TV Musings

During the group song, "Stuck in the Middle With You," I was waiting for someone's ear to be cut off.

Oh god--Simon and Ryan went to Africa and Randy and Paula are going to Louisiana. I'm all for doing good deeds, but not when you televise it for millions of people to see how wonderful you are. That SPECIAL AMERICAN IDOL EPISODE!!!111! promises to be a clusterfuck. Borat? Annie Lennox? Bono (Haaate)? Gwen Stefani? WTF?

Carrie looks like Skeletor.

Antonella and Stephanie--meh. I'm not surprised about Antonella and Stephanie wasn't shown enough in the auditions to do well. Haley doesn't have a bad voice but she's pretty pageant-y and picks the dumbest songs in the history of the world. Queen of the Night? Seriously, Haley?

Jared and Sundance--another meh. I sure as shit don't think Sanjaya deserves to be in the top 12 more than them, but I don't care that either of them are gone.

I feel compelled to write about Arrested Development like Rusty wrote about the Black Donnellys the other week because I've been rewatching our DVDs and getting even more pissed that the show didn't get a longer run. Phyllis from The Office was on the episode I watched the other day ("The Immaculate Election" from Season 2) and Kevin has a brief appearance in another episode (he informs Tobias of the gun-show loophole). Ed Helms also appeared as a real estate agent. That show had the best guest stars--Rob Corddry, Julia Louis-Dreyfus, Jeff Garlin, Andy Richter, Dan Castellaneta, and Henry Winkler, just to name a few. Several episodes were directed by Paul Feig, who created "Freaks and Geeks," which is also one of the best shows ever, and directed some episodes of "The Office."

Describing how great this show is will not do it justice. I highly recommend you watch it yourself to experience the slick writing, attention to detail, flawless acting, biting social commentary, and hilarious jokes. I can't think of another show that uses callbacks, foreshadowing and inside jokes so well. Arrested Development rewards people who pay attention, and I appreciate that. Every character is perfectly cast, and I can only think of one thing that I didn't like from the whole series, and that was Martin Short playing Uncle Jack.

It was so frustrating to be a fan of the show. We had to watch it be screwed repeatedly by FOX. They moved it all over the place in the schedule which prevented it from building a strong fan base, they cut the second season down to only 18 episodes (a full season is 22) to make room for "Family Guy's" comeback, and the third season was cut to 13 episodes. They aired the final four episodes in a two-hour block which was scheduled at the same time as the opening ceremonies of the Olympics. Nice one, FOX. You better believe that our dial was planted firmly on FOX that night though. Imagine what it's like to be a fan of one of the most intelligent and hilarious sitcoms ever and have it cancelled while "Stacked" and "The War at Home" are still on the air. Arrested was nominated for 20 freaking Emmys (winning 7) and won several other awards, for god's sake! To quote GOB, "Come on!"