I think it was just the other day on this very blog that I was lamenting the fact that there wasn’t more spontaneous dancing in everyday life. Well, if you live in Chicago you should really see what you local weekend news anchors are up to.
Add comment February 5th, 2009
Before calling up yesterday’s excellent episode of Lost, I happened to stumble on to Lie to Me, the new Fox show about the guy (Tim Roth, who I’ve always loved because of Rosenkrantz & Guildenstern Are Dead) who’s some sort of lying scientist (because that exists) who always knows when people are lying. It was clear almost immediately that this show was bad, but I watched the whole thing out of curiosity and a wish to understand exactly why it fails so hard. And it’s not just because it’s a predictable serialized drama about a Persnickety Hero-Genius who’s not as fun as Psych or as quirky as Monk or as hard-assed as House.
A typical scene will have Tim Roth or one of his minions (the cute boy, the white lady, or the black lady – no personalities yet, as far as I can tell) asking someone some questions. The person will respond in an odd way that is obvious to everyone is either suspicious or heartfelt. It is obvious because we are people who watch TV; we know how to tell if a character is lying or prevaricating or believes his nonsense because we know how to interpret dramatic scenes.
Then Tim Roth and one of his minions will go off and discuss the scene that just happened, sometimes even using video footage to remind us what happened literally seconds ago. “She’s got non-symmetrical facial response, so she must be lying,” “He’s self-correcting, which means he’s telling the truth,” etc. The reason this is so moronic is not just because it’s fake science, but because they’re doing the audience’s job — interpreting the scene that just happened and making inferences based on experience with human beings. If the audience has any intelligence at all, the “science” just tells them what they already learned from watching the actors.
At least in something like the Closer, the force of her personality and her interrogating skills make people confess. At least in House, he has specialized knowledge of medicine and tests and treatments to try out. At least on Psych or Monk, they’re noticing things outside of the suspect — the environment, the circumstances, arcane trivia — and they make leaps and connections that, although often guessed by the audience, do require a little bit of genuine insight rather than just looking at people’s faces.
So I don’t care for it. But I won’t lie: Amidst all the repeition and idiocy, Tim Roth does have a certain strange charisma.
2 comments February 5th, 2009
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We’re only one month into 2009 and I’ve already found two bands that I think deserved a spot on my year-end music list (that I posted on my much-neglected other blog). The first is Frightened Rabbit, which I wrote about the other day, and the other is a band with a name that is both glorious and damned to be embarrassing in a devastatingly short amount of time: Natalie Portman’s Shaved Head.
NPSH is basically a young party band that infuses their electronic dance rock with silly lyrics and an aggressively goofy attitude. Aggressively goofy? Yes, aggressively goofy. See their video below for Sophisticated Side Ponytail.
There’s something I like about the fact that NPSH’s music, like their name, seem to be a kitschy, contemporary joke. It probably won’t age well, but that’s not important. The fact that they have enough balls to make music that probably won’t stand the test of time is something that I admire.
But, who knows? Maybe they’ll be the Dee-Lite of the late 2000s.
natalie portman’s shaved head – sophisticated side ponytail from thatgo on Vimeo.
1 comment February 4th, 2009
Congrats to TiFaux reader Suzy for winning the Thom Felicia-slash-The View-slash-Kimberely Clark giveaway!
She’ll receive a book and all sorts of paper products, including diapers, for writing to us with the subject line “Diapers for my imaginary baby.” However, the joke’s on me, because it turns out that good old Suze is actually gestating a real-life infant as we speak!
So, I think I speak for the whole TiFaux crew when I say thank you for reading and we expect you to buy one of these fetching onesies.
Add comment February 4th, 2009
See, the cute kind of garbage!
Scrubs recently began its eighth, possibly final season, also its first on new home ABC. The default response to any non-smash sitcom in its eighth season could probably be described as indifferent, but I’ve noticed a pretty strong disdain for Scrubs among the kinds of TV watchers who cherish the likes of its onetime NBC stablemates The Office or 30 Rock — that is to say, people like me. Generally, people like me do not care for Scrubs at all, probably because it’s cutesy, sometimes venturing into mawkish or grotesque.
But I have to give the show some credit for doing a lot of stuff right without a shield of hipness. When it debuted back in 2001, it was a single-camera comedy in the waning years of Friends; it wove in earnest, sometimes sentimental drama and surreal cutaways like some kind of weird cross between The Wonder Years and The Simpsons; and as cartoonish as the broader material can be, the characters have always seemed more or less believable to me — I’m particularly fond of the show’s goofily affectionate portrait of male friendship between J.D. (Zach Braff) and Turk (Donald Faison). My vague respect solidified when a med student friend said that even with all of the wackiness, Scrubs, not ER or House or any other one-hour drama, comes closest to the actual experience of working in a hospital.
Click to continue reading “A Defense of Sorts: Scrubs”
8 comments February 4th, 2009
Add comment February 4th, 2009
| Title | Season |
| Afro Samurai | Resurrection |
| Becker | The 2nd Season |
| Bewitched | The Complete 7th Season |
| Columbo | Mystery Movie Collection 1990 |
| Dave’s World | The 2nd Season |
| Jon & Kate Plus 8 | Season 3 |
| Mystery Science Theater 3000 | Collection: Volume 14 |
| Night Court | The Complete 2nd Season |
| Partridge Family, The | The Complete 4th Season |
| Tom and Jerry Tales | Volume 6 |
Add comment February 3rd, 2009
This week’s Gossip Girl commentary nearly didn’t make it to you, dear friends, as your correspondent almost chopped off the tip of her left index finger making dinner. And that would have been bad, as I need that finger to type “OMFG” properly.
It's cool, the coffee guy can be our chaperone. This is totally legit and not at all statutory rapey!
So we returned from a week’s hiatus to find Dan getting all cozy with the elfin new teacher, Rachel, who earned Blair’s undying ire for getting Queen B sentenced to Central Park trash duty (which Dorota had to do, of course). Serena is insecure about her English paper, which is kind of adorable to see because for once it’s for a good reason rather than Dan making her feel like a useless whore. She does not appear to be an intellectual titan (although who on this show is?), so she should feel kind of unstable when treading on King Lear. He’s a tricky fucker.
OMG CHUCK AND I HAVE THE SAME AREA CODE. Chuck woke up at the beginning of the episode and immediately started having flashbacks to that time he and Whitney Port did ketamine and went to Monte Carlo. Turns out he stumbled into The Castle and had no Veronica Mars to save his candy ass. But at least he’s back in his sassy turtlenecks and ascots.
Blair. Jesus, Blair. The new teacher tried to ban cell phones at school (HA!), which quickly got Blair’s death squad to join her fight against Rachel, so the Vicious B told Gossip Girl that Rachel and Dan were doing the nasty. Which prompted Rachel to GET THE HEADMISTRESS TO EXPEL BLAIR OMFG. So what happened then, after stupid Rachel got all mopey and protesting her innocence? She met the 17-year-old student she was accused of having an inappropriate relationship with at a romantic, candlelit restaurant sexy coffee shop and proceeded to tell him she would totally give him a good rogering if only he wasn’t a student at her sister school. This, after she insisted on meeting SERENA outside, so there would be no appearance of impropriety! Good Christ that woman is dumb. Serena, of course, saw Pacey Dan wiping the tears off Ms. Jacobs’ Rachel’s face, and got the necessary photographic proof to get Blair un-expelled and therefore not booted out of Yale before she got there. Rachel got fired. I was not sad, because Rachel appears to live in Ina Garten‘s house in the Hamptons and therefore is a horrible person. Oh! And then she committed statutory rape just as the headmistress was telling Rufus and Lily she could have her job back because she’s not a sexual predator. It’s like if O. Henry had access to roofies.
(Oh, and it also bears mention that when this happened on Veronica Mars, it was Blair accusing a teacher of knocking her up and then throwing cash at her to take care of it. The circle of television!)
Nate and Vanessa don’t go to school anymore. They just have unenthusiastic sex involving costumes.
In the episode’s lone actual sad moment, Blair’s dad told her he was disappointed in what a conniving, shallow monster she is. And of course, didn’t take any responsibility for his role in helping her become such a wretched beast. Because she sprang fully formed from his head and began wreaking havoc on the Upper East Side in the fall of 2007.
Everyone seems to be in kind of an ugly place as we leave the 10023 this week. Serena and Dan are broken up again, and even though Dan got laid, he’ll probably go on a tedious, self-obsessed pity spiral when he figures out that Rachel will lose her job a second time for nailing him. Rufus and Lily clashed over punishing the kids, and Blair now has no parents whatsoever. (Oh, and I quiver to think of what’s going to happen to Nelly Yuki for betraying Blair.) Chuck is…well, Chuck is kind of the TV character embodiment of the fifth season of Alias: completely implausible even by his previously low standards of believability and surrounded by people we don’t care about. And for his sake, I hope Eric has gone to Vermont with Jonathan to toboggan and sip hot chocolate and have sexy snowball fights in matching, hand-knitted hats.
3 comments February 3rd, 2009
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