Issue # 3, 25-31 May 2008

Posted by AJ in TV Rewind.

Show: Greek
Episode: “A Tale of Two Parties” (1×20)
You Can Watch It: Mondays at 8pm on ABC Family

The plots are still thickening as we near the end of the first season of Greek. Golden boy Evan Chambers, who is currently the hero of all the Greeks on campus for getting the administration to lift their heavy restrictions (“No Campus for Old Rules” 1×19), decides to throw a six-way party for the best fraternities and sororities on CRU’s Greek row. And in Evan’s mind that of course means excluding Kappa Tau (Cappie Tau?) at all costs. Not the type to take this kind of insult lying down, the KTs decide to throw their own party. As the rivalry between Evan and Cappie finds new life, Casey fuels the fire of the rivalry between her and Rebecca by assigning the pledges the duty of being sober sisters the night of the six-way party. Ashleigh and Casey work out detailed plans to take full advantage of their first opportunity in months to meet new guys. Once the party stars, however, things go wonky—big surprise. Evan commands his little brother (frats, people, frats) Calvin to watch over Casey at the party and keep guys away from her. Because of this, Calvin gets some more screen time and, for once, gets to act like a queen. Frannie puts on her best desperate face to try to get Evan to forget about Casey AKA lower his standards and pay attention to her. The KTs, who could not come up with enough money on such short notice to buy enough alcohol for their own party, go in douchebag disguises (seriously) to steal all of the liquor from the Omega Chis. At this point, Cappie makes a hilarious joke about Gossip Girl that should go down in history as one of the funniest pop culture references to a competing show in history. By the time the party moves to the KT house, Evan is too smashed to notice and Casey has left her guy hunting to drag a drunk sister over to the KT house and scream at Rebecca for not listening to orders. And Casey’s guy connection that night turns out to be the most disgusting kisser television has ever seen—the Sex & the City girls did not encounter anything as weird as this in all their six years. Meanwhile, Rusty has spent the entire episode ignoring calls from Tina and trying to figure out how to break up with her when he discovers they are…“fun” buddies. The show ends with Evan standing in front of a closed ZBZ door, Frannie hopefully feeling a bit slutty, the KT party raging on into the night, and Rusty finally being left alone by Tina.

Conclusions:
Beaver and Calvin: supporting characters of the year.

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Show: Denise Richards: It’s Complicated
Episode: “Denise Dating” (1×01)
You Can Watch It: This show has moved to Sundays at 10pm on E!

That’s right, people—we’re getting down to reality and reruns. Because I was planning on watching Living Lohan (see below), I knew it was only right to give Denise Richards: It’s Complicated a chance. I know nothing about Denise Richards other than she was married to Charlie Sheen and now she’s not, and I actually don’t really care to know more than that. And the pilot of her new reality series did nothing whatsoever to sway my position. In a short thirty minutes, we learn that Denise likes to curse and live in a house overrun with family members and animals who defecate freely. While the episode seemed like it was supposed to be focused on Denise’s inability to choose the right men with her sister and her BFF doing everything in their power to help her change, the half-hour slot was filled with pig sex as Denise focused on finding her pig, Charlotte, a mate. Denise did go on one date, however, with someone her BFF Trish set her up with. By the end of their meeting, Denise and the audience were convinced the guy was not so interested in women (editing perhaps?) and the show went back to pig sex. Not exactly my cup of tea, but to be honest Charlotte’s life seems more interesting than Denise’s at this point. Although the premiere of It’s Complicated became increasingly boring as the minutes wore on, the preview at the end of the pilot episode (which featured teaser clips for the entire season) convinced me the show will eventually be worth watching. I hope.

Conclusions:
Bleep sound: going to be needed a lot for this one. Why not just air this on HBO? Oh, because no one would pay extra to watch this.

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Show: Living Lohan
Episode: “Mommy Will Fix It” (1×01)
You Can Watch It: This show has moved to Sundays at 10:30pm on E!

Maybe the premiere of It’s Complicated was a huge letdown, but Dina Lohan is not one to waste a minute of camera time—let alone camera time when she does not have to talk about eldest daughter Lindsay. The Living Lohan pilot was everything I could have dreamed of and more. Quite frankly, this is going to be the best reality series since the inception of The Hills. Nothing beats watching Dina Lohan work her media magic, Ali Lohan attempt to act older than she really is while starting her career as a music “artist,” and Cody Lohan not giving a rat’s ass about anything that goes on outside of his prepubescent world (except he is happy his sisters are “following their dreams”). Dina Lohan and assistant Alexis spent most of the episode coming the pages of rag mags and threatening legal action against various tabloids for stories they printed about Lindsay “I’m not going to be on this show ever” Lohan. Fourteen-year-old Ali and twentysomething producer friend Jeremy fought over an interview that insinuated Jeremy told the press he is dating Lindsay. Ali also spent the majority of her camera time demanding more “hip hop” songs from her label and refusing to record songs appropriate for her age. She did make a good point when she said that people her age don’t listen to the crap that the label thinks is appropriate for them, but the struggle seen on camera for Ali to be both a fourteen-year-old and a rising star made for some interesting moments. Scenes of the already-dyeing-her-hair tween arguing with record execs on her mother’s cell phone were interspersed with clips of her mother having to pull Ali and Cody apart for wresting in the hallway. She may have Lindsay’s raspy voice and delusions of having vocal talent, but this kid is still a kid. By the end of the show, which closed with the delectable promise of “To Be Continued,” I was sold. All of the media outrage about exploitation and hypocrisy (Dina Lohan complains of a lack of privacy from the media, yet willing allows the lives of her family be taped) have turned out to be true, which is why this train wreck is going to be the medicine we all need since the writers for The Hills gave up on creating realistic dialogue and interactions. Also, Nana is the greatest thing to come out of Long Island since those special iced teas.

Conclusions:
Dina Lohan: the White Oprah? No. Greatest catchphrase inventor of all time? Yes. (Example: “Screw you, I’m doin’ it!” with matching hand motions.)

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Show: The Real World: Hollywood
Episode: “Get It On” (1×07)
You Can Watch It: Wednesdays at 10pm on MTV

This week’s episode of The Real World: Hollywood essentially solidified this season’s place as the all-time most ridiculous reality series ever and the all-time most dramatic, nonsensical season of The Real World ever. Greg’s presence in the house is still causing problems for, well, everyone but Joey…because Joey is in rehab. The show opens with Greg preparing a meal for some friends. Cut to a few hours later, and Sarah, Kim, and Dave stand in the middle of the mess he left behind griping about how Greg disrespects the house by being disgusting and never cleaning up after himself. And you might be thinking this shouldn’t be such a big deal, but the kitchen counters and stovetop were covered in a two-inch layer of grease and maple syrup and the sink was piled high with dirty dishes. The trashcan was also overflowing with discarded chicken bones. Ew. This is where it all starts, people—the unraveling. Greg disregards a note left by his roommates to clean up his mess and writes some profanity back to them. Sarah’s brother-in-law and sister visited, and brother-in-law attempted to make Greg and Sarah reconcile after last week’s panty debacle. He seemed to only make things worse. Will reached his breaking point with how Greg “disrespects females,” and Dave joins him in a quest to bait Greg into punching one of them in order to get kicked out of the house. Slurs at dead fathers are thrown, as is something else (a water bottle perhaps?) at Greg’s head. The producers are called in Trisha-vs-Parisa-style (RW: Sydney) and Will is sent to a hotel for the night. But never fear, no one gets kicked off. Dave and Will are sent to anger management classes; Greg continues to be a prick and not make any sense; the roommates have a house meeting to discuss the incident and Sarah is more annoying than ever; Joey calls from rehab and sounds psychotic still, but says he is doing better; the roommates make a trek to visit Joey and Greg acts uninterested and unimpressed the entire time. Also, Dave loses his place as the one non-loser in the house when he calls his mom and cries. Oh, and Kim’s friends visited and brought her two ugly poodle-ish dogs with them and the dogs spent their vacation pissing all over the house. Note to dogs: that grass around the hot tub was fake.

Conclusions:
The poodles might be the smartest beings to ever walk through those doors.

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Show: Burn Notice
Episode: “Broken Rules” (1×07)
You Can Watch It: Thursdays at 11pm on USA (reruns of the first season)

Here are the aforementioned reruns I have been forced to share with you since, well, there really wasn’t anything else going on this week. (Never fear, new shows are coming soon.) I’ve been watching reruns of the first season of USA’s original series Burn Notice starring Jeffrey Donovan and Bruce Campbell in preparation for the July 10 premiere of the show’s second season. Donovan plays Michael Westin, a covert agent for the U.S. government who has received a burn notice (hence the title) meaning he’s been cutoff without any warning and no explanation of why. The show focuses on Westin’s journey to find out why he’s been burned while he deals with his family and friends and takes side jobs to get by in Miami. This episode, as it is the direct middle of the season, proved to be the climax where everything starts to come together—except it started coming together at the very end of the episode so now we have to wait until next week for answers. But at least we know they’re coming. Westin and Fiona finally reignite their long-from-dead flame (they had sex) and the NSA agent Westin blackmailed finally brings him the dossier on his burn notice. But during the other forty minutes of the show, Westin helped a beachfront store owner rid the neighborhood of a female crime boss and her goons by acting psychotic, robbing the store of the guy he’s supposed to be helping, and getting the crime boss’s right-hand man to blow her up. All in all, it was a job well done.

Conclusions:
Next week cannot come fast enough. Also, Westin is really good at blackmail.

Until next week, dear readers. Don’t forget to be kind and read your weekly TV Rewind!

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