The Ice King Cometh

Here is my tribute to the new TV show Adventure Time, which premieres on Cartoon Network in April. This was done with one stencil by layering various colored sprays over each other.

TV Party- Annihilate all week long

So the new TV season is in full swing, and unfortunately with the writers strike, may be over soon. I'll let you know what I've been watching, as if you care...



MONDAY
At 8pm on CBS is How I Met Your Mother, the premise behind the show is of a father telling stories to his kids about his friends and how he met their mother (who they still have yet to introduce). The show's really funny, and is basically a cross between Scrubs and Friends (before it got terrible). Pretty much the only thing on CBS worth watching.
When I was working in NYC, there were huge billboard for 2 new shows: Chuck (on NBC) and the Big Bang Theory (CBS). I've given both a shot, and neither are really all that great. Chuck starts at 8, but I just flip to the last half hour before Heroes comes on. The premise of that one is that a nerdy dude happens to get an e-mail w/ government secrets in it. Now he works with the FBI and done some crazy James Bond type shit. Big Bang Theory is about nerd who live next door to a hot chick, yawn.
Heroes is on NBC at 9, and is probably my favorite show on TV now. I know I've talked about it before, but it's basically a comic book in a live action setting. Unlike 90% of the comic movies that have come out recently, it's totally not crap. The most recent Season adds new characters, and puts some of the prominent ones from last season into the background. The mid season cliff hanger in 3 weeks may be the season finale, and I read that they made an alternate ending just in case. Fox's 24 will have some tough competition for the 9pm slot.
After Heroes at 10 is a new show on NBC, JourneyMan. It's somewhat similar to Quantum Leap, except the guy jumps into the past in his own body, and has to fix the future. It's not bad, but by the end of the hour I start losing interest. I'll probably keep with it until the end of the season, but if it changes time slots, I probably wouldn't follow it.

TUESDAY
The only thing I really watch on Tuesdays at 9 is House on Fox. Dr. House is an unorthodox doctor, who always has some sort of crazy diagnosis. This season however, he needs to find a new team since his last team abandoned him last season. It started out interestingly enough with an American Idol style weeding out of people, but it's still not decided who the new team is. It's still entertaining, but it's becoming more like CSI and Law and Order, where each episode is basically the same.

WEDNESDAY
An interesting new show on ABC is Pushing Daisies, which is like a crime drama mixed with a Dr Seuss book. There's a narrator which follows the storyline, and gives background information. Pretty cool, and probably the only thing I watch on ABC.
9-10 is kind of a bust until LOST starts again (if it starts again). I've been watching Kitchen Nightmares, where a chef goes to disgusting restaurants and tells them what to change to stay in business. Definitely not something to watch while eating, but it's funny to see him make fun of these dumb owners.
At 10, Comedy Central's been showing the new season of South Park, which for some reason is still just as witty 10 years later. Obviously you get the same satirical gross out humor, but there's been a lot of political shows and shows where they just make fun of a celebrity for a half hour.
The Sarah Silverman Program is a relatively new sitcom. Sarah plays herself as a character who's extremely juvenile and annoying. The supporting cast consists of her sister and her boyfriend, and her 2 gay neighbors. Pretty good off the wall humor that I'd take any day over Mind of Mencia.

THURSDAY
Thursday's a pretty big day, where I stick to NBC. At 8, it's My Name is Earl which is kind of different this season, since Earl is in prison. Normally it revolves around Earl traveling around with his brother Randy. The supporting cast of his ex-wife, the crab man and the maid at the hotel where they live are also great. Unfortunately the dynamic of the characters has been a little off this season, but I hope Earl gets out of jail soon, and they get back on track.
At 8:30 I usually watch 30 Rock, which is basically a sitcom about the making of an SNL stlye sketch comedy show. It stars SNL alumni Tina Fey (former writer), Tracy Morgan (former cast member) and Alec Baldwin (frequent guest). It's an alright show, but hardly the best of the lineup.
The Office has been a favorite of mine for a while. It took a little while to click, but the dry awkward humor is perfect for on the job based comedy. The show is set up like a reality show, and is based on a BBC program of the same name. This is by far my favorite comedy right now, and it even has a soap opera aspect to it.
This is the final season for Scrubs, and while I enjoyed the show since its beginning, it's the right time. The show's still funny, but the characters are changing, and the show's seemed to have lost it's stamina. JD just had a baby, Carla and Turk also have a baby, Elliot called off her engagement, and they killed off Laverne. It just doesn't have the same spark as it did before. Don't get me wrong, it's a great show, but I'd stick to the re-runs.

FRIDAY
I'm rarely home on a Friday night, but if I am, Meerkat Manor on Animal Planet is pretty awesome. Occasionally Discovery Channel will have Mythbusters reruns on, and that show is amazing.

SATURDAY
As big a loser as I am, I don't watch anything on Saturday.

SUNDAY
Sundays have been dominated by Fox for me because of theSimpsons. However at this point, it's more a force of habit since the show hasn't been funny in about 10 years. It's kind of ridiculous how long that show's been on TV. I remember when it started, me and Bart were both in the 3rd grade. Of the almost 20 years the show's been on TV, it maybe had 5 or 6 truly great seasons. The jokes now seem extremely forced and predictable. I'll occasionally watch it, and it has gotten better than it was, but still not at the level of its hey day. The Simpsons movie was surprisingly decent though.
I think King of the Hill is on after that, but that is seriously the WORST show. I have no idea who watches that crap, probably the same people who like those redneck comedy shows.
Family Guy got resurrected from the dead a few years ago, and I honestly wish it hadn't. Originally it was fresh how they had little non-sequitor parts would break up the story. Maybe it loses its charm over time, but the tired pop culture referances and lack of plot really lose my interest now. South Park had a good episode which tore into the fact that their jokes cover up the fact that they have no plot.
American Dad is done by the same pople as Family Guy, and relies more on plots than pop culture jokes. It revolves around a right wing CIA agent and his wacky family. It seems to only get by when placed before/after Family Guy, but probably couldn't stand on its own.

ALL WEEL LONG!
Cartoon Network's Adult Swim programming has been reigning supreme over my late night TV viewing since it started up. During the week it runs from 11-12:30, then the Anime starts, and I go to bed. The Daily Show and the Colbert Report on Comedy Central are usually good for more high brow / low brow humor. During the 11pm-12am block of time, Adult Swim has Futurama and Family Guy (both of which I own on DVD), so I'm not really missing much if I decide to miss those. Adult Swim has original programming which airs in mass on Sunday. Great original shows like the Boondocks, Metalocalypse, Aqua Teen Hunger Force, Harvey Birdman, and old shows like Sea Lab 2021 and Space Ghost are ridiculous and great. The Adult Swim style of humor is usually pretty offensive, and sometimes ridiculous. I still don't get why anyone watches Tim and Eric Awesome Show Great Job.

Alice in Chains (ex-Neon Christ?!)

This feels more like gossip than anything else, but I was looking around myspace, and found a Neon Christ page. On that page was a link to a more official page w/ info and pictures from their 2004 reunion show. On there, it says that William (the guitar player) is currently singing for Alice In Chains. AIC recently did a reunion tour, and since their singer died, somehow the dude from Neon Christ got the gig. As if that's not weird enough, Alice in Chains made an appearance a few weeks ago on VH1's Rock Honors show. They performed w/ some country singer and did a cover of Heart's "Baracuda." The dude from Neon Christ was playing guitar on VH1! It's so weird, but at the same time pretty awesome.

at the Neon Christ Reunion:

with Alice in Chains:


If you're not familiar w/ Neon Christ, they're a classic old early 80's hardcore band from Atlanta. They put out an awesome 7", which was bootlegged a few years ago. Here's some links to learn more...
http://www.myspace.com/neonchristatlanta
http://nx.motherbuster.com
http://www.7inchpunk.com/?p=181

the State tribute

No this post isn't about the classic hardcore band, the The State (who by the way ruled). It's about the old classic comedy series, from back in the 90's on Mtv. It seemed that back in the mid-late 90's there was a resurgance in sketch comedy troupes. Comedy Central was in its infancy, and had a bunch of new sketch comedy shows, mixed in with old SNL episodes. At the same time, Mtv had a little show called the State. There were maybe like 10 people in the cast (only one was female), and they played all the characters, as well as writing and directing. The comedy style was a mix of classic Monty Python style men in drag comedy, but with a lot of edgy off the wall sick humor. It did 3 seasons on Mtv before it was cancelled. CBS picked it up briefly, but never made it past the pilot episode. The members went on to movies and tv shows. Most notable Wet Hot American Summer, one of the best movies in recent years.

It seems like the State has faded into history, due to a lack of a DVD collection maybe. I'd been hearing about a DVD for years, I think some of the cast members were even selling bootlegs at some point. The problem was that the shows used a lot of popular songs from the era. At the time Mtv was able to use any songs that had a video on Mtv as a part of any of their shows background music. Since it's been like 10 years, the license agreements had ended. This however left the state with a big chunk of sketches that couldn't be reproduced. Recently though, all the episodes have been re-cut with new music. Mtv put the episodes on iTunes a few months ago as well. Maybe they did this to test how well a potential DVD would sell, but I mean honestly who buys tv shows on iTunes? Why would I pay $2 poer episode to watch a 5" wide tv show? I know for a fact that I'd buy a boxed set in a heartbeat. Also a few members of the State star in the new Reno 911 movie, and apparently there will be guest appearances by other State alumni.

Carlos Mencia needs to shut up

I guess when Dave Chappelle walked away from his show, Comedy Central thought there was a void in the racially themed humor department. Enter the completely not funny Carlos Mencia. I can honestly say I've never found anything he's said remotely funny. I basically only watch Comedy Central, and now stupid Mind Of Mencia is on literally every night. His stand up special has been on quite a lot lately too. It's horrible all he does is state obvious racist jokes. Mexicans jump the border, black people are criminals, white people are lame, asians are smart. Real ground breaking stuff there Carlos... He also makes fun of the handicapped with his stupid fucking catchphrase of "deet dee dee." Again, real ground breaking. Dave Chappelle's racially observant humor was always fairly witty, but Carlos is basically rehashing worn out territory. You'd think that for someone whos ripping off jokes, they can at least be funny.

thanks to the Carlos Mencia Isn't Funny Myspace page

LOST is right...

I've never really talked about my TV watching on here, but I've been watching ABC's Lost since it started. I feel like I keep watching it to figure out what's going on. Between the season finale last year, and the season premiere this year, I fell like no questions were answered, but now I've got even more questions. Do the writers even know where they're going with this? In the first 2 episodes, they haven't really explained anything, and now there's even more questions. I think I've lost interest, let them all die on that confusing island, I've stopped caring.

On a more positive note, the show Heroes on NBC is really awesome. Has a definate comic book vibe, and has been pretty interesting the first 3 episodes. It reminds me a little of one of my favorite comics, Rising Stars. Normal people developing super powers, and there's some mystery in terms of what exactly their powers are, and who's going to do what. I like it.

American Idle?

Does it make anyone else sick to know that more people voted for the American Idol winner than in any presidential election. I mean more people formerd an opinion on who they want to see sing cover tunes on a cruise ship than who they'd want to see run the country. Are people really this desperate to be on TV, I mean what have all the past American Idols really done? Aside from Kelly Clarkson, nothing of merit... Maybe a fair or carnival in some southern state. This is why every other country hates us.

Sean Paul is annoying

I normally don't care about popular music, or what's radio friendly these days. I don't listen to the radio and I don't watch MTV, so my only real contact with popular music is in commercials. There's currently a commercial for a cell phone with this horrible song by Sean Paul. I'm not into dancehall reggae, but yelling gibberish over a dance beat is apparently considered music these days. I guess if you're just making music with the intent that people can dance to it, then lyrical content isn't really a factor. My sister pointed out that it's hypocritical of me to say it sounds like gibberish, when to her my music sounds like that. Big difference in that however is, there's no commercials forcing Charles Bronson and Spazz down your throat. I'm trying to watch VH1's best metal song countdown, and on the commercial breaks I'm forced to see idiots dancing with their cell phones while listing to this audio garbage. I had thought nothing could be worse than Shaggy, but I was wrong... Sean Paul sucks!