By Eric Pytel

The greatest infomercial on network TV isn’t really an infomercial at all. It’s Poker after Dark, televised on NBC after the late-night talk shows and the nightly replay of the 10 o’clock NBC 5 news. I recently came upon the show after a bout of insomnia and quickly found myself glued to the tube. It’s shown nightly (Monday-Friday) with a weekly behind-the-scenes director’s cut on Saturday in the wee hours of the morning. A director’s cut!
NBC has partnered with Full-Tilt Poker.net to show weekly themed broadcasts of no-limit Texas Hold ‘Em. In between the action, commercials run that are part noir/part campy theatrics aimed at enticing viewers to try their luck at online poker. Each episode is an hour long. It starts with six seated players on Monday and by Friday the table is narrowed to two who go head-to-head until there is a victor. It’s an imaginative – and winning – formula.

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Posted on May 15, 2007

By Steve Rhodes

Who knew Todd Bridges could act? And that I would learn this seeing something I thought I’d never see on TV – black people on Little House on the Prairie? And that I would actually watch an entire episode of LHOTP, as I assume fans call it? Holy crap was it good.

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Posted on May 14, 2007

By Kathryn Ware

If America Ferrera wasn’t such a magnetic rock holding Ugly Betty together, this show would run the real risk of Will-and-Gracing itself with a wicked cast of supporting actors that outshines the leads. Marc (Michael Urie) and Amanda (Becki Newton) steal every scene they’re in.
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Memo to Ask.com’s ad agency: Is it really necessary to have the father-son conversation about search engine algorithms happen while the oh-so-smug daddy sits in the tub? At least they didn’t throw Jeeves into the mix too.
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Funtivities and chicken heads! It’s Beach Day at The Office everyone! Thinking he’s up for promotion, Michael uses an office outing to “scenic Lake Scranton” to choose his successor, complete with Survivor-esque egg races, a hot dog eating contest, and walking on hot coals. Wrap your mind around your feet.
(Note to self: Don’t watch while eating Cocoa Puffs for dinner. It’s too hard to hear the dialogue over the crunching.)

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Posted on May 11, 2007

By Steve Rhodes

I don’t care what anyone says, TV brings you the world. It’s not always pretty; in fact, rarely so. But there’s hardly a better medium to capture the culture right now than a day and night of television, from Rosie O’Donnell on The View and the multiple layers of The Price Is Right (Bob Barker’s longevity, the gaming of household consumerism, the total melding of editorial and advertising) to the voyeurism and moral judgements of Judge Judy and Dr. Phil to the latest news out of Iraq bumping up against reruns of M*A*S*H.
And that was just yesterday.

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Posted on May 10, 2007

By Steve Rhodes

Tuned into the Cubs game last night in the bottom of the 7th inning to find that REO Speedwagon frontman Kevin Cronin was in the booth with Len & Bob. Whoa! Are you telling me I missed Kevin Cronin singing the national anthem?
Or, as Cronin would do it, sing-ging the na-shun-a-ela an-a-them-a . . .
You have to understand that it’s the considered opinion of a few of us that REO’s “You Get What You Play For” is the greatest live album of all time, no matter what sins the band went on to commit.

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Posted on May 9, 2007

By Steve Rhodes

St. Elmo’s Fire was on last night and I hate that movie on about 50 different levels. First, the movie was an obvious attempt to craft an 80s-based version of The Big Chill. You know what? The Big Chill people were a lot cooler. Second, there’s not a single likable character – and I like plenty of unlikable characters, but you like them because they are unlikable. These characters are just loathsome.
I mean, the rebel is a guy who can’t break away from his frat house! God, I hated the 80s.

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Posted on May 8, 2007

By Steve Rhodes

My name is Steve Rhodes, and I’m a binge TV viewer. I know it’s killing me, and I hate myself when I do it, but I don’t want to stop, either. It makes me feel good.
Like yesterday, when Dr. Phil morphed into a particularly good Celebrity Fit Club, which slid easily into Bad Girls Club, and then its male counterpart, the Cubs. Can you feel the high?
Oh yes, there were bouts of self-loathing amidst the rushes of seeing Dr. Phil smack down the 19-year-old doofus planning to marry his sneaky 30-year-old girlfriend after just two weeks of dating, and watching the rerun of new roommates arriving to cold, skeletal shoulders on Bad Girls Club, but this was also a journey of self-discovery. I discovered, for example, a new high/low in laziness, which I reported to my friends with glee. Like John Bender said in The Breakfast Club, being bad feels awfully good.

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Posted on May 2, 2007

By Scott Buckner

Has the grown-up life you envisioned when you were in high school turned to shit? Can’t get a job because you’re a convicted felon? Is every single boss you work for an insufferable asshole who’s keeping you down? Don’t despair, buckaroo – the fugitive recovery industry has a place for pretty much any loser who still somehow maintains some initiative, some brains, or a clue about how not to jolt yourself with a taser.

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Posted on May 1, 2007

By Scott Buckner

My evening started off with ABC’s World News showing President Bush dancing and banging a drum onstage with a highly colorful African drum troupe. What followed for me was the exact same thought a bazillion other people worldwide with access to television sets had at the exact same moment:
Oh. My. Fucking. God.
Back in the day, the most embarrassing thing an American president would be caught doing in public was trying on a silly hat. President Reagan was good for this. How in the world could the president and his advisers – and the First Lady – not see this disaster coming? Perhaps President Bush was observing the death of former Russian President Boris Yeltsin by paying homage to Yeltsin’s dance chops.
At least Yeltsin had the decency to be drunk at the time.

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Posted on April 26, 2007

By Scott Buckner

When it comes to boxing, I can take it or leave it. Not because it’s violent and has an underbelly with all sorts of unsavory characters, but because for me, it’s not as exciting as, say, Ultimate Fighting. But last night’s The Best Damn Sports Show Period turned into the best damn boxing show period with a 10-round women’s bout between Holly Holm and the extremely scary-looking Ann Marie Saccurato.
Before last night, the only exposure I’d had to women’s boxing was seeing Muhammad Ali’s professional-boxer daughter Laila once and thinking she was pretty damn sharp. I came in halfway through the Holm-Saccurato bout, and these two were brutal – but not in that sort of aimless, drunken brawling way you normally see during boxing exhibitions featuring washed-up child stars. No, these two knew how to administer a professional Grade A ass-kicking, and the only thing missing was the slaughterhouse freezer with sides of beef hanging from huge hooks and Saccurato glaring at the camera and snarling, “I predict . . . pain.”

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Posted on April 21, 2007