When the Lights are Cutting Out…

Last night on The Hills,

Charlie, previously employed as a hitman, proposed that Spencer had already hit his mid-life crisis, entailing he won’t be around much longer. Make room for Old Western Swimsuit model, *Charlie.*

In Vegas, dumb Stacie third-wheeled and Justin repeated everything his love interest said first. Once again. He must think it convinces them he’s listening. The girls wanted to go to a strip club (?) and Justin didn’t argue. Wait, Vegas sounds too fast-paced. Let’s check in on Spencer and Charlie again.

Um, why does Charlie have a big book of baby names at his place? Freak. Does he name his…1 ball cap? Wait, no it already has a name. “Kings.” Yeah, didn’t say it was a cool name.

Hills’ Music: Phoenix! High fives! The rest of the picks went downhill from new Keys to not-so-new Gaga, technically year-old Beyonce, and a handful of identical sugarpop boy band songs.

Mimi

Finalize This, Bobby!

On The Hills-

Heidi childishly sided with Enzo “Spender’s mean.” “That’s right.” “I don’t like him.” “No.” after realizing he tricked her with the puppies. Then he waved a purse in her face and she got distracted.

Charlie accompanied Spencer to the urologist…And we all know anything involving Charlie is a fabulous idea. Spencer learned that certain procedures aren’t temporary, shrieked, and told the doctor he was a weirdo.

Barslut Stacie (remember her? she’s the homewrecker that lost Spencer Pratt to his wife. mm-hm.) is the next best thing to another girl’s boy to her new fake-friend, Kristin. Maybe they can start something. They’re certainly around each other enough- I mean, somebody has to narrate slicing a banana! This show doesn’t have much left to it!

For some reason, Audrina crawled back to Justin to, in his words, “finalize something that’s not there.”

“You look good.” She told him immediately, taking in his greaser ensemble. He kind of just sat there. Audrina attempted to rub it in his face that Kristin seemed to be with Brody. Justin only wanted to bring up his bare chest. He was mean to her. She cried and walked away. *Roll credits* Yes! That’s as interesting as it gets! Don’t outdo yourself, Hills’ producer (singular because the others quit.) I know it could be worse. We could listen to Lo’s whiny voice every ten minutes or have time to overdub an entire Brody-Jayde-2nd girl slapfight while Audrina tries to jumpstart her brain (“I’m gonna go”) but Kristin/Justin/Audrina/Justin/Kristin/Justin is getting old.

Then again, it’s always better than The City.

Hills’ New Music: Boys Like Girls, OK Go, Keri Hilson, new Rihanna

My Current Music Obsessions: Phoenix’s Wolfgang Amadeus Phoenix, Sherwood’s Qu

Mimi

I Love The Boys!

This week on The Hills,

To the sounds of new OneRepublic and old AAR, Kristin finally broke it off with Justin (we think.) Like most people, pants don’t agree with Kristin, but that’s okay, she doesn’t miss them. In one scene she announced “I love the boys!” and in the next, homewrecker-turned-cohort Stacie was telling her to “take it easy” on a banana.

In a way, Audrina broke up the happy couple…but can she really be held responsible when she’s baffled by putting her car in reverse?

Kristin didn’t fit Justin’s pace of life anyway. He asked her “Can you just mellow out? Take a nap-? Cruise-?” You’re probably thinking ‘wow. that tool sounds like a greaser.’ Good thing he had the threads to go along with it.

Justin Bobby played dress up as a greaser and a detective! Yay! The crazy outfits are back! Can we make requests? My vote is for chinos, cowboy boots and mittens.

On Greek,

Cappie and Casey are finally back together after an entire season filled with discussion about the end of the world party. And what better way to celebrate than setting another sorority’s house on fire? OK, Evan Lame-bers didn’t seem too happy for them when he set up the KTs and got 3 of Cappie’s best expelled from the school they never attend. Ashley wasn’t totally excited, either, but that’s probably because she remembered she was dating the girls’ manny. All the odds could be going against them right now but it’s Cappie and Casey and now they’re sharing more than a “Night, Cap.”

People losing competitions:

On The Amazing Race 15, when Maria and Tiffany had to pick their Detour challenge, they were comfortable in their decision. They thought they would be equally good at both dancing and playing golf, but they chose dancing. Unfortunately, they needed upper body strength to get through the door so, after many attempts, they switched tasks. They biked all the way back to the swamp they had to swip through. But golf was hard, too, and they were about fifteen hits over par. They biked back to the first task, dancing, but were still too weak. They returned to golfing (via bike, strip, swim) but now it was windy! After “hugging it out” many times, they gave up and Phil came to find them. In this situation, that wasn’t even the most embrassing part.

On Project Runway, Christopher played his worn woe-is-me card to try to win the judges’ pity. But this didn’t make them suddenly forget his horrible design, which he admitted described him as a designer, and for once in the challenge, his tears didn’t work. If Gordana knew this tactic wouldn’t work maybe she wouldn’t bring her coming-to-America story into things. Then again, Heidi was just wondering how the Grey Dress Woman stuck it out so long.

Mimi

You’re Such a Menace

_One Tree Hill_

You’re Such a Menace And You’re No Good

Everyone started preparing for Dan Scott’s acclaimed “nightmare TV show” at 11 AM or so, and this was something they were dreading. Before the show filled up their schedule for the day they might’ve stared at a spot on the kitchen wall or had a dramatic, heavy-breathing competition.

Rene` narrates the steps to her alleged sexual encounter with Tree Hill superstar Nathan Scott as we get to see relationship flashbacks we never wanted to see. But congratulations, Haley’s sister! You are the most boring character on any show since Fantasia won American Idol.

Redemption makes everyone openly question themselves and each other, but seriously? I’m getting really sick of watching a TV show on a TV show…Watching them watching each other – doesn’t that defeat the purpose?

Brooke and Julian spent three or four straight hours off in their own little land, sitting on a bench near the beach being moody. Their relationship talk  went something like:

“Marry me?”

 ”Huh?” “Totally. Maybe.” “I’m your boy.”

“I’m sorry.”

Meanwhile, and not entirely in the real world either, Clay’s dead wife came back in his mind just like Q pestered Nate for a while; to make him crazy and turn down the new girl. They wouldn’t work anyway. Did anyone else find it a little weird that David is easily 45 and Quinn is about 19? 

So, back to the show, Dan Scott and his lady-friend trick Rene` Richardson into a fake lie detector test and Dan plays mind games with her until she cracks.

“Cool!” Says Nathan, whose life is a mystery to himself, “Did she or didn’t she?”

To make a long, double-episode short, Rene` was lying and Dan Scott set Nate free. Still, Dan claims “the truth is only half” so if the truth was that she was a desperate, lying leech what is the other half?

OTH, thumbs up on the cool, new Dashboard Confessional.

_The Hills_

“You’re Wrong, Spensa.”

The recap continues to show Brody’s most attractive side (“leave, we don’t care”) week after week. Thanks, producers. You capture what a sincere person Brody is very well.

In the scene “You’re wrong, Spensa,” Spencer tries to discuss Holly’s drinking problem but Heidi shushes him.

“Hey,” She slowly reads her line, “Not in front of Enzo.”

Enzo says, “Yeah.”

The viewers are thinking “wow! this is a pretty good MTV original drama!” Then Spencer’s evil(er) twin showed up and announced he was pregnant with Nathan Scott’s baby.

The people on the show who don’t need lines are alreay enough of party animals to get drunk and say stupid things to each other. Brody and Jayde were in a fight. K-Cav and Justin B were in a fight (kind of.) And someone gave Holly alcohol.

BT-Dubs, Brody, no one gets the point that “you’re done” unless you say “I’m done” 11 times. Hm. No cigar.

“Wouldn’t it be funny if Brody and I dated again?” K-Cav, the professional sociopath asks Stacy, Skanktender after she and Brody repeatedly denied getting back together. Yeah, Kristin, that would probably keep you on the show longer then, wouldn’t it?

Mimi

Starting to Feel Just a Little Abuse Like Being Treated Badly Like Audrina

The Hills-

She Wolf! I called it! We’re getting sucked further and further into the weird budding romance of Kristin and Justin ever since she stopped being mad at him for, well, treating her like he treated Audrina. Yeah, Justin-Bobby sure can “make up for” being a loser by making box mac’n'cheese in his bathrobe. Wait. Doesn’t that further prove he’s a loser? Anyway, he made her dinner. She took it as a big deal. He negated it being a big deal when he met up with Audrina and scoffed about it. He said Audrina was the best he’d ever have (for the record, Audrina is decidedly not K-Cav.) She grinned and said she’s stop dating his best friend. He slurred something and- right. This is Justin. It wasn’t a normal conversation.

Meanwhile, Holly had “two hundred drinks” (someone should introduce Spencer to math) and Heidi and Spencer issued an intervention. Now that’s when you know it’s bad!

Gossip Girl writers certainly made things more interesting – pinning the Dan Humphrey best friend and girlfriend/roomies against each other. Both of whom knock Blair Waldorf out of the running. This forces Vanessa to lie to both Dan and Olivia and guess what, they find out. Then, in an annoying sequence of events, everyone hates both Blair and Vanessa. So they decide to be hated together. I repeat, Blair and Vanessa.

Mimi

Help Her Get Rid of the Body

One Tree Hill-

“Get a shovel and help her get rid of (Alex’s) body,” has been Brooke’s attitude for a while now. The fact that Julian and Alex were able to kiss and make up and focus on Alex’s “script” isn’t helping things. Meanwhile, Millie just wants to be Alex and has no idea that Mouth has been fired because being a fake model is more important. Haley got arrested, Nate has been useless and Jamie: super-introverted and emotional. Somehow we’re still dwelling on Quinn and David and how she is sexually-inactive sleepover buddies with Clay…Excuse me, but where did the writers go? Did they leave with Lucas, Peyton and baby? Did they quit shortly after Nanny Carrie and Q got shot? Soon we’re going to care about Skills and Tina which is even worse than Kate Voegele and that guy LC dated!

Gossip Girl-

Who knew the Van der Woodsen-Humphrey kids could be so Brady-like? Meddle for their parents’ sake much? And what could make their force stronger than inviting ol’ Peter Brady into the gang? Gaining a Jan. But beisdes that, nothing!

Georgina. Winning, losing, violating Dan Humphrey…Serena. Playing stupid and falling for the same guys over and over…Bree. Blandly betraying and getting found out…Vanessa. Not being liked by two guys at once. Jenny. Wait. Is Jenny still on the show?

The girls never cease to amaze us with their mediocrity! Maybe if they were doing shady things like the guys; making deals, having sloppy affairs, 2-minute flings, being secretive and talking in hushed voices; maybe then it would all be worthwhile. Prepare yourselves for Blair Waldorf, jewelry thief.

Greek-

So Cappie and Evan and Casey are friends…but only in secret, which means basically never, and Cappie and Casey still won’t be together? OK. Just checking. Rusty and Jordan had broken up but Rusty realized he has no game and other girls don’t want to date him so he tried to get her back with a roomful of people hanging on his every pathetic word. Dale is once again “in a relationship with God”, Casey is openly jealous of Cappie’s girl, Ashley and Fisher have nothing in common, and Beaver is always ready to defend a bro. Sounds about right. 

The Hills-

K-Cav has never hit it off with another girl before as well as she is with Skanktender Stacie! What a relief!

Jayde, Brody’s girlfriend, throws Brody a birthday party (c’mon, doesn’t the guy have a birthday every 3 months or so now?). K-Cav announces she’ll have an after-party at her house. Brody says he’ll go. Jayde is thinking “huh?”, gets mad, walks away. Brody shouts “We don’t care. Leave. We don’t care.” He is such a winner – I still can’t believe it didn’t work out between him and Kristin.

And hold up a minute! Stupid-ass Pratt is able to hang out with K-Cav and Skanktender now? Since when? Remember “do you own pants?” and “you need to respect Audrina” (rebuttal) “this is how it’s gonna be?” How much extra are they being paid to tolerate each other, seriously?

“Love is the kind of thing that ends a relationship,” is the dumbest thing Brody has said since not recognizing Jimmy Carter. Why are we celebrating this moron’s 3-month birthday???

Off in Heidi & Spencer land, Spencer is trying to play lose-golf with his brilliant friend, Charlie, when End-Zone shows up right on cue. Spencer asks him “how did you get in?” Enzo, as rehearsed, says “0-3-1-0,” grinning devilishly and fingering the rolled up dollar bills in his chinos’ pocket.

But Spencer redeems himself when he takes Heidi to a ‘fancy dinner’ dressed like a cowboy extra. Heidi asks him to take the hat off but Spencer is wiser than that, remarking, ”Only a true man can wear a beaver-skin hat to dinner.” Audrina could learn a thing or two from these words of wisdom!

Mimi

I’m Kind of Sweating

The Hills played Paramore’s Brand New Song #3, the ever-popular first single Ignorance. Surprise? Later they promoted the average-sounding MTV locals, Vedera. If this was, once again, supposed to glam up Beverly Hills in our eyes, it didn’t work. I’ll take Noisettes any day, though. 

Heidi hired a stage family with a little “nephew” to pose as their next door neighbors and make Spencer want kids. Baby-crazed and worried she won’t be fertile for much longer, she speeds the process along, feeding and sitting the little boy within days. But he is not interested in Heidi’s attention. Sucking up to her is not the reason he is getting paid. So he plays with Spencer’s Wii and asks “Is Spender going to play video games with me?” Cute, right? Not to Spender, it ain’t.

To prevent falling into Heidi’s trap, maybe he should follow Enzo’s words, “When I do this, I see nothing,”; hide his face, and ignore the game.

As far as K-Cav and Justin B go, Kristin invited Audrina to lunch where, for some ominous and rather poetic reason, Lo showed up in her place. Kristin got mad and took Justin for good. Again, should we be surpised? Hardly.

Mimi

Happy Endings Are Few And Far Between

One Tree Hill is on top of current music surprisingly steadily for the demographic of the show. Last week, they reminded us that they love SK6ERS like nobody’s bid’ness and this week they got a band to perform within the episode. Starring Noisettes, a funky Duffy-esque band that happens to be more interesting than the plotline, they have taken a turn toward good music. If they can’t have Leyton, might as well get something worthwhile to retain viewers.

In the wise words of a dramatic Dan Scott “What they see is who you’ll be.” This is proving to be true for Nathan, who Dan will soon exploit, on the cover of Tree Hill tabloids. *sigh* Come on. We’re not going to believe that Nathan Scott is suddenly some big celebrity. There aren’t local tabloids. If there were, they would dishing about Brooke and Julian.

Even worse than Nate and Haley’s marriage buckling are the new soon-to-be divorcees. Quinn and David bored us to death, making us wonder why an ending marriage is still being drawn out over a month’s time. We don’t care. We want to see Brooke get in a catfight with her easy, cheesy spokesgirl. We want to see Victoria go on Dan’s show and betray someone.

Which brings us back to the real question- What do they see in you, Dan Scott? A tool in a suit hiding behind canned lines? Or a tool faking a picture-perfect marriage? Or maybe a tool proud of his morally screwed past? Any way you look at it, great philosopher, you are a tool.

On Gossip Girl, Georgina was pushed out of the scenario about three minutes into this week’s episode and the show would have been looking up if Hilary Duff hadn’t appeared. Playing a Twilight-inspired version of herself, no less. Wow, that is a tough stretch.

Still, we were patiently waiting for things to get better. Blair acting like a whiny high schooler, Vanessa being drier than Rufus Humphrey and everyone being uncharacteristically invited to a movie premiere was getting to be a little much. Yet, without JoAnna Garcia sucking all the air out of the room it seemed to be looking up!

Then Tyra showed up. Trying to act. Trying to act and playing an actress. “Oh, no,” is right.

“Don’t Blame it on the Motorcycle” 

Last week, The Hills repeatedly played Paramore music that was released the same day, trying to appeal to an audience that isn’t about to go anywhere. Throw in RS’s favorite, Little Boots, and you have the kind of uninteresting soundtrack that OTH successfully stays away from – congrats!

The entire point of this season seems to be that Kristin is a She-wolf -I’m calling that plug now- and no one can overcome her majestic powers. Right. She makes guys want her by swearing, asking weird questions, and not making eye contact? Try it out, Pity-vote Audrina! You can win him back!

So for the next couple weeks, Kristin will be sinking her claws and teeth into Justin Bobby, a fresh new leftover, proving just what kind of taste she has in men…And how you “shouldn’t mess with her” because she’ll steal your ex just like she was about to anyway? Okay, some people are just a waste of breath.

As for Heidi and Spencer, they bought a house! Well, Spencer bought a house Heidi didn’t like and she was still surprised by his habit but she did have one positive thing to say about it. “I love all the trees and the nature.” There ya go, Spencer! She loves the nature that happens to be outside. It’s not all bad.

Tonight, Kristin will go after her fresh meat, cackle, ride his “motorcycle”, and say something short to one of the girls, which they will debate and stew over for the following fifteen minutes. Just a prediction.

Mimi

Once Upon a Time, You Were Queen

One Tree Hill

Fourteen months have passed in OTH Time since May bringing new surprises, characters, and a Dan Scott Dr. Phil-style show titled Redemption. Yes, really. Lucas and Peyton are mentioned about every ten minutes which just reminds us what an important part of One Tree Hill they were and that without them this may very well be the last season.

Dan Scott has a young little wife, Nathan supposedly has a love child, and Brooke is leading a Sam-less life with her sweetie, Julian. Haley’s sister showed up to not add much spice to things, Skills’ relationship is staying PG – maybe because it always seems to include Jamie- and Haley is working on managing the record label instead of her music career. Thrilling. The writers just removed everything we watch OTH for, in two episodes no less. 

“Once upon a time in a far-off land, you were a queen. (but here you are just a loser who will never fit in.)“ 

On Gossip Girl, Blair, Georgina, Vanessa and Dan Humphrey played a dull game of Popularity Tug-of-War: College-style and this time, Blair didn’t come out on top. Isn’t that the purpose of having such a spoiled, dramatic princess in the picture? She wins. Or she pitches a fit about not winning. But either way you know Blair Waldorf will come out on top so you can sit back and enjoy her power struggle getting there. 

As for Leighton, the girl behind the goddess, the predictable Good Girls Go Bad plug we were expecting but somehow missed out on during the premiere showed up during the rooftop party. But none of the girls were going bad. The good girls were staying good. And the bad girls were still bad.

As for Serena, she decided the play hooky before college even started and plans to do nothing in her spare time. New Daddy Rufus wasn’t happy about this and, since the actress playing Lily Bass is still out on maternity leave, there has been a whole lot of Rufus.

Nate is off in Stiff Girlfriend Land (is this possibly where Blair reigned?), awkwardly kissing the tutor from Privileged, and lacking any delivery to his unmemorable lines. Chuck Bass is wrapped up in his next big deal, which Serena screws up a couple times and proceeds to drag Carter Basin into her little game. Too bad they suddenly adore each other-?

Jenny, Eric and anyone else still in HS suddenly doesn’t matter but unlike Lucas and Peyton, their siblings aren’t even acknowledging they exist. Little J might have been a figment of our imaginations…After all, once Blair wins a war is her opponent worth remembering?

Mimi

The Outburst That Outplayed Russell

The 2009 MTV VMAs-

The show started off with Madonna saying a few words about Michael Jackson, which then faded into Thriller, Bad, and Smooth Criminal dance reenactments. The performance peaked when Janet Jackson came onstage and played her part from the Scream video (playing in the background) making it feel almost as if Michael was there.

One of the first awards of the night was given out to little Taylor Swift. Kanye ruined her moment by jumping onstage, stealing her mic mid-speech, and saying Beyonce should have won. Then the producers had no clue what to do to save face so they rolled Part 1 of a nightlong Tracy Morgan bit while Taylor was led offstage.

Lady Gaga’s freak flag flew away during her performance and, no, she didn’t surprise people in a good way. Over-the-top outfits, overly dramatic rolling around combined with her unsubstantial techno-pop is not music. Although Jay-Z missed the majority of the show…and his wife’s performance and win, you didn’t see him popping any blood bags onstage.

Beyonce replaced Taylor’s moment when Single Ladies won for best video, trying to make up for Kayne’s earlier rebuttal. The self-proclaimed country singer quivered and choked out “Let’s try this again.”

That would be a good choice for the entire show. This time they were ready on the censor as far as songs and Russell, but they couldn’t exactly control all that, um, personality.

I assume Russell was invited back to host because people don’t like him so much. They expect him to insult everyone, he does, and therefore viewership goes positively up.

Too bad not enough to make the show a success.

Mimi