ASG Vs Oscars: Who Won?

Here we have a nice little breakdown of my TV night - filled with Oscar safety and All Star Game excitement. Which came out on top Le Sport or Les Pop Culture?

Did I Want to Kill Myself?

Oscars: Partially. If you consider everything, this was a very watchable Oscar night. It was nearly 2 hours in before I looked at the clock to see when I could continue on with more relevant things in my life. This is quite an accomplishment. They played it safe, which is good for those folks who think talkie pictures are just a fad.

All Star Game: Absolutely not. I flipped back and forth between both of these events, seemingly not missing anything important in either event. Perhaps this heightened my love of the NBA All Star Game, but let's be real - when LeBron James starts the second half 9/9 and brings his team back from 17 points down before failing to win, that's exciting.

Winner: All Star Game.

Who Had More Celebrities?

Oscars: I believe the Oscars win in terms of white celebrity - does it get bigger than Jonah Hill for the stoners, Brad Pitt for the 20 something females, George Clooney for everyone and Meryl Streep for every other woman? Probably not.

ASG: The NBA lured in celebrities fit for a more "urban" generation (I think that's the PC way to say it these days). Lil Wayne was there, presumably robotrippin', as was every other major rapper (50 Cent, Nicki "I'm gonna eye rape you" Minaj, Drake), and of course a smattering of others like Mary J. Blige, Floyd Mayweather - in his best Cosby sweater no less, and Spike Lee, who makes movies right? Shouldn't he be at the Oscars? Oh that's right, he doesn't have enough white people to hate in public right now.

Winner: Oscars.

Who has more surprises?

Oscars: The Oscars somehow made the Grammy's winners (Adele, and only Adel) seem surprising. The Artist basically won everything that wasn't technical, Hugo won everything that was technical and Meryl Streep won for best actress. I think we can safely guess no old people died this year from shock induced heart attacks.

ASG: The All Star game, while exciting, was filled with lackluster defense, LeBron James shining and then failing, and Kobe whining. These are things that can be expected from most regular season games and definitely every ASG.

Winner: Push.

Best dressed?

Oscars: I did not get to see the red carpet special, but I did get to see Angelina Jolie stick her leg out of her dress like she was trying to lure in an unsuspecting car, weird the awestruck male driver in and then eventually kill him - most likely in the midst of a sex act. Jonah Hill also stuck out - with his brownish purple bowtie and dress shirt. Yikes.

ASG: Meanwhile, the ASG was not much better. Mayweather wore his Cosby sweater, Chris Brown wore his brass knuckles, and the All Star Game uniforms weren't as hideous as past years. (Derrick Rose in that skin tight jersey, I'm looking at you.)

Winner: All Star Game.

Grand Winner: All Star Game. 2-1-1.

The 4th quarter of the All Star Game was more exciting than all 3 hours of the Oscars. There was actual suspense, instead of tepid aggravation as we had to wait to hear The Artist win everything. Bold prediction: Next year their will only be 2-3 talkie pictures nominated for Best Picture. Talkies are out, Chaplin's in.

Angry Boys - The Saddest Comedy

This post might hit deaf ears because only 245,000 people even watch this weird, weird HBO show. Angry Boys is a "comedy" from creator Chris Lilley, who plays almost every single one of the main characters. Lilley is a comedian born in Australia and has created previously great series like Summer Heights High and We Can Be Heroes. Every single series is the same mockumentary style, Lilley plays every main character, and weirdly each show's opening credits feature a children's choir singing while the camera shows different groups of children...It's weird. Summer Heights High was hilarious though and so I looked forward to ripping through Angry Boys on HBO GO.

Angry Boys centers around several story lines - a juvenile detention center and its compassionate, yet racist, elderly female caretaker (Lilley), a gay asian skateboarding teen and his mom (Lilley), two brothers (both Lilley) - one who is deaf, and S.MAUS, an American black rapper(Lilley), who throws the N word around about 24 times per episode . The show's story lines each entangle and at the end of the series they all come together somewhat miraculously and without merit at all. Throughout the 12 episodes I probably laughed a total of 7 or 8 times out loud, this was not a very good series.

In the last two episodes it got downright drama-y. The gay asian skateboard tells the world he isn't gay and then disavows his mom who threatens to kill herself, the female caretaker is found to have Alzheimers, almost killing a child with neglect and the two brothers struggle with saying goodbye, as one is forced to go to a deaf school. I'm all for drama - I'm currently trying to burn my retinas from the memory of Glenn Close's face after watching 13 episodes of Damages in 3 days or dramedy (The OC), but this just get's downright depressing. When a comedy goes entire episodes without even trying to make a joke, what's the point?

Spoiler alert ahead.

Even worse, the show ends on the sappiest possible conclusion. The brothers throw a going away party, inviting S.Maus!, the asian skateboarder, (both live in America, while the brothers live in Australia) and the surfer, who I forgot to include because every character looks the same (also played by Lilley). Their Alzheimer's grandmother forgets to invite them (cuz of dat Alzheimer's) and then apologizes to the boys. Seconds later, three cars pull up out of the middle of nowhere, literally, these boys live on a farm that spreads for miles of beautiful overgrown Australian desert. Out of the cars pop our celebrities who go on having a grand old time at a party across the globe with only 2 adults and 6 kids in attendance. The last 5 minutes of the season has no words, just an incredible Disney type orchestral piece as everybody rejoices.

This hopefully will end Lilley's mockumentary run, it seems like he ran out of funny ideas - n word jokes from a white guy in blackface excluded - and just decided to attempt to pull at our heart strings with the trials of characters I couldn't care less about.

The Return of Community

Community has finally been released back on the world. Starting March 15 Community will return to NBC on Thursdays at 8 PM, pushing 30 Rock to 8:30 PM and taking Parks and Recreation off the schedule until Up All Night runs out of episodes. In doing so, NBC continues it's run of not having their 4 best shows on the same for a little bit longer. For whatever reason NBC just can't seem to let Community, 30 Rock, Parks and Rec and The Office on one night at the same time. Instead they throw out garbage like Whitney and Up All night - perhaps praying that people will fall asleep while The Office is on and thus be physically unable to change the channel when Up All Night arrives.

The bigger issue, however, is the return of Community - the great internet equalizer. Community gets some of the worst ratings a show can get in a primetime slot without cancellation. It's quirky brand of humor takes a certain type of fan, I suppose. Yet, the internet seemingly blew up early this afternoon when the creator of Community tweeted that the show was coming back. While the ratings scream "Who Cares?," Twitter seems to care way too much. Thus the juxtaposition - a show with no chance of surviving past season 4 (currently on 3), but a fanbase that will surely turn homicidal then suicidal when it inevitably gets cancelled. The math is all screwed up here - it must be that everyone who watches the show is a voracious internet voice for the internet, which has a much bigger audience than TV, to blow up when TV land doesn't care seems odd. Until you realize that everyone who does watch the show -- and its inability to have an episode that not so subtly references an entire movie per episode arc -- are exactly the type of people who stand in line for Star Wars 3D and spend several hours per day trolling message boards and creating Community memes like this.

Twitter feeds burst to life for 15 minutes with this seemingly joyous news, but in 12 weeks when the shows run is over and the cancellation rumors creep up, that's when Twitter will surely implode. All 1.2 million viewers of Community will strike hard and fast complaining till they get what they want. They've done it before, they somehow made this man a rap star.

Short Stories with Tragic Endings

Recently, I've spent most of my days at home surrounded by luxuries like a Playstation 3, HDTV and iPad. I mostly use all 3 at the same time and since I consult from home 15 hours a week, my life is mostly spent getting blown up by 12 year olds from Japan, staying up way past their bedtime to destroy schlubs like me. It was a recent Friday night that my girlfriend noted I probably needed to go outside of the apartment. She had made plans that I had no interest in and I was content to stay at home watch Fringe on repeat. Win/win?

No. On her way out, she dropped this bomb - "you know, I think you might have FUN if you go out?" Little did she know that my definition of fun for the night consisted of video games and not walking around in freezing weather, getting wasted and gorging myself on chips as I stay up till 4 AM watching Pawn Stars. Sober TV watching is a lot more reputable than drunk TV watching. But when you are love, guilt can run your life. Some friends were having a party on the bad side of town that was a) the bad side of town and b) way too hard to get to, so I called up a friend and we met at a bar.

We had been to this bar for day football games before and it was fine - cheap beers and decent food. On a Friday night, its true self came out and its true self looked like an amalgamation of a Jeremy Lin fan club (too soon?) and a single peoples group. You know, the type of group where overweight 35 year olds who can't meet anybody all get together and try to find true love. The JLFC was very loud, yelling across the bar as other members entered. The singles people group seemed to already be paired off - perhaps these are just sad, overweight couples - and this bar had a BOOT special, which the couples quickly jumped on. I could smell the anticipation of the sloppy sex about to happen in 3 hours. Oh, that's another note. THIS WAS 9 PM.

Things got worse when the bar started blaring old school hip hop and 80's jams. I can't remember any specific song but my friend definitely noted - it's 10pm, this song is a 2 AM song. Perhaps this bar knows its clientele, the singalong to the 2am song ensued at 10, just like it was 2 am. The sadness loomed over us. After two beers and one shot, we went our separate ways, but my excitement did not end. I was already on the street I live on - about 4 miles down. The cab ride could not be easier - drive straight - yet the cab driver, who was a 20 something AMERICAN with the rare combination of coke problem/obesity got confused went 3 blocks south in the wrong direction then 4 blocks east in the wrong direction. Eventually he just turned the meter off and muttered how sorry he was. I wondered if I was just carrying the sadness stench with me.

The Time I Got Weirded Out at the Gym

As a current fatty, I'm trying to get my weight down. I signed up for a gym just blocks from my apartment and I soon hope to represent Wendy's in an ad campaign similar to Jared's from Subway. This gym is unique - although the only other gym I've been a member of was a college gym - whose mix of naked professors and almost naked 20 year old girls became the norm. This gym is special because it has not meathead front desk guy, silently judging you as you come in with a magazine. This gym is open 24 hours and you just type in your code and go whenever you want - sure it's a safety issue - someone will inevitably collapse under a dumbbell and need an "I've fallen and I can't get up" necklace, but that's not my problem yet.

I enjoy this. Often there is no one there, no judgy eyes, no nothing. I can lift my 20 lb weights in peace or plod along on the treadmill while my feet sound like thunder. It's glorious.

More recently, I keep going at times when there are personal trainers and their clients. Now, this gym is quite small, 6 treadmills, 3 ellipticals, a bike and some free weights. If there are trainers, there is no room to move. It was even worse today when the trainer was coming on to his client like this was gymnastics class at a bar. Even worse, this girl was reciprocating. She wore makeup and earrings to workout. She stood there in her Alabama t-shirt pretending she didn't know how to do an arm curl. Seriously. "Oh, trainer, can you put your hand on the small of my back and use your other arm to push my arm towards my chest? Here let me push it out for you," her body language suggested. I was deep in post rock running mode and thus could hear nothing, but the interplay said it all.

She got to a point where she just couldn't take anymore and he edged her on like a personal trainer should, put he edged her on by placing his hands on her shoulders and rubbing. What does a person do when they are watching the makings of a porno about to happen? The answer, as it turns out, is write a blog.

The What I Think, You Think, She Thinks Meme

This is getting out of hand. In recent days the internet has been inundated by this new fangled meme that goes like this "job title or activity" at the top followed by 6 windows of different views of people.

"What my mom thinks I do"

"What society thinks I do"

'What my boss thinks I do"

"What my friends think I do"

"What I think I do"

"What I actually do"

This shit has to stop. Every one of these is the same and when you inevitably read one that relates to you, you exclaim loudly to yourself and immediately repost to your friends. This is why the internet will break someday, remember that. Not only does no one care about your particular field - everyone of these is the same. Let's break it down:

"What my mom thinks I do" = The idealistic view of my job

"What society thinks I do" = The simplified view of my job

'What my boss thinks I do" = The worst view of my job

"What my friends think I do" = The coolest view of my job

"What I think I do" = Nothing/Self Aggrandizing View

"What I actually do" = Nothing/The boring view of my job.

Every single one of these is the same - not only is it not funny, but I just decoded this quicker than Tom Hanks defeated the albino self mutilating priest in the Da Vinci Code. Come on internet, you can do better than this.

The Argument Against Whitney

Why do we care when celebrities die? The only feasible explanation is that they remind us of a time that we enjoyed with them. Michael Jackson gave millions of people audible joy throughout the 70's and 80's and then hundreds of boys an entirely different type of pleasure in the 90's, but the millions who grew up with the Jackson 5 or danced to PYT on a piece of cardboard back in the day will always think of Michael as a sign of good times. "Michael was with me when I had my first kiss!"

This supposed connection is enough to wipe away years of awful memories, years of mocking and not so subtle chuckling and yet, it still doesn't feel like an adequate excuse for sobbing. Whitney Houston is the recent heir to this throne of celebrities given the gift of a fantastic voice, great looks, and the constant need to medicate to "deal with the pain." I suppose this is a double edged sword, they can't deal with the fame so they need drugs, but when the fame starts fading they do ANYTHING to attempt to get it back. Sometimes successfully, sometimes not. With Whitney Houston it's important to remember she hasn't been relevant since the early 90's. While she had some massive songs in her peak years, she has done nothing but sully her reputation since then. Let's not forget that this not only happened, but she agreed to show it to millions of people on cable. She was THAT desperate.

Is it incredibly sad when someone with an immense amount of talent passes? Of course, but for the last 20 years we laughed at this woman's pain. We read the gossip magazines, watched her fail miserably on a reality show and bounce in and out of rehab without more than "poor girl" passing through our lips. People value celebrity deaths like family members - Twitter and Facebook exploded - and if that's the case shouldn't we be angry at what a waste of life this person was? She had the ability to be the voice of a generation, but just couldn't break her drug abuse cycle. It's sad, but I don't understand how death erases everything negative about a person's life. How are we so eager to mourn for someone who has been nothing but a doormat for us for years, just because she meant something somewhere in the corner of our mind?

Staying Alive With The Walking Dead

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It's not that I hate The Walking Dead on AMC, it's just that I want to take several naps whenever there is not a commercial blasting me in the face. The Walking Dead is always the last show to be painstakingly viewed on my DVR and thus, it probably acts more like a sleeping aid than I realize. It has been well documented that the second season of this show has moved very, very slowly, but there was hope! There was a new show runner in town, the second half of the season would be better!

Then the first of 6 new episodes aired and I was in the same dream like state I was in 3 months ago, when I was left in a post apocalyptic farm world, where nothing is scary, ever. Something is wrong with a horror show that doesn't give you nightmares or create so much adrenaline that you can't sleep. The episode starts off with 37 minutes of the same poppycock from before - "get off my farm," "we need to save everyone," and "I love your Asian body." You can almost guarantee that a much wordier version of each of these quotes is in every episode. In the last 5 minutes of this episode we are introduced to a new character who seems shady and perhaps, will create some real problems for our crew. This show might be creeping on us....

SPOILER ALERT AHEAD

Yet in some fashion, the show runner for the Walking Dead must believe that it's just best not to rock the boat. These characters are introduced and subsequently extroduced (eh?) in one scene. The MO of this show seems to be "well lets put one good scare in per episode and then just meander around for another 40 minutes." This put a damper on my hopes for a good second half of the season, but things got worse. I read this interview with the new show runner who couldn't have screamed louder "I'M NOT TRYING TO UPSET ANYONE AT ALL ANYWHERE." He argues that the first half of the season wasn't his fault (it was a different show runner) but vehemently pushes that he and the previous show runner see eye to eye and get along. He has no problems with network budgetary cuts and he hates fan reactions that insinuate the show stinks. Hmmm, this seems like someone who just wants to come in and not make anyone mad.

It would be silly of us to think that a show runner obsessed with maintaining the status quo can really change a show that has the same aesthetic. A show that screams, "hey we are a zombie show, we have one zombie death per week," while also harping that 40 minutes of character (and not story) development are important and not as boring as watching Chelsea Handler.

This makes me throw up in my own mouth, and I anxiously await the return of The Killing on AMC, at least their show runner is willing to intentionally mess with an audience.

Kity Purry Need Records NOW

As I type this, I'm listening to Katy Perry's new song "Part of Me." When I watched it live on the Grammy's my inevitable first thought was "Wow, this is a break up song of magnanimous proportions." I'm partly impressed that she was able to turn out a break up song this fast and partly not impressed because I'm guessing a 34 year old producer with a one word name - most likely "Shyne" or something like that, wrote this song 4 years ago. However, after careful consideration something else needs to be pointed out. Katy Perry's desperate obsession to earn the title for most number 1 songs on an album.

She currently stands at 5 - California Girls, Teenage Dream, Last Friday Night, Firework and ET - and she came very close with a number 6 (which is the record, held by Michael "I Was A Teenage Black Child" Jackson) with The One That Got Away. As an avid hater of pop music I must say that I would listen to at least three of these songs without a gun pointing me in the face. I constantly like to pretend I'm Kanye and sing his verse on ET in the most nasal tone you can imagine. However, a few weeks ago I read this article that noted Katy Perry was "re-releasing" an acoustic version of The One That Got Away hoping to push it back up the charts after it had already started fading. This was the SECOND re-release - apparently she re-released it the first time with a B.O.B. remix.

This is obviously Katy Perry and her record company clamoring for a record. You release a song 3 separate times to try to get the record? That reeks of desperation. ITS ONLY A NUMBER 3 SONG GET OVER IT.

When I first heard the new song after the fear I felt for Russell Brand) I thought, I guess this makes sense, California Gurrrlz (pretty sure this is the correct spelling) came out 2 years ago, time for a new album - I guess this will be the single. Wrong.

She is re-releasing the ENTIRE album with this song and 2 other remixes added. Thus, this song will have the opportunity to make it to number 1 and give her the record. This song is beyond solid, she looked amazing last night doing it and oh yeah, girls under the age of 22 will definitely think this is their anthem for every guy that ever wronged them. Congratulations Katy Perry you finally did it, you have the "best" radio album ever, and it only took 4 different album versions over 2 years to get there!