Yeah, I'm a little late with this, but better late than never. Here was my 2009 in movies: 01/01/09 - Marley & Me 01/02/09 - Doubt 01/02/09 - Four Christmases 01/02/09 - Valkyrie 01/03/09 - Milk 01/10/09 - The Curious Case of Benjamin Button 01/17/09 - Gran Torino 01/24/09 - Slumdog Millionaire 01/31/09 - Revolutionary Road 01/31/09 - Frost/Nixon 02/22/09 - The Reader 04/19/09 - 17 Again 04/26/09 - The Soloist 05/02/09 - X-Men Origins: Wolverine 05/09/09 - I Love You, Man 05/22/09 - Terminator: Salvation 05/25/09 - X-Men Origins: Wolverine 05/29/09 - Star Trek 05/30/09 - Up 3D 06/06/09 - Night at the Museum: Battle of the Smithsonian 06/07/09 - The Hangover 06/13/09 - The Taking of Pelham 123 06/21/09 - The Proposal 07/01/09 - Public Enemies 07/12/09 - Bruno 07/15/09 - Harry Potter and the Half Blood Prince 08/01/09 - Harry Potter and the Half Blood Prince IMAX 3D 08/02/09 - Funny People 08/15/09 - District 9 08/28/09 - Inglourious Basterds (Which I just noticed is spelled wrong on the ticket stub) 08/30/09 - The Time Traveler's Wife 09/18/09 - Jennifer's Body 09/20/09 - The Informant! 09/26/09 - Whip It 10/03/09 - Toy Story/Toy Story 2 3D 10/25/09 - Where the Wild Things Are 11/08/09 - Michael Jackson's This Is It 11/14/09 - The Men Who Stare at Goats 11/22/09 - New Moon 11/27/09 - Ninja Assassin 12/19/09 - The Blind Side 12/20/09 - Avatar 3D 12/24/09 - Did You Hear About the Morgans? 12/31/09 - Sherlock Holmes 12/31/09 - Nine
Project Runway is consistently one of the best reality shows on television today. And my favorite overall. I like it because you can't just coast through the show, even though some contestants have in the past (Ricky, Suede, Vincent, I'm looking at you). If you can't sew, you're going home, you can't depend on an audience to vote for you to stay because they think you're "fun" (You'll hear more about this from me when American Idol returns).
As much as I love PR, we can all admit it has been off its game this season. I'm not going to put the blame squarely on Lifetime, because it's bigger than just switching networks. I know I'm not the only one who has noticed the slip in quality this season. And I know I'm not the only one who wants it to return to glory.
With that, I'd like to present my top 5 ideas (in order from least to most important) to save Project Runway:
5. Never leave New York again Now, not all of Los Angeles was bad, but they didn't make a strong point for taking the show out of New York and having it retain the magic that makes it great. Taking the show west is also the reason we didn't get to see Nina and Michael much this season (see No. 3 for more on this issue). Hopefully, Season 7's return to New York will make us forget all about this sun-soaked disappointment of a season.
4. Bring back the creative challenges This season has had two, count 'em two, quasi-fun challenges: The newspaper challenge and the movie genre challenge. But even the genre challenge was stretching it a bit. When I think of the rest of the challenges, I ......not even worth it. Honest to Jeebus, the producers were so lazy in coming up with original ideas. They had a challenge where they had to make a companion look for one of their previous designs, for crying out loud! "Designers, for your next challenge, we'd like you to create a design inspired by....whatever." Let Tim Gunn come up with some challenges, the man can do no wrong, except not giving Kenley the bitch-slap she deserved during Season 5.
3. Permanently attach Nina and Michael to their judging chairs And never let them leave, ever. The game of musical judges this season has contributed to a severe lack of continuity in results. In seasons' past, the judges can watch a designer grown and present their vision from the beginning. Take this away and it's disastardly if one of the designers has an off day, because whoever they've dragged in off the street to judge that day has no idea of what they've produced earlier in the season. Plus, we all need Nina there to question taste levels and Michael to deliver his patent brand of bitchy.
2. Fire Bunim/Murray And bring back Magical Elves Production. Do you really think the people responsible for bringing us The Real World, Road Rules, The Bad Girls Club, Keeping up with the Kardashians, Kourtney and Khloe Take Miami, Living Lohan, Love Cruise, Real World/Road Rules Challenge, The Simple Life and The Real Cancun could take over Project Runway without injecting some of their worthlessness into it? Now, they haven't gone and brought in a communal hot tub or pumped everyone full of booze, but they haven't done any favors. Season 6 has ratcheted up the bitchiness, and not in a good, Santino-bitchy way. In the past, designers have come off as catty and fairly light-hearted when picking on other designs, but this season it seems like the designers can't wait to spew vitriol behind one another's back. This is blatantly obvious in the case of Irina. Also, it appears that someone is regularly pissing in the judging panel's cereal before they come to work. That's the only explanation I can think of for the harsh critiques that have been leveled against this season's designers. Listen guys, this isn't some trashy show on MTV or E!, it's Project Runway, treat it with the respect it deserves.
1. Select a cast that is as entertaining as they are creative The biggest reason I can't get behind Season 6? This cast is dull and boring! There have been no break-out stars. No Chris March, Christian Siriano, Santino Rice, Daviel Vosivic, Korto Momolu, Michael Knight or Uli Herzner. Don't get me wrong, this season has had a few designers that have been consistently good, but I'm looking for great. Someone that designs something that makes me say "Why hasn't this person made it already?" This show also needs an entertaining cast of characters that makes it fun to watch. Here's hoping they step it up for Season 7!
Are you holding out hope for a fiercer and more fabulous Season 7? Or are you cutting your losses and walking away? Do you think they should change anything else before next season?
How is it possible to go from being the crown jewel of broadcast television to the laughingstock of the medium? Jeff Zucker can tell you.
News broke this morning that NBC is prepared to sell a 51% stake of NBC Universal to Comcast Corp. A cable television operator.
Now, no one can deny the fact that broadcast television is a struggling medium. Look no further than NBC for proof of that. What once was the number one network on television is now slumming it in fourth place, behind CBS, ABC and Fox.
But, that's not to say broadcast TV has flatlined. CBS' NCIS, the current number one show on air, is averaging 21 million viewers a week. ABC's Grey's Anatomy and Fox's House both pull down 17 million weekly. The only show NBC can consistently get in the top ten is Sunday Night Football.
So, what the hell is NBC's problem? Willingness to accept defeat, I say. And well before they decided to give Jay Leno free-reign. Even before they let glorified frat-boy Ben Silverman crap all over NBC's legacy.
Now, I am a faithful watcher of NBC's Thursday line up - two hours of the best comedies on television is what you get there. But a network cannot exist on two hours of programming a week. And they certainly can't survive with some unfunny, moon-faced doofus tanking in the 10 o'clock hour. Seriously, who thought putting Leno on five nights a week at 10 was a good idea? Because, I gotta tell you guys, it's not.
So, do you think this Comcast deal is a good idea or should NBC just air reruns of their shows people actually watched? What if they just bought the syndication rights to other networks' popular shows and stop putting any effort into producing TV at all?
Howdy. I've been kicking around the idea of starting a blog for quite some time. I finally came up with an idea and it only took me six months after that. So, you can tell I'm someone that goes after what I want in a timely fashion.
Right, onto business. I'm just a gal who loves pop culture more than I should. But I get coached when I spend my work day talking about it. The peeves part is inspired by a blog post on Popwatch.
Basically, I'm not going to be breaking any hot gossip or devote time to talking about the people who have confused the definition of "celebrity." (Paris Hilton, Kim Kardashian, I'm looking at you) On second thought, I sense a pet peeve post about them at some point in the future.
Most of all, I don't want this to turn into a huge snark fest. I want this to be a place where we can come and talk about the things happening in movies, television, music and all the other mediums that get us going.
Listen, I've got to share all this with someone or I'm going to get fired. So help a gal out because "Can quote Anchorman verbatim" is not considered a transferable skill in the workplace.
