Le seguenti foto mostrano Hugh Laurie all’uscita dell’Ivy, un noto locale di Londra, con un evidente occhio nero.

Girano voci che se lo sia procurato durante un allenamento di pugilato a Los Angeles, sport molto amato da Laurie, anche se l’attore smentisce questa notizia e scherzando dice di aver sbattuto contro una porta.

Probabilmente ciò è dovuto al fatto che l’assicurazione non gli rimborserebbe il danno per lesioni da boxe.

House Season 6 Episode 8 Ignorance is Bliss

Watch s06e08 Heroes, 6×8 Watch House Season 6 …

November 23, 2009

A Abc finalmente anunciou a data de estréia da sexta e última temporada de Lost.

02/02/2010…pra ninguém perder hein? Com um episódio especial de 2 horas (que na verdade será o 1 e 2 episódio da série , LAX, que é dividido em 2 partes) e antes da estréia,  vai rolar um outro episódio especial (como sempre) com um resumão de tudo de importante que aconteceu até agora na ilha mais bafônica ever!

Estou a base de medicamentos para controle de ansiedade!

Watch The Office  Season 6 Episode 11 – S6E11 online video stream for free. You can watch The Office  Free Streaming Video here. For you that always been waiting for this TV show, now the newest episode of this television series has been aired on 19 Nov, 2009 (11/19). Title for newest episodes of The Office  Season 6 Episode 11 – S6E11 is ““Shareholders Meeting”".

Episode Synopsis : Michael brings Dwight, Andy, and Oscar to NYC when he’s to be honored at the Dunder Mifflin shareholder meeting. Jim tries to get Ryan to work.

Watch The Office  Season 6 Episode 11 – S6E11 online video stream here

Don’t worry if you had missed to watch this TV show at the aired date above or outside U.S and can’t watch this TV Series, you can still watch online live streaming video of  The Office  episode here for free. Taken from updated and working video hosting like Hulu, Sling, Megavideo, Zshare, etc.

Don’t miss to watch The Office  Season 6 Episode 11 – S6E11 Free Streaming Online Video, and also you can watch all Full Episodes of The Office   TV show and other popular TV series

Watch Grey’s Anatomy Season 6 Episode 10 (S6E10) online video stream for free. You can watch Grey’s Anatomy Free Streaming Video here. For you that always been waiting for this TV show, now the newest episode of this television series has been aired on 19 Nov, 2009 (11/19). Title for newest episodes of Grey’s Anatomy Season 6 Episode 10 (S6E10) is “Holidaze“.

Episode Synopsis : As Thanksgiving, Christmas and New Year’s pass, Miranda gets a visit from her father, William who disapproves of her choices in life. Mark and Lexie cope with an arrival of a woman from his past.  Thatcher questions the Chief’s recent behavior as Meredith comes to his defense.

Watch Grey’s Anatomy Season 6 Episode 10 (S6E10) online video stream here

Don’t worry if you had missed to watch this TV show at the aired date above or outside U.S and can’t watch this TV Series, you can still watch online live streaming video of  Grey’s Anatomy episode here for free. Taken from updated and working video hosting like Hulu, Sling, Megavideo, Zshare, etc.

Don’t miss to watch Grey’s Anatomy Season 6 Episode 10 (S6E10) Free Streaming Online Video, and also you can watch all Full Episodes of Grey’s Anatomy  TV show and other popular TV series

-TRAMA- 

Un vecchio amico ed ex-paziente di Wilson viene ricoverato nella clinica perché soffre di una paralisi al suo braccio destro. Nel frattempo, la Cuddy continua nella sua ricerca di una nuova casa.

Inanity, Intrigue and Inigo Montoya

November 20th, 2009

In the promos for the season finale of Season Six of Project Runway, Lifetime uses dramatic music and a deep-voiced announcer to try to build suspense for the big reveal. However, in their language, they have something wrong: they create anticipation for the reveal of who is “the next big name in fashion,” and my immediate response is “who cares?”

See, what works about Project Runway is that it transfers the aesthetics of the fashion industry into terms that are unrelated to the fashion industry. I know nothing about fashion, but I know a lot about what Nina Garcia likes to see in fashion, or what the series values in terms of creativity. It’s created an audience that, even if they have no knowledge of the fashion industry, have gained knowledge of what Project Runway considers fashion. As such, rather than caring about what these young designers do in the context of the fashion industry, we care about how they situate themselves within the show’s cast of characters from seasons past. For a viewer like me, Bryant Park is the setting of the finale of Project Runway, not a global fashion event, which is why Lifetime language is demonstrative of the season’s failures: I don’t care if they’re a big name in fashion, I want them to be a big name for Project Runway.

And I can confirm that Irina, Althea and Carol Hannah will not be names to remember, a fact which has more to do with the way the show treated them than it does with their individual personalities and talent. And while we’ll never know if this season would have been more interesting if it were in New York, and if the production company hadn’t changed, what we do know is that Season Six failed to provide both the next big name in fashion and a single memorable name for this franchise.

[A few more thoughts on Project Runway, and then some thoughts on both Top Chef and Survivor, with spoilers after the jump...]

I won’t spend any more time identifying what went wrong this season, as Linda Holmes at NPR has pretty much done that for me, but I want to say that Irina is about the perfect winner for the season. She had the most sense of character and the most interesting point of view, but was still ultimately uninteresting and lacking in identity, fitting the season perfectly. I didn’t think her collection was actually that interesting, but compared to Carol Hannah’s (which lacked cohesion) and Althea’s (which lacked clarity – there’s a difference) it was about as close to a winning collection the season could get.

And while some eliminations this season have been impossible to predict thanks to the confusing mismatch of judges, this one was really easy to see coming based on the judges’ deliberation. You could sense the judges were struggling to come up with something to say about each designer: these final critiques are always more positive than negative, and yet you could sense that the positives were all more dull than you could imagine. You could sense the judges trying to pretend as if there was ever a sense of consistency in the design aesthetics: my favourite was Heidi describing Carol Hannah, which I’ll now quote for you.

“You do see Carol Hannah, you see her point of view, and she loves dresses, and she’s impeccable in her tailoring…I mean that’s…what has…made her get this far, because she’s always been very good at that.”

So her point of view is dresses and impeccable tailoring, and the reason she got this far is because she was very good at it. Right there, with all the stammering pauses intact, you have the problem: she had no point of view except making acceptable clothes decently. Michael Kors had a similarly laughable moment when he described Althea as “very plugged into the street,” which made me guffaw. None of these designers could possibly be street-smart, and it was as if they were so desperate to distinguish these designers from one another that they needed to pigeonhole them into one idea. It made for a really hilarious sequence as you could sense things unraveling, and yet they could do nothing but plug on through and pretend that this really was the most dramatic finale of all time.

What’s interesting about Survivor (yep, this is a segueway) this season is that, for a show that often creates drama where there is none in an effort to make the final tribal council interesting, the producers have been able to sit back and watch people self-destruct over the past three weeks. Never before has a merge created quite this much chaos, and I’m sure Mark Burnett is giddy about the whole thing: I’m not sure I can remember the last time I’ve sat through the last quarter of this many episodes in a row. I fell into a pattern a while ago that I would effectively stop watching the show in its entirety after the immunity challenge, knowing that (because of how common pecking orders are, and because of how rarely the immunity idol was in play) the result was inevitable, and there were only a few occasions where something surprising happened during my fastforwarding that would result in me going back to see how it went down.

But after the merge, the self-destruction within the Galu tribe (who were dominant early on) has been a joy to watch – as Erik, sitting on the jury after being the victim of the first set of bizarre circumstances, said last night, “Man, this is some good shit.” After last week saw the Galu tribe fail to listen to Monica and plan some sort of contingency in case Russell managed to find the hidden immunity idol (which he did), resulting in Kelly leaving the game, this week was all about the Galu tribe running around like chickens with their heads cut off. When things finally get to tribal council, the sides are tied at 5, and when John eventually switches sides in order to avoid the drawing of rocks (which could send himself or anyone else home) it’s yet another moment where Galu realizes that they are not, in fact, a tribe anymore. What’s interesting about John is that he is really part of the problem here: I think that Galu would have simply picked off a Foa Foa member in that first week if he hadn’t first suggested taking off Monica, which was the information Erik got burned on as a messenger, so he’s sort of the one who set this all in motion. As such, it’s fitting he puts the final nail in the coffin in what was a really engaging final tribal council. The first merge episode had the frantic switchover that got rid of Eric, last week had Russell’s cagey Idol play, and this week saw John kill Galu for good – a very eventful, and very strong, period for Survivor.

Top Chef, meanwhile, sort of had an off week. This isn’t to suggest that I didn’t like the end result, which has the always likely Final Four come together after Jennifer manages to throw off her demons to win the Quickfire and place respectably in the Elimination Challenge in earning a spot in the Napa Valley finale, which sees Eli sent home. The episode was about the camaraderie of the chefs, as they seemed to all get along and there was a whole lot of emotion to be found in the final sequence was Eli basically admits that he’s okay going home at this stage considering the people who are going on instead (which was especially sad after Eli had turned himself into an Inigo Montoya figure for his mentor Richard Blais earlier in the episode). I didn’t particularly like Eli, but the rest of the chefs did and as a result I found his departure interesting.

However, I think that (to bring this all full circle) the actual challenge suffered because I really had no idea what this supposed “Culinary Olympics” was really about, and more problematically the show couldn’t actually judge based on that sort of criteria considering the amount of time given to the chefs. I understand that they wanted to try to capture the spirit of the event, but while Project Runway has turned Bryant Park into a life long goal that everyone aspires to this competition came out of nowhere and had too little meaning for me to be all that excited about. It also created a strange scenario where the judging was supposed to be based on who best captured the spirit of the event, and yet because nobody really went wild with zucchini baskets or anything similar it ended up coming down to whose food tasted the best, which is why Kevin was ultimately named the winner even when many judges felt Bryan had the most potential within the context of this type of competition. I don’t doubt Kevin deserved to win based on some criteria, but considering the nature of this competition he himself admitted he didn’t show enough technique, so the judges seemed to ignore that aspect of the challenge in favour of simply feeling Kevin best-executed “food” and thus wins the $30,000.

It just goes to show you that there’s only so much you can do in an hour of reality television: sometimes you try to make an exciting season sound interesting, sometimes you have everything go perfectly and barely need to touch a thing, and in another instance you have a big idea that just never translates well into the competition (unless my lack of knowledge of Thomas Keller in some way destroyed my ability to see the challenge as a really big deal).

Cultural Observations

• My favourite thing about the Runway finale was that we had the prior knowledge of the fact that, since this was taped during the period of legal limbo for the show, nobody knew who the designers were and thus they couldn’t actually be seen by the crowd and the media. What this means is that any time you saw any of the contestants watching the show, or saw the families, or saw the designers on the runway, that was all staged either before or after the fact (note how no one but the other designers comment on any contestant by name). What I loved is how, even if I hadn’t known that, the awkwardness of the introductions would have tipped me off: they were clearly uncomfortable with the charade.
• Does anyone have any verdict on Models of the Runway? I stopped watching after about two weeks, and I found that the models were total non-entities for me as a result – I can’t imagine watching another 30-minutes of this terrible season every week, but I did miss not caring about Irina’s model in any capacity when she won.
• My one complaint with Survivor is that they “gamed” the game too much in terms of trying to turn the “Immunity Idol” scavenger hunt that Russell invented into an actual part of the gameplay setup. It was way too easy to find when they were given a visual clue, and while it resulted in the “chase through the woods sequence” and got a good moment out of Dave being oh-so-close to finding it, I thought that it was a bit cheap and sort of took the spontaneity out of Russell’s genius.
• I’ve had no issues with Kevin’s beard on Top Chef this season, as I believed it to be awesome, but then this week we saw what happens when he doesn’t spike his hair at all. It totally makes the beard look about 5x mangier, and the longish greasy hair he had in the preview for next week made it look even more ridiculous. The different hair at Napa (Padma had bangs, Jennifer’s was curly) totally took me out of the show, which really does say something about me, doesn’t it?

Bem báfu esse poster que na verdade nem é tão diferente assim do anterior, tem apenas mais personagens do passado de Lost, que já partiram dessa para uma melhor na série. Medro! E John continua de costas neam? E a presença de Vincent! Rouf Rouf!

Detalhe o nome do primeiro (e segundo ep porque será um epispodio duplo) é LAX. Báfu! Será que eles conseguiram chegar a LA? Que báfu seria isso? Estou mega ansioso mil!

Bom, fato é que certamente o episódio final de LOST vai entrar para a história como uma das maiores audiências da Tv, fatão!

Até o momento eles estão fazendo um jogo duro com relação aos spoillers e não estão querendo liberar muita coisa, só o que eu sei é o nome dos 4 primeiros eps dessa temporada final:

Lost Season 6 – Episode 1: LAX
Lost Season 6 – Episode 2: LAX (2)
Lost Season 6 – Episode 3: What Kate Does
Lost Season 6 – Episode 4: The Substitute

E é isso, só nos resta tentar nos conter de tanta ansiedade!

In the opening scene of Season 7 of Project Runway, Heidi walks into the bathroom.  It’s really steamy, and she doesn’t know why.  She thought she was alone.

She goes to open the shower door and is shocked to see Tim Gunn standing in her shower.  Tim turns around, smiles and says, “Hello Heidi!  How are you doing this morning?  I thought I’d get an early start.  I’m delighted to start our first season of Project Runway on Lifetime!”

Horrified, Heidi realizes that…

(a) Tim Gunn must be really confused;

(B) She really needs to stop eating before bed; and

(C) Season 6 of Project Runway was all a dream.

(More like a nightmare.)

Tonight was the season finale of Project Runway, in which a collection of vibrant, diverse, and innovative clothing was passed over in favor of a parade of unimaginative black sweaters and felt helmets. I am of course speaking of the shocking defeat of Carol Hannah Whitfield, with the PR judges instead selecting Irina Shabayeva instead as the winner for Season 6.

The third finalist, Althea Harper, produced what was in my opinion an all-over-the-place collection of boring separates and knitwear. The clothes themselves were nice, but they didn’t go together on the models and really looked like something you could buy at Target. What is most infuriating about Carol Hannah’s loss was the way in which the winner was announced. Instead of Althea being told she was going not the winner first, and having Carol Hannah and Irina as the last two standing, Carol Hannah was sent home first. This made it seem as though Althea’s collection was better than Carol Hannah’s, which it patently was not. The judges’ comments even backed this up. The main – and really only – critique of  Carol Hannah’s collection was the lack of “common thread”, a quality that was far, far more present in Althea’s line. Carol Hannah was complimented on her designs and fabulous use of color. Irina’s line, on the other hand, was almost entirely black, with repeated motifs of armor and metal. It was dark-on-dark and much the detail was hidden from easy view. It honestly seemed like Irina had become fixated on the idea of a black sweater with metal accents, for that is what she gave us model after model. Even her gown had the same accents, with what seemed like the same strips of metallic fabric done in almost exactly the same way. Overall, a major upset that will surely have mouths flapping for weeks to come.

Here’s a taste of Carol Hannah’s line:

And here’s some of Irina’s line:

To see all 36 designs by the three finalists, visit the Elle website. They’re all jumbled up in an attempt to keep the winner a secret pre-finale, but essentially if it has a headband or is a non-black sweater with long sleeves, it’s Althea’s. If it has a felt helmet, a high ponytail, or is black and ominous, it’s Irina’s. If it’s perky, colorful, and wearable while still being high-fashion, it’s Carol Hannah’s.

ABC announced today that the final season of LOST will premiere on Tuesday, February 2nd.

The Press Release:

ABC ANNOUNCES THE PREMIERE OF THE SIXTH AND FINAL SEASON OF “LOST,” WITH A SPECIAL ALL-NIGHT EVENT ON TUESDAY, FEBRUARY 2

ABC announces the premiere of the sixth and final season of “Lost,” with a special all-night event on Tuesday, February 2. A recap special will kick
off the night from 8:00-9:00 p.m., ET, followed by the much anticipated two-hour premiere from 9:00-11:00 p.m.

The series will then air in its regular time period – Tuesday nights from 9:00-10:00 p.m., ET – beginning the following week, on February 9.

“Lost” stars Naveen Andrews as Sayid, Nestor Carbonell as Richard Alpert, Emilie de Ravin as Claire, Michael Emerson as Ben, Jeff Fahey as Frank
Lapidus, Matthew Fox as Jack, Jorge Garcia as Hurley, Josh Holloway as Sawyer, Daniel Dae Kim as Jin, Yunjin Kim as Sun, Ken Leung as Miles,
Evangeline Lilly as Kate, Terry O’Quinn as Locke and Zuleikha Robinson as Ilana.

“Lost” was created by Jeffrey Lieber and J.J. Abrams & Damon Lindelof. Abrams, Lindelof, Bryan Burk, Jack Bender, Edward Kitsis, Adam Horowitz, Jean Higgins and Carlton Cuse serve as executive producers. “Lost.” which is filmed entirely on location in Hawaii and premiered on September 22, 2004, is from ABC Studios.

Beginning with a one hour recap show at eight, and a two-hour season premiere at 9:00pm, the news has left fans like me anticipating the possibility of a FlashForward/LOST/V Tuesday night schedule on ABC.

Wouldn’t that be great!

Lost Season Six Premiere Date + Ramifications

November 19th, 2009

Well, there’s finally a date. On Groundhog Day, 2010, Lost returns for its sixth and final season with a two-hour finale on a new night (Tuesdays) and at a new time (9pm Eastern), and…well, it doesn’t really matter.

See, I’m as excited as everyone else is about Lost’s final season, and since my Tuesday viewing schedule is more open than Wednesday I’m pleased to have the show making the move to the night. However, this season isn’t about ratings, or timeslots, or really anything: Lost is getting a final season that is for the fans, not to prove anything to Nielsen or anyone else, and the result is that this move says less about Lost and more about the remainder of ABC’s lineup.

As such, while this is certainly exciting news (only 75 days away!), I want to take some time to discuss what this means for some of ABC’s other shows that will be affected (or won’t be affected) by this change.

For newcomer V, it effectively means that the show is going to be moving to 10pm behind Lost when it returns to the air in March (since I started this piece, Variety confirms this is likely ABC’s intention). While this hasn’t been confirmed by ABC, the family-friendly nature of Dancing with the Stars would make moving the results show to 10pm to be illogical, so that will be taking V’s current 8pm slot (although, Better Off Ted and Scrubs are in that timeslot once V finishes, and will likely remain through mid-February) and thus forcing V to move later into the evening.

While another night is always possible, it’s unlikely: ABC thinks that V could be its next Lost (just as it thinks FlashForward could be its next Lost), and the back-to-back science fiction potential is something they’re probably going to jump on. When I raised this point on Twitter, however, both Jace Lacob and Alan Sepinwall quickly pointed out that this goes against ABC’s experience for the past five years: people don’t want to watch another show like Lost after they watch Lost, as evidenced by the failure of Invasion, Alias, and a whole host of other shows who learned the hard way that Lost is not, in fact, a strong lead-in for other genre programming.

And yet, I don’t think ABC is going to start paying attention to this evidence, as even if V doesn’t prosper in the storyline there really isn’t a better slot available to them. Lost will provide one of the biggest demographic lead-ins on the network, and the show’s only competition in the timeslot is the older female skewing The Good Wife (we’re not counting Jay Leno as competition). While the shows aren’t going to become extremely compatible all of a sudden, as Lost has never meshed that well with other shows (as Alan points out, fans are too busy deconstructing Lost to bother with another series – I know I’ll be writing my Lost review and watching V later, for example), it’s the safest spot to put the show after it will have been off the air for over three months by the time it returns.

The one problem, however, is that it creates substantial expectations: right now, V is self-starting at 8pm, which makes expectations low enough that even two weeks of substantial dropoff have seen it remain a “hit” by any logical standard. When it comes back, it’s going to have a substantial lead-in, and less competition, and while airing at 10pm creates slightly lower expectations it’s still going to mean that the bar will be set higher for the series. It places a lot of pressure on the new creative team at V to pull something together to appeal to this influx of potential viewers, and that might actually work against it in the end. However, ABC is crossing its fingers that it will all work out, and they can be talking about V’s sixth season in the future.

This is also, relatively speaking, a coup for Modern Family and Cougar Town, as ABC is unwilling to move their comedy block around in order to put Lost back into its old stomping grounds on Wednesdays. While some could argue that there was room at 10pm, considering Eastwick is done and that Ugly Betty could easily be banished back to Fridays should it fail to see an uptick in viewers from its move to Wednesdays, ABC is both confident in their Wednesday lineup and looking to use Lost’s last season to drum up at least a bit of support for their current crop of shows that, unlike Lost, will be around in the future.

Cultural Observation

• The premiere date came with confirmation about which characters would be regulars this year, which contains few surprises – full list is at the Variety article, in case you’re paranoid about spoilers.

Here’s a date for your diary… Tuesday February 2nd 2010 is your official start date for Lost season 6. That’s only another 75 days to go Losties! The end is almost here!!! -We’ll give you info on the official UK start date as soon as we have it!!

Have You Seen Desperate Housewives: Season 6 Episode 9 – Would I Think of Suicide??

Episode Synopsis:

In the wake of another unexpected attack, Angie decides the time has come for her and her family to move away from Wisteria Lane. In the meantime, Susan and Bree clash over the latter’s affair with Karl Mayer, whereas Gabrielle and Lynette clash over the latter’s pregnancy. Meanwhile, Katherine’s crazy schemes have brought Mike to a point where he can no longer put up with her, and a heated arguement between the two of them has shocking results.

So what do you think of this episode?

If you missed it, you can watch it here.

I never thought that I would be that person, the one that followed tv shows on Youtube. I mean seriously, I wish that I could watch them on my telly but to actually follow them on the internet requires a whole new level of  commitment that I just didn’t see me making.

Imagine my surprise when in an attempt to postpone the inevitable and dillydally instead of working on my homework assignments, I came across the first week of X Factor 2009 season 6 auditions. I didn’t just watch the show to rate my singing abilities against those of the entrants but I fell in love with the contestants, and wanted to see them perform and develop, grow on the show. It’s been a couple months now and I still look forward to Mondays and Tuesdays when I can watch all the videos together, the performances and live results. Perhaps pathetic, but who cares. I actually cried the week that Rachel Adedeji was eliminated- she is an amazing singer and even more remarkable person. I don’t care what the entire British population says, she is definitely a marketable singer. In the word’s of Eliza Doolittle, “Just you wait Henry Higgins (Brit Pop)! …You’ll be sorry but your tears will be too late!

More as a reminder for me but I guess also for those interested, I am posting a link to the finalists’ performance of You are not Alone. It was definitely awesome to see Miss Frank again, big up to the ladies- you’re sorely missed.

This might be my last post about House (well,at least until the next super idiotic thing happens)

I haven’t watched the 8th episode, Jennifer Morrison’s/Cameron’s last, Teamwork but I watched a few of the scenes, watched the heartbreaking scene between Cameron and House.

I cried today watching that scene, it ruined my day (as pathetic as that sounds).
The only time I cried at a movie/tv show was when I was little,less that 7 I think and I was watching La Piovra(an italian tv show of the 80s-early90s about the fight with the mob)and this character called Corrado Cattani ,was killed in a horrible and brutal way ,gunned down by a wall. I remember that I cried the whole night then not because he was brutally murdered but because I thought that,since he was the title character at that time, the show was over. It was in fact not over but I didn’t know squat about seasons and stuff like that. I will always remembered how I cried about that show, it was the first show that got me hooked and I watched it ,the first 5 or 6 series, a couple of times since then (now my fav character is Tano,the mobster LOL).

Back to House and Cameron’s departure now. Honestly I don’t even know what to say, I am very disappointed, it was one of the reasons I cried. The last scene was good but it marks the end of a story that never began,the end of a character that grew so much,that evolved and shared a special connection to House(even in that last scene we got a glimpse of just how well she knows House). For over 3 seasons, House/Cameron was pretty canon ,the chemistry was always ,until the end,amazing, there were subtle scenes,glances,the eye!sex as we call it,that pull ,the understanding, sexual tension and a beautiful story waiting to happen,nothing forced,something that grew from the first episode of the first season. In the end it (and we ,the fans) got nothing,it got no story,it was a lot like sex without the orgasm ,foreplay that lead to nowhere and jumped straight to the “bye bye,I’m going home”. All it got was the echo,the memory of distant promises from everyone including David Shore and Katie Jacobs, a kiss that was never discussed and that was ,probably on purpose, set in a context that allowed it to mean nothing in the end. Most of all,in the end, all it (and we) got was a farewell scene that had a lot of soul and the confession that came too late,at a point where Cameron faced the new canon House,a House who probably never cared about her,a House who didn’t experience the first 3 seasons. I wish this would have happened in season 3 when he was still the House i loved ,the House who had a connection with her and I wish it would have taken their relationship to the next level in a far less soap-opera-ish way than the Huddy, with far less accent on it, just glimpses,something,anything,even short lived.
All that is left are broken promises, no fulfillment, an empty spot where an amazing character used to be and the disappointment and anger caused by a bunch of producers,writers and executives who decided that only one small group in a fandom is to be taken into consideration even though this is a business and in a business one should take all customers into consideration.

Huddy is stupid, the whole backstory now makes no sense because the first seasons had nothing of that,it’s all forced and it takes away from what the show used to be,the ratings will drop and it will die but I don’t care,I don’t want to care anymore.

Hugh Laurie,you’ll never read this but you disappointed me too, maybe now you really only care about the money and fame or are too tired to realize what is going on in your show.

I want to preface this blog hailing Larry David as a genius. I love him. I love him. I love him. I admit I was a bit worried with the plantation genre and the stereotypical ending in Season Six of “Curb Your Enthusiasm”, but he managed to dodge that lingering bullet almost effortlessly in Season 7. Vivica A. Fox’s character Loretta Black  and Larry break up in the second episode of the season, “Vehicular Fellatio” and it had nothing to do with race. Larry was planning on dumping her because she got cancer. He is so unsympathetic and sympathetic you just have to love him.

So Larry’s project in Season 7 is winning his wife’s affection by letting her play the role of his actual wife in a “Seinfeld” reunion season. And everyone is on board. We get to see Julia play Elaine, Seinfeld play himself, Larry’s mirror image George Costanza, Jason Alexander ironically as Larry’s complete opposite….and there is….. Michael Richards….. as Kramer. Ehhhhhhhlllllllllllll.

the pink elephant in the room-racist richards

We know he had to be on the show to fulfill the myth of the reunion season, but there is just this bad taste in my mouth when I see him on screen. I’m sure most of you remember his infamous racial fuck-up. It was a fuck-up so bad it wasn’t even excusable. It was the fuck-up heard round the world, Lexington and Concord style.  Here’s a link to his comedy routine.

Okay I just watched it again I am pissed!!!! Arrggggh! When will it stop? Here are just a few unsettling savory bits:

“Fifty years ago we’d have you hanging upside down from a tree!”

“They’re going to arrest me for calling a black man a nigger?”

“Throw his ass out! He’s a nigger, He’s a nigger, He’s a nigger!”

oh LAWD

After a while the black man he was talking to called him a cracker, which I discuss in my earlier blog, is embedded with a notion of racial superiority on the part of the white person who is being called said name.

I’m not really sure what pissed Michael Richards off so much. But I am gonna assume it was some loud mouth Negroes, yeah I said it, talking too much during a performance which is why he told them to shut up. And yes, really my brothers and sisters, you know who you are, you need to stop talking through movies, it’s annoying. I wanted to cut a bitch the last time I was in the theater.

But there is no reason to say what Richards said. I mean come on. A good shut the fuck up would have sufficed. He didn’t need to offend everyone in the place. And he forgets, black folk actually paid to see him perform. I mean can you imagine, taking your lovely black boyfriend or girlfriend on a date to a comedy show, and thinking wow, we get to see the guy who played Kramer, I’m so excited, and while you’re sipping on your Long Island Iced Tea you get taken back to 1865 with some white dude talkin bout hanging niggers from trees. NIET KIEL DAWG.

Hence, the icky taste in my mouth. But in the last episode of Curb Your Enthusiasm, Larry addresses the issue of harboring a known racist on the show. He does this in three ways.

1. Michael Richards looks like crap compared to everyone else in the show. Even though everyone has aged, they still look the same. Maybe they have led healthy lives, maybe it’s the make-up job, but clearly they skipped over Richards. Additionally, the hair that made Kramer so noticeable is almost all but gone. Larry wants him to look that way. By presenting Richards as visually unattractive, his appearance clearly faltering since his racist comedy routine, Larry is reflecting on the accepted myth that sin is written on the body. (A topic heavily discussed in Oscar Wilde’s Picture of Dorian Gray and The Libertine)

if you hadn't been fucking all those whores, maybe God would have spared you leprosy

2. To reify this idea, Larry also gives Richards a life threatening illness, Groat’s disease(a fictional illness) that may cause his death. He is literally paying for the sins externally and internally that he committed when he pledged his allegiance to supremacy on that unforgettable day.

3. He cleverly has a scene with Leon and Richards, in which Richards has a valid reason to be pissed at Leon (he lied about his identity and duped him into giving $200,000). While he is screaming a crowd of people are watching Richards yell at this black man and we laugh because ironically he an actual reason to be pissed. It is really funny and makes it a bit more acceptable for Richards to be part of this season.

However, I recently read a blog, by the African American Environmentalist Association-Hollywood, and while I agree Larry made a smart move in the “The Table Read”, it really doesn’t redeem or reform Richards as a person. It only redeems Richards within the fictional world of “Curb Your Enthusiasm” that Larry himself has created. And then we have to think, well if Richards’ previous act of racism had to be addressed to us, how will it be addressed to the fictional audience that would be watching the Seinfeld reunion season? And, ignoring the fact that humor on a fictional show doesn’t excuse an act of racism in the real world, we were too busy laughing at the scene to deconstruct what it fails to address. When Richards says “if there were any word i could use to show how angry i am…,” David seems to be juxtaposing valid reasons to be pissed off (leon lying/getting 200g) against using racial slurs without a valid reason. But is there ever a valid reason to use racial slurs? And I say valid reason cuz clearly the heckling at his comedy show did not warrant “nigger,nigger, nigger”, but because Leon lies it might? And are we ignoring the real irony in this scene, that Richards could have “slipped up” again because Leon did what a white man told him, and most likely Leon had to lie because his livelihood (living in Larry’s mansion) depends on it?

Larry also depicts this representation in “The Anonymous Donor,” Season 6, when a dry-cleaner loses his baseball jersey. He then has Leon approach a man wearing the similar jersey(we don’t know if it is Larry’s or not) and from then on the white man Leon has robbed may engage in stereotyping of black men as criminals. But the crazy thing about it is that Leon himself didn’t care about the jersey, he stole the jersey because Larry, the white male, wanted him too. Is Larry making a statement, by having Leon bear the brunt of his iniquities, that blacks are unfairly stereotyped not by their own acts, but the acts that are guided by the white man. Basically, are whites are hating blacks because of whites. I mean that is why Richards gets pissed at Leon, Larry doesn’t take the rap for the incident, at least we don’t get to see it.

If so, whoa Larry, and Bravo, Bravo. I now love your show even more, can we be best friends?

Of course, it is not up to Larry David to rectify Richards fuck-up. He shouldn’t have to alter his whole season cuz Richards can’t keep his mouth shut. I think David makes amends to his avid black fans by at least addressing the issue, and I thank him for it. But Richards has a long way to go. A fictional confrontation on the issue will not redeem his racist soul. And although most black folk are forgiving, sorry Richards, you don’t get my vote.

Thoughts?

P.S.

J.B. Smoove on the scene with Michael Richards:

“I can’t see someone being so upset with it that they’d never want him to be on TV again. You can pass the blame along, or you can accept your responsibility, and he accepted his actions. Sometimes, when you get a girl pregnant, you blame the condom. His condom broke that night.”

UPDATE:

Ok…so now that the votes are tabulated, it’s time to vote for LOST in the People’s Choice Awards Finals:

Let’s work together to give LOST the accolades it deserves in it’s final season! And…

Remember to refresh and VOTE OFTEN!

CLICK EACH IMAGE TO VOTE:

VOTING ENDS DEC. 8th, AWARDS AIR JAN. 6

You can also vote for LOST as Best SciFi program HERE! 

Thanks to VirginiaCreeper at SpoilerTV for the quick links!

Nelle seguenti foto vediamo Hugh Laurie trascorrere il suo tempo libero a Los Angeles, con due dei suoi tre figli, Bill e Rebecca.

-TRAMA-

House e il suo team devono vedersela con il caso di James Sidas, un brillante fisico che ha deciso di abbandonare il lavoro di ricerca per un altro impiego, sostenendo che la sua intelligenza è stata solo un fardello che ha gli ha portato depressione e dipendenza. 

PER VEDERE IL VIDEO DELLA PUNTATA COMPLETA CLICCARE SUL LINK SOTTO:

http://megavideo.com/?v=0TLLMRF1

-TRAMA-

Una ragazza, Jordan, viene portata al Plainsboro dopo essere svenuta, con le mani e i piedi gonfi. Rimane accanto a lei un’amica, e affermano di aver passato la serata precedente con un loro idolo, l’autore di uno show televisivo, Jeffrey Keener. Del caso si occupano Chase, Cameron e Foreman. House pensa alla rabdomiolosi, ma le analisi di Chase smentiscono quest’ipotesi, e si inizia a pensare alla bulimia. Intanto, Wilson va a una conferenza, e House, venuto a conoscenza del fatto che anche la Cuddy parteciperà, decide di andare con loro. Wilson, prima di partire, va da un suo paziente, malato terminale di cancro, molto sofferente. La ragazza, intanto, convinta dall’amica, confessa di non aver trascorso la serata con Keener, ma di averlo semplicemente pedinato in compagnia dell’amica; le due non si sono mai separate, tranne una volta, dove Jordan si è allontanata per andare da Keener. Inizialmente, racconta di avergli riportato l’agenda personale dimenticata al ristorante e di aver avuto un rapporto con lui nella stanza, ma le analisi rivelano che un’emorragia le sta schiacciando una parte del cervello, causando le bugie. In realtà Jordan non ha avuto il coraggio di bussare alla porta di Keener, e ha solo lasciato davanti alla porta l’agenda. House, intanto, partecipa ad una festa anni ‘80 tra i partecipanti alla conferenza, e incontra la Cuddy; parlando, House le fa capire che è interessato a lei da molto tempo, ma la Cuddy, improvvisamente, lascia la festa stupita e torna nella sua stanza, con la figlia adottiva. Il mattino dopo, House scopre che il paziente di Wilson è morto: Wilson aveva comunicato a un’infermiera la combinazione per la dose di morfina a voce alta, in modo che il paziente la sentisse, così, per l’eccesso di morfina, il paziente ha perso la vita. House capisce che l’amico voleva che succedesse proprio il giorno della conferenza, in modo da parlare del caso, dell’eutanasia. House non vuole che l’amico parli, perché teme che possa rovinarsi la carriera, così lo droga e gli sottrae il discorso. Fa House il discorso al posto di Wilson, dal momento che è andato alla conferenza sotto falso nome. Wilson inizialmente non prende bene l’accaduto, ma poi conviene con House che è stata la cosa migliore. House, intanto, viene a conoscenza della relazione tra Lucas, un investigatore privato che lui aveva già assunto in precedenza, e la Cuddy, e capisce che Lucas è una persona sempre presente, mentre lui non è abbastanza affidabile… Frattanto, Jordan peggiora a causa di alcune emorragie interne, ma House, discutendo con Wilson, trova la soluzione al caso: la ragazza aveva mangiato ostriche al ristorante, proprio come Keener, solo che la ragazza aveva l’emocromatosi; questo l’ha resa sensibile al vibrione delle ostriche, causando l’edema alle articolazioni. Le era stato somministrato il ferro contro l’ipotesi di bulimia, sovraccaricando il fegato, il che ha causato le varie emorragie interne; così, riesce a curarla con farmaci per l’emocromatosi e per il vibrione dell’ostrica. Chase, a fine episodio, confessa alla sospettosa Cameron l’omicidio di Dibala.

“Murder”

November 12th, 2009

The best thing about The Office is that its silliest episodes can sometimes be its most effective. An episode like “Cafe Disco” last season was the perfect way to break through the tension of the Michael Scott Paper Company period, devolving into a dance party that helped to bring everyone back together albeit through a less than serious structure. While the show can go off the rails if things become too silly, there is something very honest about situations where the silliness is the result of a human response to a crisis, or to a period of tension. Michael Scott is not the only person in the world who doesn’t like tense situations, although he may be the only one who decides to turn his office into a dance party or, as we see in “Murder,” the scene of a vicious murder.

What makes the episode work is that it continues a couple of ongoing character trends (Jim slowly turning into Michael, Andy’s interest in Erin) in an episode that otherwise devolves into the office’s crazier characters overacting their way through a murder mystery in a box while the rest of the characters contemplate some major financial restructuring. It’s a good introduction to what seems like the next major arc for the series, and I think it’s an effective piece of television comedy in the process.

I want to start off by acknowledging that anybody not charmed by Ed Helms in this episode is simply immune to charm. Andy in a relationship with Angela was ultimately a mistake because she is insufferable and he is earnest, to the point where the relationship was destructive to a character that I genuinely like (Dwight and Angela worked because Dwight suffering has always felt more logical, and the two “deserved” each other to some degree). But now that the show is sweeter on Andy, albeit not afraid to make him creepy (See: touching Pam’s stomach), it makes more sense for him to go after someone like Erin in a way that is sort of allowing the show to pretend like we saw the first days of Jim and Pam’s flirtations, except with both characters being a bit more off kilter. I also like that the episode does give us both sides of the relationship, as we see Andy’s anxiety for most of the episode before revealing that we could have just as easily seen Erin’s anxiety throughout. Ellie Kemper broke my heart in the scene where she tells us she thought it was a real date, and that’s stunning for an episode that had characters talking in terrible southern accents for most of its run time.

Similarly, despite the overall zaniness, I thought that the Jim and Michael side of this story hit home pretty well. While this isn’t quite “Tube City,” it is an example of Michael going for the fun over the practical, although Jim once again sees that there is some logic to his argument. He argues that it was a good day for there to be two managers, and I think the episode only worked because of it. Part of what frustrates Jim about Michael is how selfish some of his ideas are, and there was a moment here where (when defending the murder mystery) Michael became overly emotional and more or less admitted that it is more he than the office who needs this. It’s why he falls further into the delusion when David Wallace does eventually call (although, to Michael’s credit, he did call him in the first place), and it’s why Jim eventually withholds the information regarding the company’s insolvency. He knows that the office wouldn’t be able to take that sort of news, and that the game (for all of its silliness) might be the only way to get through this day. Some have argued that this storyline is the show preparing for Steve Carell’s exit from the series, letting Jim learn from Michael’s successes and failures, and while I don’t think Carell will leave the show so soon (his movie career hasn’t suffered due to being busy on the show, it’s suffered due to bad movies) I do think that it’s really getting the most out of the dual-manager system.

Otherwise, I thought this one was a lot of fun if not a lot of substance. I’ve done these murder mysteries before, and it is only really fun when everyone gets involved, so seeing montages like Dwight accusing everyone before eventually deciding it’s Phyllis (which is right) because she is who he is most medium suspects is just plain funny. I also liked seeing how Pam, who Jenna Fischer did a great job turning into a cranky opponent of Michael in the past few episodes, transitioned back into a supportive role, playing along before anyone else and then quite wonderfully becoming part of the double agent gun fight in the episode’s coda. I thought the episode did a great job of breaking down the bigger pieces of news with humour, like Oscar being forced to use a terrible southern belle accent to try to explain cash flow problems – it never seemed like it was reducing the importance of those emails and the reality of Dunder Mifflin’s financial scenario, but it also never got bogged down by them either.

As for those problems, we’ll see where they go from there: the show has not been avoiding the recession, as branches have been closed and jobs have been lost, but for the entire company to be in this position is something that raises a lot more questions. We know that Scranton as a branch has been performing well, but having two managers seems frivolous and this certainly does place Michael’s job (as a potentially unnecessary bureaucracy) in jeopardy. This was a good way to ease into the storyline with a bit of humour, so I’m pleased to wait and see what the show has to offer from here on out.

Cultural Observations

• In an ideal world, Dwight would have had some emotional component in this one, because Rainn Wilson was pretty great throughout: I particularly enjoyed the cold open, which is a very simple joke (Dwight attacking Dwight) that was just played really well.
• I am enjoying the fact that Ryan’s weird fashion choices has become an unspoken joke for the show and all, but isn’t it about time we bumped him from the credits? I don’t dislike B.J. Novak or anything, but it’s getting obnoxious.
• I thought that Creed’s late arrival, and his quick exit when he thinks he was really under suspicion of murder, was almost too rote a Creed joke: I knew how it would go as soon as he drew up, and not necessarily in a good way.