like crazy to NOT watch Survivor the first 4 or 5 seasons when it came out. I was one of those “no time for Reality tv” type peoples. That all changed with Survivor Thailand when I gave in and watched. I was immediately hooked.
So now, here I am in between Survivor Cook Islands and Survivor Fiji and I am having cravings for Survivor! So I did rapid fire burn through that season one DVD and I was very happy to see it. I must say that it was PALE by comparison to the current day Survivor shows as Jeff Probst and the gang have come a long way. But it was fun to see the rough and tumble creation of what would become a TV dynasty for Mark Burnett. (read more…)
Living With Ed on HGTV
Living with Ed premieres on HGTV.
 |
Well, I must admit it - I never expected to be tuning in to HGTV, much less to watch a reality tv show starring Ed Begley Jr. But I did and I must say it was more enjoyable than expected. |
As you may or may not know, Ed’s claim to fame was as Victor Ehrlich in the old hit tv show St.Elsewhere, of which I was a big fan.
Since then Ed has made a lot of appearances on other shows most notably Arrested Development and Six Feet Under. He has also appeared in a few high profile movies including Best In Show.
Current day, Ed Begley Jr. has become known for his quirky adoption and promotion of green type living practices, with his home as a role model with solar powered everything.
First off I must say that Ed and his wife Rachelle Carson live in Studio City, California and that just a few years ago I too lived in “the Valley” in neighboring Sherman Oaks. I had seen Ed and his family in the hood on more than a few occasions. In fact I saw him at Fashion Square Mall a few times in the food court. So when I saw there was a reality tv show with Ed I took up an interest and decided to watch.
Tivo snagged the first episode of Living With Ed for me and I must admit I have since added a season pass for it. It’s pretty good, although not as exciting as Survivor, but hey, it’s a quick fun show to watch. So far at least. (read more…)
Top Chef a Top Reality Cook-off Show Contender
Top Chef a Top Reality Cook-off Show Contender by Roxanne McDonald
|
Top Chef is another reality TV show with the cook-off premise—maybe ala Iron Chef and Hell’s Kitchen, but a tamer version of the two. |
Unlike Iron Chef, the contestants have no direct audience (save the thousands at home watching, of course), and unlike Hell’s Kitchen, there is no head chef who also runs the show and barks invectives (though the judges and host seem to take up the snooty and cruel slack quite well).
I came into the show, which is a program offered by the producers of Project Runway, in episode eight, by chance happening upon a Bravo Top Chef marathon–but having to leave to do errands (and not having TiVo hooked up yet) only got snippets.
Here is what makes the show at this
juncture, then:
There are five competing chefs left—Dave Martin, with the signature dish of Lotta Enchiladas and formerly an English degree candidate and subsequent techno-exec who hails from Le Cordon Bleu in Pasadena; Harold Dieterle, with the signature dish of Steamed Thai Snapper and formerly the Sous Chef at NYC’s The Harrison; Lee Anne Wong with the signature dish of Smoked Sturgeon Roll, Cauliflower Puree and a self-proclaimed iron chef who hails from her post as executive chef of event operations for The French Culinary Institute in New York City; Stephen Asprinio, dubbed a borderline OCD personality, is former Culinary Institute of America grad and Sommelier for Nob Hill at the MGM Grand in Las Vegas (the job that will influence his fall from grace in this episode); and Tiffani Faison, with her signature Pumpkin Lasagna, hails from Bwoston and brings experience as chef de partie to Daniel Boulud and his Wynn Hotel restaurant.
So, episode eight, “Wedding Bell Blues,” begins with the Quickfire Challenge to design a wedding reception menu and then pitch it to win the bid (so to speak) and therefore be leading chef for that particular competition round, the elimination challenge.
As is often typical of pre-reception prep, things are chaotic, last minute mini-debacles arise, and the biggest issue for four of them is that Stephen is nowhere to be found. At least he aint in the kitchen, working as a “team”, and the team is pissed that they have to wash the price stickers off the dim sum serving dishes (which are Chinese soup spoons).
Stephen is instead in the dining room, wearing a “sommelier” jacket and coaching the wait staff on perfection.
Delightful and Much Deserved Happiness on Outback Jack
Delightful and Much Deserved Happiness on Outback Jack by Roxanne McDonald
 |
Outback Jack, the Aussie Bachelor meets Survivor. |
Handsome and rugged “Jack” with the endearing Aussie accent and ways, welcomes twelve unlikely Sheilas—city slickers, chic chicks, all makeup and shopping and dainty fragility—to compete for his marriage proposal…AFTER they compete in rigorous bush activities. They visit a crocodile farm, for instance, and are required to test the gender of the crocs: this is done by inserting one’s pinky into the genital cavity and feeling about, and this in turn requires their French manicures get chopped off and “ruined!”
Well, okay, one chickee has to get a nail cut for the experience. This is Natalie, one of the more vociferous and dingy, seemingly,
one who at times gets on your nerves with that drawling, pitchy yakking: when the girls are taken to experience an Aboriginal fireside spirit cleansing ritual, Natalie says to the camera afterward that it “…was something I’d only seen out of National Geographic!” I’m not sure if this is the more obnoxious or if the first utterance or outburst of “Oh. My. God.” from one of the other balloons with a wig is more lame and irritating.
Natalie also editorializes about the camel ride they have later, complaining about how bad the camel’s breath was and how sore her butt is, tossing out a rotten cliché, that even her bruises have bruises. Yukk Yukk.
However, if you have watched the show in its entirety, you will know that Jack chooses Natalie (aka “Princess”) to be his outback bride. You will also likely agree that this was the perfect choice, for as grating as she may have been, she was the least of all the bosomy beauty evils. Some of the others…grumble, grumble….
A Wonderful Guilty Pleasure: The Villa
A Wonderful Guilty Pleasure: The Villa by Roxanne McDonald
|
A real blockbuster of guilty pleasures is The Villa, an Australian matchmaking show which is delightfully entertaining on a number of levels. |
One could really put all reality TV into the “guilty pleasures” category, for it has little redeeming value (save maybe shows like Survivor or Big Brother, which you could say teach you how to cohabitate and strategize and, well, survive). But a real blockbuster of guilty pleasures is The Villa, an Australian matchmaking show which is delightfully entertaining on a number of levels.
Produced by Target Entertainment and originally airing on Sky One (dubbed the UK’s “most popular non-terrestrial entertainment TV channel”), The Villa was acquired in July of 2005 by Fox Reality with a number of other “unscripted programming” series never before seen in the U.S.—to show American viewers how reality TV is done in other parts of the world.
First, then, is the fascination we have with
accents and brogues, of which there are plenty on The Villa! Mostly Australian, the [eight] participants are flown from England to Spain, to the Mediterranean island, Ibiza, to stay for a week (well, five days, really) in a lovely, spacious, inviting of romance and romping villa. The participants are four men and four women, selected by a computer according to personality, looks, astrological predisposition, likes, dislikes, and infamy. Each potential couple is matched by the computer, unbeknownst to all eight people. (read more…)
Chef Ramsey Doing the Devil’s Dirty Work
Chef Ramsey Doing the Devil’s Dirty Work by Roxanne McDonald
|
They (some theys, anyway) say you can tell the type of lover a person is by watching him eat. So watch Chef Gordon Ramsey eat on the show Hell’s Kitchen and you might be able to infer how passionate he would be in the kip. |
In a similar respect, you might find how vociferous and fiery he would be by watching and listening to him run Hell’s Kitchen and the “donkeys”, “boobs”, “buffoons”, “nitwits”, and other wannabe chefs.
The show is made a “must-see” because of Ramsey’s perfectionistic, and at the same time highly intolerant of incompetent persona.
His attitude of course carries the general tenor of Hell’s Kitchen competitions and performances, for Hell’s Kitchen runs on the overt fire, heat, and Hell on earth metaphors.
In conjunction with the Satanic tridents dropping into glasses of unctuous-looking liquid, the brands (no pun intended) whooshing into vengeful blazes, and other bugs and bytes of fire and brimstone, Ramsey’s vicious, vitriolic issuing of commands and administration of punitive commentary make that one sensory experience viewers cannot get come most alive—we can FEEL the heat, both metaphorical and literal.
In the same respect, and with all due respect, Chef Ramsey, besides making for good TV in his weekly performances, credits the “winning” competitors, smiles and acknowledges skills and jobs well done, and brings to the show a personality that practices what he preaches (he’s a world class chef, hailing from London, where he raised Aubergine by three-star accolades and more); appears to identify with the strugglers (looking like he has toughed out a few street lives); and elicits an authentic desire on the part of the chef trainees to “please him,” to model him….
A Reality Show Worth Playing: Mad, Mad House
A Reality Show Worth Playing: Mad, Mad House by Roxanne McDonald
|
One show has made me reconsider how maybe, maybe I would go for a stint: the show is Mad Mad House, on REALTV (also, evidently, on the SCIFI network), and it appears to work on more levels than just the monetary grab level. |
As much as I adore, am fixated on, and most appreciative of reality TV and the people nutty enough, courageous enough, or clueless enough to participate on them—for our viewing benefit—I have not been able to fathom going on one myself.
For the most part, I am not up to any grueling physical extremes, cannot stand conflict (backstabbing, etc.), and have no interest in further challenging my IQ beyond oh, maybe a Carmen San Diego game puzzle. But one show has made me reconsider how maybe, MAYbe I would go for a stint: the show is Mad Mad House, on REALTV (also, evidently, on the SCIFI network), and it appears to work on more levels than just the monetary grab level.
Mad Mad House is based on the general reality TV game show premise—you make through a series of trials and you do so as the last one standing and you make $100,000.
But you don’t have to emotionally destroy
a family member, don’t have to develop some pseudo alliance, and don’t need to risk ripping every muscle from groin to gourd in any physically ridiculous challenges. Rather, you—and nine others—commit to moving into the Mad Mad House with five alts, five individuals who live (not just play at) extremely alternative lifestyles (those the mainstream culture typically balk at, giggle over, and utterly misinterpret/misunderstand). This season the alts are Art Aguirre, a modern primitive; Ta’Shia Asanti, a voodoo priestess; Avacado (David Wolfe), a naturalist; Don Henrie, a vampire (also spelled “vampire”), and Fiona Horne, a white witch (or wiccan).
The alts run the house, deciding the activities, the events, and the fate of the Mad Mad House guests (who will stay for more spiritual growth, who will go because he/she is not opening up, not participating, or no longer needing spiritual, higher consciousness expansion).
Unlike many a game show host or emcee who is in the process for the fame and big bucks, the alts are devoted to their lifestyles/practices, and bering a reverence, a seriousness, to the tasks at hand. Whether they are designing and conducting a kind of rites of passage ritual, mentoring a Mad Mad House guest, deliberating about eviction (someone gets evicted, or released, once a week), or carrying out the elimination ceremony, they are in “character,” and they are truly concerned with the guests.
For example, have you ever seen Jeff Probst cry when a Survivor contestant gets voted off the island? Fiona gets choked up when the surrogate matriarch Bonnie—who is a cool middle-aged woman—gets eliminated. Have you ever looked into the eyes of or been ALLOWED to look into the eyes of Big Brother (or, let’s say, the Stepford-like Julie Chen) and see true respect for and paternal love toward a contestant who is making an emotional/psychological and hence spiritual breakthrough? Art can be seen silently expressing such fine regard for his minions in this and many ways.
Running with the Loveable Dog, the Bounty Hunter
Running with the Loveable Dog, the Bounty Hunter by Roxanne McDonald
 |
Dog the Bounty Hunter is in one respect just another reality TV show (on the crime-fighting circuit rather than in the game show vein). But in another respect, it is a unique experience, taking viewers inside the grittiest of lifestyles and extracting the hardest of messages. |
Yet, further, the balls-to-the-wall bounty-hunting family expose a most rare and unlikely strain of hard-asses.
If you watch a few episodes, you will be struck by the unusual tone of a show that one would think would be of bad guys resenting and good guys denouncing, etc., etc.. The tone, instead, is one of absolute spiritual reclamation. Notice how when Dog and his posse
catch a guy who has bailed on his bail, they chat him up, give him tough love but love, and urge him to get help…all while riding in their big brute of an SUV on the way to the pen. So, by the time the captured con is being ushered into the local jailhouse, he is thanking Dog and telling him he LOVES him!
There’s terrifying criminal, for example, named Walter Jardine. He has 25 priors—terroristic threatening; burglaries; addictions to ice. He is, Dog admonishes his team, “a chunker who will throw down crazy” when cornered by the bounty hunters. The guys go to great lengths to find, track, and capture Jardine, who is a tall, bald, somewhat angry-looking man in the police mug shots.
In handcuffs and in the back seat of the SUV, he is tame, calm, and almost childlike in speech. He confides in Dog about his problems and issues, and Dog advises him, all the while injecting the lingo of the island, like “Bra” and “bra’ man”. As Jardine is escorted out of the vehicle and into the jailhouse, he says, “I love you, Dog.”
I Wanna Be a Soap Star Unavoidably Worthwhile
I Wanna Be a Soap Star Unavoidably Worthwhile by Roxanne McDonald
|
I did all I could to avoid I Wanna Be a Soap Star, though I have a history of being addicted at one time to All My Children, As the World Turns, and, of course, General Hospital, and though I adore all things reality TV. But one night, at the time that this soap star hopeful show airs, nothing else was on, or I was in mid commercials or something, I clicked, just for the hell of it. Not bad. Not bad. |
One of the more redeeming characteristics of I Wanna Be a Soap Star is found in the judge, Debbi Morgan. She had begun acting in minor parts, then became a mainstay on All My Children, playing the devoted medical student Angie Baxter—a virgin-pure girl who got involved with the troubled thug Jesse Hubbard—and becoming over the years on All My Children Angela ‘Angie’ Baxter Hubbard, then Dr. Angela ‘Angie’ Baxter Hubbard Harrison, then Dr. Angela ‘Angie’ Baxter Hubbard Harrison Foster (as soap operas tend to evolve their characters, right?).
Morgan then showed her range and versatility, appearing as The Seer (evil as Cole Turner, Satan incarnate). Given her gifts and repertoire (on dozens of other shows, as well), Morgan brings to I Wanna…a base of knowledge and experience that lends credibility to her commentary regarding the soap hopefuls. And her commentary is spot on. Can’t say as much for the other two….
Equally entertaining but frustrating, that is, are the other two judges, Judy Blye Wilson and Michael Bruno,
both of whom might be responsible for the marginalization of a show with some real potential and the latter of whom makes the vaguest of comments, including such confounding pointers as a mumbo jumbo about centering and commitment that is so obscure in meaning that the contestant being critiqued has to ask for clarity.
Just as controversial (and I am glad I am not alone in my observations, here) is the choice made by the judges in any given week.
Solitary a Most Redeemable Show
Solitary a Most Redeemable Show by Roxanne McDonald
|
Upon watching the whole series, and especially upon watching the finale and the reunion show, one comes to the conclusion that Solitary has some redeeming qualities (which not all reality TV shows can advertise as having, of course). |
It is heartwarming, or at least touching, to view the behavior and attitude of contestants who have more at stake than money; it is delightful to witness individual players pushing themselves beyond their physical and emotional limits to come to a place of spiritual reclamation; and it is lovely to partake of a show that had some serious producers and creators who displayed the show by way of fresh and skillful writing and editing.
The finale, that is, involved Number 5, Mark C., and Number Seven, Steven G. The final challenge was a Batman and Robin walls-closing in on them challenge, combined with the most grueling of earlier tasks, the pointy beds. But 5 is like six feet tall and 7 is closer to five and a half feet tall, so you think 7 will have an easier time of it.
However, Solitary game-makers create a discomfort box that is in proportion to each contestant. Good for them.
They show 5 and 7 going through hours of suffering (time-lapsed for us, of course),
and voiceover narrate the changes each goes through. 5 is typically jovial and coo-coo, alternately; and 7 is quieter in his hopeful determination.
As they did with all challenges, they do not tell the winner when the opponent quits. Instead, they show him pictures of family and personally related places and people, then show him pictures of himself.
Val asks, “Who is this a picture of?” and 7 gives a standard response. Val asks again and again, “Who is this a picture of?” as each time 7 responds it is a picture of a teacher, a husband, a son, a religious person, etc., etc., etc.—until he all-of-a-sudden realizes what Val is asking and what his response should be: with the look of a good little boy who has just figured out his first algebra problem (making this viewer get a little fklempt, actually), Number 7 says the picture is a picture of THE WINNER of SOLITARY! So cute.
Definitely NOT the One: Making a Music Star a Weak Imitation
Definitely NOT the One: Making a Music Star a Weak Imitation by Roxanne McDonald
 |
It’s a given: they’re new, green, and desirous of being a music star by being willing to work hard. But the performers on The One: Making a Music Star just don’t seem to deliver anything all that star-worthy. |
While, understandably, (all art being a response to something, even other art), the show is a knock off, The One: Making a Music Star has less redeeming worth than many successful knockoffs. The pattern and process is too similar to Idol, Making of the Band, and other performance/reality shows, but is too derivative.
Even, or expecially, the contestants seem to be weak imitations of other celebrities: Aubrey Collins (who was told she was not “the one” on the fourth episode) has the Carrie Ughderwood thing going on: and Jadyn Maria (who was booted in episode three) bears an uncanny resemblance to the actress, Kimberly McCullough, who plays/played Robin Scorpio on All My Children.
Maybe we have done it all one too many times.
Maybe executives are not musicians and are therefore not REALLY the most fit for judging talent (though, as we all know, of course, the judging is based on sales not on musical prodigy).
In one commentary, for example, two of the three panel experts spoke to the contestant about grooving and upping and really making it by grasping at another level gibberish that while paraphrased here was equally incomprehensible on TV. There was, in other words, not one musical term, not one even performance euphemism that this viewer (of hundreds of shows) found worth diddly crap. The contestant was humble, but the look on her face suggested she, too, was no better for the “advice”.
 |
|
 |
 |
 |
|
 |
|
 |
|
 |
|
