television Archives - Page 38 of 42

Spoilers QUESTION

read movie reviewers relish not knowing about the films they are going to critique; optimally, the movie trailer will not make actually seeing the film redundant.

There is a tradition among many not to reveal surprise endings of movies and even TV shows until enough people have had a chance to see them, which is quite honorable.

But what I’ve noticed lately is that the TV shows themselves are at least leaking possible story bits to the media. The very first Law & Order: LA this spring notes that someone will die. Other shows, such as those alphabet soup programs (CSI, NCIS) tease that “a hero will fall.” Is it that we should watch because someone will die? What happened to the element of surprise. See, e.g., the death of Colonel Blake at the end of the third season of the TV show MAS*H.

I contrast this with The Good Wife on CBS. A big reveal a few weeks ago was that the lead character’s husband had slept with her work friend. But ah, it was a couple of weeks later before the GW herself finds out the news, and it is devastating for her, and for the viewer. The surprise maximized the impact.

I read movie reviewers relish not knowing about the films they are going to critique; optimally, the movie trailer will not make actually seeing the film redundant.

So how do you like to see TV and movies? Does knowing too much wreck the experience?

A television meme

I so seldom watch TV in real time anyway.

SamuraiFrog says the “questions here are taken from the defunct TV Tuesday blog.”

1. What is your favorite “Classic” TV show?

The Dick Van Dyke Show, followed by The Twilight Zone; these are only two series I own in their entirety (although I would have bought the MAS*H box when it was on sale had the packaging not been reviewed so poorly by several folks on Amazon.)

2. What character from a “Classic” TV show would you like to be?

Alan Brady from the Dick van Dyke Show.

3. On which “Classic” TV Show would you have loved to have a walk-on role?

Probably Star Trek.

4. Can you remember a line you liked from a “Classic” TV show?

Yes. Maybe even more than one.

5. Which TV doctor would you choose to remove your appendix?

Marcus Welby.

6. Which TV doctor would you not let touch you with a 10-foot pole?

Jack “Boomer” Morrison on St. Elsewhere; he was well-meaning, though.

7. Which TV doctor/hospital would you choose for the best medical care?

The OTHER hospital in town besides St. Eligius (a/k/a St. Elsewhere).

8. Everyone knows nurses run the hospital. Who was/is your favorite TV nurse?

The nurses of China Beach, especially McMurtry.

9. Do you consider yourself a “fan” of reality TV?

No. I’ve watched it in the past – Real World, Survivor – but I’ve totally burned out on the genre. Unless you count Who Do You Think You Are?, which is a genealogy search.

10. What’s your “can’t miss” reality TV show (or shows)?

None.

11. What reality TV show do you suppose the devil plays on the TV in Hell as punishment?

Any of those shows involving 16-year-old girls who are either wanting a lavish party or are pregnant.

12. If you were given a free ticket to be on any reality show, which one would you choose?

The Amazing Race. It doesn’t interest me, but it doesn’t offend me either.

13. What shows would make up a perfect night of TV viewing for you?

I so seldom watch TV in real-time anyway. So, JEOPARDY!, Who Do You Think You Are (about the only 8 o’clock show I watch), Modern Family, 30 Rock, Grey’s Anatomy.

14. What show(s) would you cancel without a moment’s hesitation?

This would involve actually watching a show enough to hate it. There’s a wide swatch I just ignore.

15. Is there a show (previously canceled or just no longer airing) that you’d bring back, original cast and all?

No. Shows for their own time.

16. You get to create one show to put on the schedule, with any stars you choose. Who and what would it be?

I can’t imagine doing that. Even shows that are on currently that seem decent (Castle immediately comes to mind) I’m not watching because I don’t have time, so adding another program to the mix seems counterproductive.

17. Is there a game show (past or present) you think you would do really well on, as a contestant?

Password. Or Pyramid.

18. Is there a game show you think is the stupidest thing you’ve ever seen?

Well, yeah, but it was so dumb I don’t recall it. I do hate the whammy on Press Your Luck.
I was going to link to a bomb that Jackie Gleason hosted called You’re In the Picture – noted last year by Mark Evanier – but it seems to be removed from the Internet, but the apology still remains.

19. Is there a game show you watch but don’t like to admit to watching? (A guilty pleasure!)

No. At this point, I just watch JEOPARDY!, without guilt.

20. Who is your favorite game show host? Who is your least favorite?

i watched a LOT of game shows in their prime, and I thought most of the hosts were quite competent: Bill Cullen, Bud Collyer, Garry Moore, Dennis James, Alex Trebek before JEOPARDY! I don’t think I disliked any, really, though Howie Mandel on Deal or No Deal is a bit peculiar.

21. Who is your favorite (past or present) TV cop?

Barney Miller.

22. Which TV cop do you think was the most crooked, or the most inept?

Barney Fife.

23. Which TV show had the best ensemble cast of police officers?

Barney Miller. Or Hill Street Blues.

24. You need to hire a bodyguard for yourself. Which TV cop do you choose?

Mick Belker from Hill Street Blues. He was nuts.

25. Who is your favorite stand-up comedian of all time?

Bill Cosby, followed by Bob Newhart.

26. Which one could you do without? (Not your type of humor, or just plain stupid!)

Benny Hill. Actually, there are a lot of them, but I just don’t keep track of things I dislike.

27. Which comedian do you think has gone on to have a great career aside from doing stand-up?

Steve Martin, clearly. I’ve seen one of his plays a few years back.

28. If you went to a comedy club on an amateur night, and they gave you some jokes and a microphone, would you go onstage?

Not on your life.

29. Who is/was your favorite TV mom?

Timmy’s mom on Lassie, played by June Lockhart.

30. Was she a realistic mother, or more of a TV fantasy type?

Very real.

31. Which TV mom did you find the most unrealistic? Or if you’d rather: creepy – sappy – mean – you choose the adjective, and you name the mom.

My Mother, the Car.

32. No disrespect to your dear old mum, but which TV mom did you think it might be neat to have as your own?

Laura Petrie!

33. What show would you like to see brought back for an hour or two episode, to see how the characters are doing now? (This should be a show that it might be possible to do a reunion on.)

Freaks and Geeks

34. Pick a show that could not realistically be brought back for a reunion, because some or all of the cast members are gone. What if they could have done a reunion before it was too late? Name the show you’d most like to see.

Barney Miller.

35. Which reunion show have you watched and thought “Wow, they should have left that one alone!”

Haven’t watched one in years, but there was a particularly cloying episode for the Brady Bunch.

36. Which do you prefer- a “reunion” episode of the series or a “cast reunion” where the actors sit around and talk about the making of the show?

I’m very fond of the MAS*H cast reunion, and even Happy Days, which was an OK show, but hardly one I watched regularly.

37. What is your favorite TV theme song?

Hill Street Blues. Or Perry Mason.

38. Which song drives you crazy enough to hit mute on the remote?

Nothing comes to mind.

39. Which song are you proud to say you remember (most of) the lyrics to???

Proud is not the word. I do know the lyrics to Mr. Ed, Beverly Hillbillies, Gilligan’s Island, and Green Acres. Do they still do TV themes with lyrics?

Private SNAFU

Dr. Seuss would have been 107 today!

Here are four of the 26 Private SNAFU (‘Situation Normal, All Fouled Up’) cartoons made by the US Army Signal Corps to educate and boost the morale of the troops. Originally created by Theodore Geisel (Dr. Seuss) and Phil Eastman, most of the cartoons were produced by Warner Brothers Animation Studios – employing their animators, voice actors (primarily Mel Blanc), and Carl Stalling’s music.

Booby Traps (1944). Private Snafu learns about the hazards of enemy booby traps the hard way.

Snafuperman. Private Snafu mocks his peers who study, saying that he would rather fight. His guardian angel (1st class with a cigar) grants him the powers and a comical version of a Superman suit, which he promptly uses to create more problems than when he didn’t have any powers!

Spies (1943). Private Snafu, while drunk, reveals military secrets that allow the enemy to torpedo his ship.

The Home Front (1943). Private Snafu imagines the good times his family is having back home while he’s stationed in the Arctic. Technical Fairy First Class shows that even his family is helping with the war effort – his dad building tanks, his mom planting a Victory Garden, Grandpa riveting battleships, and his girl joining the WACs and even the family’s horse is pitching in.

Not incidentally, Dr. Seuss would have been 107 today. My daughter’s current favorite TV show is the PBS program The Cat in the Hat Knows a Lot About That! The Cat is voiced by Martin Short. Here’s the theme song.

Super Bowl rituals QUESTION

Back in the 1980s, I had these friends who hated football. In particular, they had a particular antipathy towards the secular holiday known as Super Bowl Sunday. So in retaliation, they would all go out together to eat, not in front of the TV, but at a nice restaurant. Then they would go to a 7 p.m. movie, as the game was going on.

Me? I’ll watch the game AND the commercials. But I have no designated snacks or particular apparel I wear.

Do you usually watch the game, and will you be viewing this year? What will you actually want to see – the game, the ads, the halftime performance of the Black Eyed Peas? I actually have that thing you can pause live TV, which is good, because, sometime during that evening, I’ll need to put the daughter to bed. Do you have a rooting interest? Mine is with the Pittsburgh Steelers, who have been installed as the underdog, even though they’ve been to the Game twice in the past decade, and the Green Bay Packers, not in 15 years.

And a question for you folks outside of the US: CAN you watch the game? By what method? Is it carried on a local network, or can you access FOX in Finland?

Honey, I’d like to watch 2 MORE football games today, OK?

Franco Harris and Lynn Swann BOTH have March 7 birthdays, same as mine. And the team had L.C. GREENwood and Mean Joe GREENe.

It happens almost all the time in the last several years: I end up watching more football games in the playoffs than I did during the entire regular season. That’s not all bad; I managed to miss my New York Giants giving up 28 points to the Philadelphia Eagles in eight minutes, a loss which essentially cost them the playoffs. Yet I’ve managed to have seen at least part of all eight playoff games leading to Super Bowl XLV thus far, though by no means all of them. All I saw of the Bears’ shellacking of the Seahawks was the 10 minutes I watched at the Radio Shack, and the Bears were already up 21-0.

Whereas I watched most of both of the Jets’ wins over the Colts and especially over the Patriots. Rooting interests are peculiar things. The sports guy at the local paper has a personal rule that once you pick a team to root for while in your teens, you have to stick with that team for life.

Though not a fan, I must admit that I was happy the first time the Patriots won the Super Bowl, and for that matter when the Red Sox won the World Series in 2004. But when it got habitual, it started getting annoying.

It occurred to me that not only have all four of the remaining teams won Super Bowls, but, not being up on the regular season games, that I tend to associate the present team with those glory days. In fact, other than the quarterback, I would be hard pressed to name more than one or two players on each team.

In rooting interest order:

New York Jets – they get some coverage around here, a little less than the New York Giants, because the Giants summer at the UAlbany, but more than the Patriots or the Buffalo Bills.
QB – Mark Sanchez, who doesn’t feel quite ready for prime time
Only other player I could name before the playoffs – Santonio Holmes, only because he won a Super Bowl with the Pittsburgh Steelers; I also know the coach, Rex Ryan, he of the loud mouth
I’m thinking about: the 1969 Jets. After the NFL-AFL merger, the Green Bay Packers won the first two Super Bowls (which weren’t called that yet), so when the team led by QB Broadway Joe Namath, he of the pantyhose commercials, guaranteed a victory over the mighty Baltimore Colts, it sounded crazy. I still remember the score: Jets 16, Colts 7.
Rooting interest: geography. I mean, they DID play in New York when I saw them play the Houston Oilers in the early 1970s. And their uniforms are GREEN and white.

Pittsburgh Steelers
QB – Ben Roethlisberger, who got into enough trouble off season to warrant a four-game suspension at the beginning of the season. Roethlisberger has already won two Super Bowls, XL, for which he played poorly, but still at 23 years old, became the youngest quarterback to win a SB, and XLIII, where he shone.
Only other players I could name: receiver Heinz Ward (appropriately playing at Heinz Field), who is Korean and black, and went to South Korea after the last Super Bowl victory to help mixed race kids; Troy Polamalu, the linebacker whose hair obscures his uniform number, who is all over the field.
I’m thinking about: the Steelers of the 1970s, with QB Terry Bradshaw. It had a running back named Franco Harris and a wide receiver named Lynn Swann, BOTH of whom have March 7 birthdays, same as mine. And the team had defensive linemen L.C. GREENwood and Mean Joe GREENe. The team has won six Super Bowls in seven appearances.
Rooting interest: geography, history.

Green Bay Packers
QB – Aaron Rogers, who, Buffalo Bills fans are reminded, could have been theirs
Only other player: wide receiver Donald Driver. Just like the name.
I’m thinking of: those first two SB wins with Bart Starr as QB, though they did win one about 35 years later.
Rooting interest: small market team (100,000 population, 300,000 in the metro area), not dissimilar in size to Albany, NY. Also, it IS the GREEN Bay Packers.

Chicago Bears
QB – Jay Cutler, who I know relatively little about except that he used to play for the Denver Broncos
Only other player: linebacker Brian Urlacher
I’m thinking about: those 1986 Bears, with Refrigerator Perry, et al.
Rooting interest: I liked Chicago when I went there in 2008

Ultimately, I’m just happy that that the game that will be played in Dallas on February 6 won’t have the Dallas Cowboys playing. Them I do not like.