The Week in Clack – Idol hiring, zombies shambling, Miley stripping?
Round and round and round she goes, but where Paula will land, nobody knows. Maybe she can be a zombie on AMC’s forthcoming series.
- The best news ever of the week was that AMC is working on a television adaptation of The Walking Dead. The ongoing comic series is far and away the most compelling “zombie apocalypse saga” I’ve ever seen.
- TNT announced that Saving Grace would wrap with a nine episode run in 2010, because they’re too cheap to produce a full fourth season for the monster hit.
- Comedy Central, on the other hand, yanked Reno 911 after the fact, meaning it’s done and gone.
- The Apprentice’s Omarosa is going to be a minister, and somewhere suddenly cold, Satan is chalking up another win for the home team.
- In a sign that we’ve let this reality TV crap go way too far, Kim’s sister Kourtney Kardashian’s surprise pregnancy is scandalous news.
- Paula Abdul might work on Dancing With the Stars, Ugly Betty, So You Think You Can Dance, something in Australia, a local Wendy’s, or any number of jobs. She’s keeping her options open.
- Meanwhile, Victoria Beckham helped out on American Idol during early audition rounds, and may be lobbying to join the show permanently. And with all that money they saved by not rehiring Abdul, FOX re-upped Simon Cowell for three more years.
- Apparently, the networks are burning through their ’80s and ’90s DVD collections, as now they’ve greenlit a series based on St. Elmo’s Fire. Goonies, anyone?
- Speaking of ’80s and ’90s — toy-themed cartoons proved a hit at the box office again, as G.I. Joe took the top spot at the box office, meaning that I might get my Sectaurs revival sooner than I thought … maybe?
- I refuse to mention a single thing that happened to anyone involved with the Gosselins. But if that saga isn’t train-wreck enough for you, FOX is giving airtime to Octomom.
- HOLY CRAP! STEWIE IS GAY?!?
- Oh, and now the Emmys will be live. All of it. So you’ll have to add six hours to the end of your DVR scheduled recording of it … you know, just in case.
- We get a sneak preview of the future career of Hannah Montana as little Miley Cyrus danced on a stripper pole at the Teen Choice Awards.
See Jane Clack – Weeds vs. Hung vs. Breaking Bad
While pondering a topic for this week’s See Jane Clack, I was struck by the number of shows featuring characters who turn to unscrupulous or illegal means to make a living. These are tough times, but would I turn to selling pot, prostituting myself, or becoming a drug kingpin to make a living? Probably not. I’m too much of a chicken.
Still … with a family to feed, and no other immediate way to pay the mortgage and buy groceries, some of these options do have their appeal.
These folks are not that much different from the rest of us. Their connecting link is that they’ve all experienced a life trauma that’s made them desperate, and/or fearless. It’s stuff that could happen to any one of us. Lives and luck can turn in a split second.
And so begins Walter White’s hatred of women
Sunday night’s episode of Breaking Bad showed Walter White’s life take quite a few turns. He learns his previously inoperable cancer is now operable, he nearly (or possibly already did) miss out on a million-dollar deal with the blue stuff, misses out on the birth of his daughter and, quite possibly, has a wife who’s very close to cheating on him. Three out of those four are negatives, and they all have something in common: directly or indirectly, they involve women in Walt’s life.
Breaking Bad’s Walter White: a reluctant man at sea
The painting pictured above was shown a couple of times in this episode of Breaking Bad, as Walter stared at it in his hospital room. I chose to put it here because it really spells out the theme for this show, at least from Walter’s point of view. Like a seaman of centuries past, he is a man who is engaging in a perilous profession that is separating himself from his family in a way that’s impossible to avoid, the ultimate purpose being to provide for them. He might come back with the earnings of the wealthy, or with some scraps of lint and enough coins to buy a week’s supper, or as a final spoken word from a shipmate’s tale of his demise.
In any case, the risk is worth what the man considers reward: the well-being of his family. As for their happiness? That’s unfortunately up to them to find for themselves, because it’s not going to be from him.
Open Letters: So help me AMC, I will burn you to the ground!
Dear AMC,
Okay, maybe that was a little harsh. I won’t actually burn you to the ground, but I will metaphorically end you with my mind if you dick over Mad Men. Yes, I know that you said it will be back this summer, which is all well and good. I mean, I would prefer it if it came back right now; hell, what I really want is for Jon Hamm and Christina Hendricks to just come over to my house and act out scenes from the show, but I get it. I don’t always get what I want.
But let’s be honest here. You’re AMC. You’re not HBO, or Showtime; you’re not even TNT. What I mean is you’re not exactly known for your original programming. You were what old people tuned into on Sunday afternoons when they wanted to watch reruns of Murder She Wrote, or Unsolved Mysteries, or whatever the hell.
The Prisoner is free (and online)
A bunch of us here at the Clique have taken to watching classic TV shows for the first time, starting with season one. We’re calling it “The Virgin Diaries,” as we do mini-reviews of each episode as we go along. Right now we’re doing The Wire, Supernatural and Gossip Girl. I was feeling left out, so I’ve decided to take on The Prisoner, starting later this month.
Lucky for me, AMC has taken to putting all 17 episodes of the original series online, including some 1-minute recaps, all free-like! So, if you’re new to the series like I am — or even if you’ve caught the show before and want to watch it again — hop on over to their website, then come back and chime in on my reviews later. I can’t wait to see what all the fuss is about, especially the controversial finale (usually I hear a lot of “can someone tell me what the hell happened in the finale?!”)
Mad Men – Meditations In An Emergency
AMC
(Season 2, Episode 13 – Season Finale)
“Congratulations?” – Francine, about Betty’s pregnancy
Wow, they really packed everything into this season finale, eh? You can’t say that fans were cheated out of drama. Not only do they increase the cliffhanger tension (I bet fans are already craving for Season 3, Episode 1), but they also made several secrets known to the people those secrets were being kept from, progressing those plots in a way I bet fans aren’t expecting.
And a few questions were answered for loyal viewers too…
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