Football Season is Here!
Thursday, September 4th, 2008The NFL Football season starts tonight! In honor of this check out “John Madden” on Letterman. Frank Caliendo does the best Madden impressions.
Archive for the 'TV' Category
Mister Rogers Going Off The Air?
Tuesday, September 2nd, 2008
It appears most PBS stations nationwide will no longer broadcast Mister Rogers’ Neighborhood. It’s a shame that it has come to this point. This is the first I have heard of this news and I really can’t see any reasonable justification for it. There is already far too much garbage on TV these days, including some of the mind-numbing “educational” cartoons foisted on the youth via regular and public broadcasting. Mister Rogers’ Neighborhood has long proven to be much more educational and valuable to children than any other television show.
“PBS said its decision is a reaction to the show’s declining ratings and the desire of many local stations, which set their own schedules, for new programming. Episodes eventually may be available online, PBS said.”
Poor ratings? Since when do ratings matter to PBS when they don’t ’sell’ commercials? I hope they reconsider as most people born in the U.S. since 1968 grew up learning from him in their early years.
To those who say that the program is “too old” and appeals less and less to the “market”, I challenge to you to name how it is so outdated? Does a 3 year old care what year they were made? Does a 5 year old care? Does a 7 or 10 year old care they are watching an episode from the 70’s, 80’s or 90’s? Of course not! The lessons he teaches are the same no matter what generation you were born. They are fundamental to all generations. Save Mister Rogers’ Neighborhood!
Watch this brief monologue he did prior to passing away a few years ago:
A Spacey Truman Show
Friday, November 18th, 2005
You knew this was coming… A reality TV show (should I really call it that?) in England is being filmed that attempts to dupe unwitting contestants that they are training for space flight. In the end they hope to trick them in to thinking they have been rocketed to space.
All of it is staged, of course, on a old military base. They have been cutoff from the outside world and actors have been placed amongst them to monitor if they are actually believing this whole scenario. The producers hope to make these goofs think they actually fly into space with special effects and video screens. It does seem like a smaller version of what the movie The Truman Show was about. Creating a false “reality” to see how people will react with everyone viewing except the actual cast knowing its fake. I suppose they’ll have to reveal everything when they don’t see the effects of zero gravity.
If they actually fall for this, they have to be some of most gullible people on earth. The more I think about it, it does sound quite funny. Nothing like a good practical joke.
Watching Lost
Saturday, October 1st, 2005
Time for a change of pace since the last few weeks has been all about the hurricanes in my blog.
Using Tivo, I watch fewer network TV shows these days. Only specific programs that I have setup for a Season Pass. The one show I became hooked on last year was “Lost” on ABC.
My first thought before I began watching last season was this show won’t last. How can a TV series last about people stranded on an island? Hmmmmm… Lets see… seems the last one was Gilligan’s Island. But this is a drama not a comedy. Well my initial thoughts have been proven completely wrong and it deservingly won an Emmy.
I enjoy how the show keeps me on the edge of my seat with the twists and turns the plot takes. Less predicable than most. I especially like the under currents of absolute truth and lessons learned. Right from wrong is clearly defined and treated as such. The current situations or backstories display subtle or sometimes very clear parable-like qualities.
The character development is well done and pieced together in a refreshingly different formula than standard TV shows. They give brief glimpses into the past of characters that have some correlation to what is happening in the show currently or explains why they act a certain way.
Ultimately, it is a high quality, unique show in a sea of junk TV.
