Get On It
Burning Love 2
Thursdays (BurningLove.com)
New Season: The sequel to 2012’s online hit Burning Love, the Bachelor spoof that was waaay too long coming, premiered last week on Valentine’s Day: Burning Love 2 centers on Burning Love’s “damaged goods,” Julie Gristlewhite (June Diane Raphael of Adult Swim’s NTSF:SD:SUV), and her search for the perfect man—after a post-rejection fling as a lesbian, during which she discovered “I’m not gay,” but “if it can happen to Anne Heche, it can happen to anyone.” As over-the-top-of-the-top giddily desperate Raphael plays Julie, she still can’t touch the real crazy of The Bachelorette, and her suitors—including Adam Scott, Jerry O’Connell, Michael Cera, Adam Brody, Colin Hanks, Rob Huebel, Paul Scheer, Nick Kroll, Martin Starr and more—aren’t as restraining-order-worthy as the creeper parade of the source material, but the funny? Burning Love 2 delivers, in 13-minutes spurts.
Get Around to It
End of the World
Saturday, Feb. 23 (Syfy)
Movie: Here’s a new twist for a Syfy disaster flick: plasma rain! In End of the World (what was wrong with Plasma Rain! as a title?), said space precipitation causes massive power surges, telecommunications outages and more passable CGI explosions than you can shake a Megapython at; naturally, it’s up to a pair of sci-fi fanboys to apply their collective knowledge garnered from running a video store (Google it, kids) toward saving the planet. The “star” here is Greg Grunberg—still wearing that leather jacket from Heroes—who could easily just shield Earth from the plasma rain with his colossal noggin.
Get Far, Far Away From It
Upload With Shaquille O’Neal
Thursday, Feb. 21 (TruTV)
Series Debut: No, The Only TV Column That Matters™ isn’t going to recuise itself every time a new show from those title-thieving bastards at TruTV premieres—just sayin,’ I established the True TV column 10 years before they decided to rebrand Court TV. So … how big of a steaming pantload is Upload With Shaquille O’Neal? Imagine Tosh.0 hosted by Sasquatch in a track suit, minus Sasquatch’s shimmering wit. Sure, Internet-clip shows are cheap to produce, but that piddling amount of scratch could be put to far better use. Like, mailing a check to a wronged TV columnist. I also accept PayPal.
Out There
Friday, Feb. 22 (IFC)
Series Debut: IFC sneak-previewed a crude, unfinished sketch demo of the animated Out There in January, and … wha? That was the final product? It’s not going to get any better than crayon-scrawled blobs dashed off by stoners between Del Taco runs? OK, then. Out There follows the small-town misadventures of … kids? Werewolves? Crayon-scrawled blobs? Hell if I know. Series creator Ryan Quincy used to work on South Park—not exactly the epicenter of great animation, but at least those blobs are identifiable. Related: Why does Del Taco sound so good right now?
Celebrity Wife Swap
Tuesday, Feb. 26 (ABC)
Season Premiere: Continuing its cycle of comedy abuse, ABC is shipping Happy Endings off to Fridays and bringing Celebrity Wife Swap off the bench to save Tuesday nights. The sad, sad thing is, it’ll probably work: The first Wives to be swapped tonight are Kendra Wilkinson (the mentally-challenged former Playmate married to sports-employment-challenged Hank Baskett) and Kate Gosselin (the shame-challenged attention ‘ho who, it must be noted, is no one’s wife at the moment, nor probably ever again). Come on—you know ‘Merica is going to lap up every second of this trainwreck, and this isn’t even the worst/best of ABC’s plans: Next month, Celebrity Diving, now retitled Splash, takes over the night. Oh, Happy Endings, you never stood a chance …
DVD Roundup
The Client List: Season 1
A struggling single mom (Jennifer Love Hewitt) finds work in a massage parlor, only to find out happy endings are on the secret menu—soon, she’s the joint’s premier handjob whisperer. A series about female empowerment … sure, go with that. (Sony)
Freaky Deaky
Christian Slater, Billy Burke, Crispin Glover and a boatload of models star in Elmore Leonard’s tale of a disgraced cop (Burke) taking on a loony millionaire (Glover) and a bomb-making nutjob (Slater) in ’74 L.A. Freaky deaky, indeed. (E1)
Girls Against Boys
After being wronged by dumb men, a woman (Danielle Panabaker) and a coworker (Nicole LaLiberte) go on a dude-slaying spree set to a, yep, killer soundtrack. A movie about female empowerment … sure, go with that. (Anchor Bay)
The Master
A WWII vet (Joaquin Phoenix) meets the leader of a religious movement (Philip Seymour Hoffman), who tries to cure him of his alcoholism and general insanity with what is certainly not Scientology so don’t sue me, OK? (The Weinstein Co.)
Total Retribution
An army trapped aboard an orbiting space station battles to save Earth from malicious space zombies and gets naked more often than seems necessary for orbital combat. Not to be confused with Total Recall, Resident Evil or filmmaking. (Phase 4)
More New DVD Releases (Feb. 26)
Border Run, Chasing Mavericks, Chicken With Plums, Company of Heroes, Fast Girls, Hardflip, Holy Motors, Iron Road, Kiss the Abyss, Law & Order: Season 12, The Loneliest Planet, Nobody Gets Out Alive, Sins, Teenage Bank Heist
This article appears in Feb 21-27, 2013.
Certainly I can’t be the only one who despises this lifeless column. This was much, much better when Bob Grimm did it as ‘Now Showing At Home’.
Why ruin a good thing?
As the father of two teenagers, I found this column invaluable. I’m sure other parents here can empathize when I say I shudder at the thought of the increasing influence and presence of television in the lives my children. I certainly remember the strain I caused so long ago for my own parents when I began experimenting with television. The long, near hypnotic watch schedule that kept my mom and dad up all night with worry. Don’t even get me started on the habits I acquired when we got our first satellite dish.
To think, I was even younger than my kids are now! television are everywhere and it doesn’t help that the tv and movies make television seem glamorous and cool. This column helped me really approach the subject of television with my kids in an honest, open and non judgmental way. Because of the insights this column provided, I can sleep a little better and cope with the reality that I can’t always be there to protect my kids from television, especially as they become adults. I’m confident that my teens, when confronted by a television show, whether it be network, or cable TV, are much better prepared to make wiser decisions than I did.
At the very least my children certainly know that they can always come to me if they have any concerns, questions or just need my support when it comes to the topic of television, all thanks to this column.