Thursday, February 14, 2008
Lowculture vs. Cuoco, Round 2
"REALITY"! Big Brother US, E4, 9.00pm Labels: 30Rock, Big Brother US, Channel 4, e4, Five, our nemesis Kaley Cuoco, The Big Bang Theory, TV
We can't say we felt especially upset about the lack of Celebrity Big Brother this year - even the Big Brother: Celebrity Hijack on E4 left us feeling utterly uninspired, considering that by the time the finale was being promoted, we'd forgotten it was even on. And while the USA's Big Brother has always been the rather poor relation of its UK, erm, big brother, the phrase "any port in a storm" springs to mind. You may note that it seems to be on a little early this year - another side-effect of the writers' strike (which is now over, hooray!), causing network heads to scrabble for any non-scripted programme to put out rather than end up with a schedule full of dead air.
And since our chums across the pond are no less prone to tampering with an established working formula than we are, this year's competition is all about coupling up, so each contestant will be paired with a house "soulmate" (the show's subtitle is 'Til Death Do You Part', in a splendidly macabre sort of way). They stand for Head of House together, get evicted together, go to the toilet together (probably) - everything. And best of all, one of the couples is a set of gays! How very awesome. Even better, one of them "slept with his sister's cheerleading coach - ruining her cheering career." We bet she was S-A-D sad about that. So, excellent idea or transparent tokenism? Probably the latter, but we're sufficiently intrigued to tune in and find out.
"COMEDY"! The Big Bang Theory, Channel 4, 10.00pm
One of our crowning memories of bizarreness here at lowculture was the time when we previewed season eight of Charmed and found ourselves having to defend our opinions against a particularly zealous defender of bleached blonde talent vortex Kaley Cuoco. Anyway, we've sharped our claws and prepared for battle again, since our arch-nemesis has returned in a new sitcom about a hot girl befriending some nerds. Oh yeah, we can see how this one's going to go.
In fairness to Cuoco (ugh, we feel dirty just writing that), she started out in sitcoms and was generally agreeable on 8 Simple Rules, although we get the impression that her role as an airhead didn't require a whole lot of acting. So she's playing to her strengths, such as they are, because in this show she's cast as a beautiful bimbo (the producers claim the character is not an idiot; they are fooling no one but themselves) who moves in next door to a couple of geeks, the variety of which only ever exist on television or occasionally in movies, because they have no dress sense and talk about science fiction all the time. Hilarious, huh?
It's not doing too badly in the States, but its relative popularity is a mystery to us - we've watched a fair few clips of it on the internet and just don't see the funny, and it saddens us greatly that the lovely Johnny Galecki has been reduced to appearing in this show. And knowing the way our luck runs, it will almost certainly rate higher than...
TRAGEDY! 30 Rock, Five, 11.45pm
Our current favourite show ends tonight, and is bowing out with very little fanfare. It hasn't really done the business for Five, ratings-wise, and has been punished by being given the dreaded double-bill treatment (though this was an extra treat for fans of the show, when you think about it) and pushed later and later into the night, up to the point where only insomniacs and the truly devoted are likely to be watching. This show deserves so much better, and if The Big Bang Theory ends up becoming a smash hit over here, we may have to go around whacking the offending viewers with sticks until they see sense.
So, final episode, and things are not currently looking up for ol' Liz Lemon. Floyd's moved to Cleveland and she's attempting to maintain a long-distance relationship. Tracy Jordan is currently missing in action (this sounds like a job for the marvellous Dr Leo Spaceman), and Jack's set to get married to hollow-boned possibly fake British chippie Phoebe. Oh, and his sassy old broad of a mother is back in town.
We've loved this show dearly, and it truly saddens us that, much as in America, it hasn't had the viewing figures it deserves. But by the hammer of Thor, let's just hope we at least get to see season two at some point, rather than just getting left in limbo like we were with Big Love. Don't think we've forgotten about that, Five.
By Steve :: Post link
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Thursday, January 24, 2008
Rock on
LATE! 30 Rock, Five, 11.05pm
We've grown used to the fact that shows we adore will, more often than not, turn out to be fairly unpopular among the public at large and disappear from our screens lamentably early (see also: Night & Day, Crossroads, Veronica Mars, etc), and we've been nursing a suspicion for some time that 30 Rock was set to join their ranks. For starters, 10.40pm on a Thursday was never really a prime slot to launch a sitcom (especially not on Five), and then it started getting pushed later, and now it's come to double bills, which are seldom a good sign. Oh dear.
It's disappointing, because 30 Rock has a higher laugh-per-minute ratio than any other show we can think of right now. We still dissolve into fits of giggles every time we think about Jenna's appearance on The View ("Your father Werner was a burger server in suburban Santa Barbara when he spurned your mother Verna for a curly-haired surfer named Roberta. Did that hurt her?"), or Tracy trying to act as much like a stereotype as possible in order to embarrass Jack at the golf course, or Liz making a list of reasons to dump her boyfriend ("Pro: Jack likes him. Con: Jack likes him."), or Jack's frequent accidental double entendres ("I'll be your bottom, Kenneth, and I want you to ride me as hard as you can.") But then, it is very US-TV in-jokey, so we can see why it might not be to some people's tastes. Especially if they haven't completely rotted their brains from over-exposure to American television in the way we have.
Tonight: it's time for the renegotiations of the staff contracts, with Jenna anxious to make up for some unfortunate comments she made in an interview (only to go on TV and get Barack Obama confused with Osama bin Laden) and in the second episode, Liz is anxious to prove she isn't racist. We're fairly certain there will be hilarious misunderstandings of epic proportions, and we can't wait.
By Steve :: Post link
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Thursday, November 29, 2007
Rock solid
BACKSTAGE! 30 Rock, Five, 10.50pm
This is fast becoming one of our favourite shows, you know. We've even managed to coerce our flatmates into getting addicted to it as well, and that almost never happens. So the other week we thought we'd check the ratings to see if it's as popular across the nation as it is with us - bearing in mind that anyway we love is almost invariably a ratings flop - and were flabbergasted to see that not only are the ratings below par, but it's actually getting fewer viewers than the programme that follows it: A Girl's Guide to 21st Century Sex, which might just be the worst piece of television we've ever seen. It involves enlighting facts such as "anal sex is sex involving the anus", for fuck's sake. Sigh.
Anyway, we thought we'd use this page and the literal dozens of people who read it every day to sing the praises of 30 Rock, which is really hitting its stride now that it's got a handful of episodes under its belt. Show creator (and writer and star of Mean Girls, thus she can do no wrong) Tina Fey is brilliant as Liz Lemon, head writer of live sketch show The Girlie Show, which is now TGS with Tracy Jordan after her boss went behind her back and hired an unstable Hollywood star to front it. She's trying to keep the show afloat while dealing with the all-male writing team, the neurotic female lead, and her aforementioned oleaginous boss. Okay, so it doesn't sound groundbreaking, but the sparkle is in the execution - literally, in fact, because the dialogue is so polished it shines. Check out the scene from a few weeks back where Jack confronts Jenna to discover whether she's been lying about her age, if you don't believe us.
Over the past couple of episodes we've been introduced to Liz's loser boyfriend Dennis, who works at Beeper King. Liz likes Dennis because the sex is fast, and only on Saturdays, which makes her life a lot easier. Liz's love life is a constant source of amusement for everyone else, and tonight she attempts to put an end to this by breaking up with Dennis. Well-meaning but utterly self-involved Jenna tries to help by taking Liz out on the singles scene, and we're fairly confident we can predict how that will go. Meanwhile, a fight between Tracy and Toofer puts them both in sensitivity training. Watch out for a brilliantly politically incorrect gag, by the way, when Tracy mentions the TV show Black Frasier. It's a corker, even if you'll be squirming when you hear it.
By Steve :: Post link
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Thursday, October 11, 2007
Live from New York, it's Thursday night
BOSS! 30 Rock, FIVE, 10.45pm Labels: 30Rock, Five, Mean Girls, TV
The best US series from the 2006-2007 television season debuts this evening on Five. 30 Rock was 'the other' Saturday Night Live-based, backstage show. But unlike Studio 60 On Sunset Strip which was about funny people being very unfunny, 30 Rock took the more radical approach and is actually hilarious. Quite unusual in a season that saw all the ratings go to a show about attractive people who can fly, turn invisible, not die and who are all miserable about it.
As someone who has defined the better part of his life by his hatred of Alec Baldwin, it is difficult to admit that he is amazing here. Promoted by NBC's parent company General Electric to oversee television programming following his stellar work with ovens, Baldwin plays the annoyingly perfect executive with blunt ease. This is the development that starts the series, much to the continual annoyance of producer Liz Lemon (played by SNL alum Tina Fey, the mastermind behind this and the rather good film Mean Girls). Liz is a woman in her thirties who is fiercely independent yet has serious worries about choking alone in her apartment and will buy a hundred and fifty hot dogs just to prove a point.
Around them is a fun cast of characters which includes mentally ill comedian Tracy Jordan (played by SNL alum Tracy Morgan), the wonderfully neurotic Jenna Maroney (Jane Krakowski from Ally McBeal) and an NBC page who makes everyone uncomfortable with his glowing love of television. Look for ongoing cameos from Rachel Dratch who plays the cat wrangler in the pilot. Keep watching as it only gets better. You'll love it so much you'll take it behind the middle school and get it pregnant.
By Mark :: Post link
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