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April 20, 2005

Shameless

Lani, lovin' it...

In the grand, three-day-old tradition of No Shame Week, I'm gonna go ahead and dip into a specific sub-genre of Shame... The Very Bad TV Shows I Can't Live Without.

As you all know, I'm a shameless television junkie. I love it. And quite frankly, it's only getting better as time goes on. TV is finally getting the respect it deserves, and I say yay for TV.

But, let's face it. Some of it is still crap.

American Idol. I know it's big, I know lots of people love it, but it's not about talent, it's about making pop stars. It's about crass commercial appeal. And it's got a guy who looks like he'd be as likely to kill you and stuff your body parts in a trunk as sing you some shimmy-lovin' tunes. But still. I TiVo it and watch it religiously, even though I often have to fast-forward through the performances. I really only watch it to see how out of it Paula Abdul is. People say she's got some level of chemistry experimentin' going on, but my jury's still out. Could be she's just high on life.

It ain't likely, but it's possible.

Note to my lawyer, Alesia, who is hopefully not apoplectic at this moment: I didn't say Scott Savol was a serial killer, just that he looks like a serial killer, which is opinion, and hence not libel. And I didn't say Paula Abdul wasn't high on life, just that I doubted it. More opinion. All on the level. Right? Right? Tell me those hours in Communications Law have paid off...

Iron Chef. I don't cook. At least not much and definitely not well, but I adore Food TV. I could watch it all day long. I love Alton Brown from Good Eats and Rachael Ray from 30 Minute Meals and I'm not ashamed of those, but I only use them to add some dignity to my true addiction - Iron Chef. And not that tame American version - I'm talking the original, crazy-millionaire-foodie-guy Japanese version. It's got everything. Competition. Victory. Defeat. Honor. Funky Food. Bad dubbing. And, of course, my favorite moment of every show - when Crazy Millionaire Japanese Foodie Guy bites into the pepper.

Cracks. My. Ass. Up.

COPS. I never liked this show. I used to promote it when I worked for a FOX station, I used to write one-sheets for the sales team on how great it did with Males 18-34, but I never liked it. As a matter of fact, I still don't like it. It's depressing, it's sad, and the cops are sometimes less likeable than the crooks. (But only sometimes - in general, I love cops. I mean, regular cops, not the show. They risk getting shot at every day so I can live a relatively peaceful life. But the occasional power-hungry asshole does manage to get some airtime on COPS, and that guy always bugs me because he makes the rest of the great ones look bad.) Anyway, my husband loves it, and for some reason, whenever he has it on, I find myself completely intrigued. Can't look away. It's the television version of rubbernecking, I guess. But still, I can't stop myself. It's crap, but it's truly riveting television.

Posted by Lani at 2:32 PM