BLOGS
January 2012 Archives
I'm just going to jump right in and address the 800-pound sombrero-wearing gorilla in the room: This pilot is racist. I don't care how accurate the premise is to Rob Schneider's real life, many of the jokes rely entirely on ugly stereotypes of Mexican-Americans. Even worse, it's yet another show that forces Hispanic-American actors to take these kinds of roles if they want to be on network TV. I could see how a person may argue that it's more a shock-humor type of deal and that this show explores a group of people who aren't often shown to mainstream American audiences. That argument might carry more weight if Rob didn't basically take the worst parts about the already-bad Jack and Jill (it even features Eugenio Derbez!) and let's-just-say-ridiculous A Very Harold & Kumar 3D Christmas and stretch them into a series starring already-annoying Schneider.
Would you give this woman a People's Choice Award? (Apparently, you did.)
Shockingly, watching the People's Choice Awards was not extreme torture... not the whole time, anyways. Kaley Cuoco was a perfectly fine emcee, and her relative lack of fame actually worked when it came to hosting. For those of you who missed the ceremony, here are the highlights and lowlights of what you didn't see.
"Egg Drop" wasn't the worst Modern Family venture this season by any means, but it was, for the most part, forgettable. Sure, another plotline where Claire is competitive and Jay is stubborn. That Gloria sure is bad at all things car-related! Isn't Haley a selfish teenager?! And how many times have we seen Mitchell and Cameron out-do themselves only to have it bite both of them by the end of the episode? (I'm honestly sick of complaining about this one -- there's not even character development within their fights anymore. It's not like Claire and Phil have it out every episode.) To break it down a bit further, here's a look at the least successful parts of the episode:
I'm not really sure who over at NBC thought it would be a wise decision to kick off Are You There, Chelsea? with Chelsea (Laura Prepon) getting arrested for a DUI. Apparently, the story is taken from Chelsea Handler's actual book, but trying to get audiences on board with a character who drinks and drives seems like an impossibly worse idea than convincing people to accept the idea of a mancession or tolerate Whitney Cummings. Even worse, those few minutes also managed to make me appreciate Ryan Murphy for giving Dot Jones the chance to play a character on Glee who's not a "lesbian jailbird." Yeesh.
A movie that no one wants isn't happening. Yay, I guess.
I was a bit worried that Dance Moms would lose its sparkle after the masterpiece that was Season 1, but within the first minute of last night's premiere, I knew I had nothing to worry about: Abby Lee Miller is back, and as twisted as ever. The whole plotline about casting a new girl was completely over the top and cruel, and if I took a shot every time Abby told a child or mother that "Everyone's replaceable," I'd be a goner. Moving forward, the jury's still out on whether "900 Number" Jill and Kendall will be a satisfying addition to the group, but until then, let's all laugh at the most ridiculous -- and, not-so-coincidentally, heinous -- lines of the evening. Shockingly, none of them are from Cathy, but we're got all season for those.
The TCAs are upon on, which means lots of TV news this week.