Summer is Boring: TV Update for Friday, 7/3/09
I’ve decided to ditch the whole “regular news post” idea for TV, at least until Fall. Truth be told, there isn’t much happening in the summer to warrant frequent updates. So instead, I’ll do these posts whenever I feel the need, a mash-up of news, opinion, and cool stuff you might have missed.
Like this neat little article about how broadcast networks are being pummeled by cable networks this summer. Actual good shows like Royal Pains and Burn Notice are besting broadcast’s crap offerings. Summer seems to be the only time where ratings make sense to me. Shitty shows do terribly, great shows do well. Hell, True Blood’s numbers are actually climbing, which probably means people are signing up with HBO to watch it. Meanwhile, dreck like I’m a Celebrity goes unwatched, as it should.
Speaking of great summer TV, There isn’t much out there, but I’ve been trying out everything that premieres. HBO’s new show Hung shows promise as a neat little comedy, though it’s too early to form any concrete opinion. Nurse Jackie and Royal Pains are also fairly solid newcomers discussed in depth elsewhere on the site. Weeds is alright, Burn Notice is still great but currently directionless. Pitchmen was really interesting for its few-episode run, but I don’t imagine they’ll keep it going sans Billy Mays. Just another reason to miss him more than we already do.Oh, and Kings and Harper’s Island are almost done, but so help me, I love them.
I’ve found a new show which I absolutely adore, Tosh.0. At first glance, it appears to be a knock-off of The Soup over on E! only with web clips (which isn’t a bad thing. I don’t know if you’ve watched The Soup lately, but it’s incredible). But while that may be the premise for G4’s remarkably inferior new Web Soup, this show takes things in a different and unique direction. For starters, it’s actually funny. Ok, enough cheap shots. My favorite bit is the “Web Redemption” where stars of popular viral “failure” videos are given a second chance at whatever they were trying to do, including Afro Ninja, Miss Teen South Carolina (”everywhere like such as”) and that one singing black girl who fell off of a table. Tosh walks a fine line between mocking and redeeming them, but he walks it very well, and it’s comedy gold. Check out pretty much every video here.
Let me end with a bit of actual news. Wentworth Miller, aka Michael Scofield from the recently-deceased Prison Break, is doing a guest spot on Law & Order: SVU’s fall premiere. Now that Break is over, I’d love to see this guy get some work. Maybe opposite a worthy foil like Michael Emerson. Oh God, I just gave myself chills.
Daniel Tosh is awesome. If you like his show, check out his stand-up.