By Merritt Martin
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I was pretty fucking excited to find out that even though I hadn't been watching too much CW of late--my doctor said I'd been getting too much crap on TV--my TiVo majestically captured the premiere of America's Next Top Model (as well as VH-1's Sober House).
By Merritt Martin
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Well, if the Olympics didn't supply enough emotional outpouring, competition and inspiration for you, you really just needed to watch this last Celebrity Fit Club. Oh, and Tool Academy. And The Real World. And Celebrity Rehab.
K, so maybe on those telecasts there were no medals to be earned, but damn, there was some crying, a little bit of sporting and a whole lot of drama.
By Merritt Martin
Serious biz this week, folks. As much as I would like to discuss Kell On Earth with you, well, it seems it's just too...respectable? Yeah, I know. But get this: Celebrity Fit Club is back...only it's Celebrity Fit Club Boot Camp. I'm not really sure of the difference, and neither is my TiVo, so we're all good.
Yes, Harvey Walden IV, drill sergeant extraordinaire is in the mud with the likes of Sebastian Bach from Skid Row, Bobby Brown (gross), Jay McCarroll from Season One of Project Runway (seriously), Kevin Federline (gross), Shar Jackson (who claims she didn't know K-Fed would be on the show and will clearly use this as a vehicle to cleanse her rep as the one KF dumped for Brit...or to get a finding-love show on VH-1 since her previous association with Brandy practically guarantees her one [see Ray-J]), KayCee Stroh of High School Musical, Tanisha Thomas of The Bad Girls Club ( I don't know her either) and Nicole Eggert, who is not fucking fat (at 130 pounds, she's looking for a paycheck).
This is big. And I'm not making a fat joke. Well, I'm not just making a fat joke.
By Merritt Martin
Toddlers & Tiaras and Little Miss Perfect are ruining my life. Tiny children sexualized via spray tan and sequins for the benefit of their stage parents is one big issue. But this week, pageantry infiltrated not only my Food Network shows (I'll get to that), but also furry territory...as in furries. On Little Miss Perfect, a diminutive blonde girl playing Little Red Riding Hood (naturally) gyrated on a giant fursuit-ed creature claiming to be a wolf. Appropriate? Hell no. Maybe it was innocent but all I could think was, "Why is that tiny child in the vertical cowgirl position on a wolf and everyone is just clapping?" Thankfully, The Soup also found the segment disturbing (the footage below is courtesy of The Soup Blog). Then, on my beloved Food Network Challenge the contest was to create "pageant cakes," and the bakers were forced to work with stage moms as their assistants. I was so pissed. Seeing a mom demand that one of the decorative elements on her daughter's cake be a fan of cash made my stomach turn.
Next, I cannot, even in jest, figure out why a guy 10 years older than the age cut-off and who was on Seasons 1 and 2 of Project Runway would show up on my American Idol audition episode.
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| But ... they LOOK like jeans ... |
By Merritt Martin
I have a huge issue with Launch My Line: Are the designers ever going to learn how to sew?! WTF, people! It should progress past the current process of total wannabes dictating an idea to be sketched and produced by an expert. I thought slowly, the designers would learn how to create instead of maintaining order-barking. Lame. I'm kinda done with it. I was, however, thankful to be watching it so I could see the commercial for fucking Pajama Jeans. No shit. They're not jeans and they're not pajamas--they're an abomination, despite their "high-contrast stitching" and yes, rivets. If ladies have gotten to the point where they can't be bothered to put on a pair of actual denim jeans to leave the house, I'm out. I'm so out. Moving on, here's the HD take on this week's reality programming premieres ...
By Merritt Martin
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[Ed. note: welcome to Is This for Real?, your weekly roundup of reality-related WTF's.]
OK, first of all, can I please tell you how relatively not excited I am for the next season of Project Runway? Lifetime has started a full court press of preview trailers, and I just keep thinking, "I'm glad it's back in New York, but it's going to take more than a location reboot, folks." For one, we're going to need the judges to be there every week--unlike last season when guest designers showed up for Michael Kors and Nina Garcia's editorial staff got to fill in for her. If Michael and Nina don't have to show up every week, neither do I...or any other viewer.
As far as what I am looking forward to, this new The Buried Life show coming soon to MTV looks promising. Four dudes knock dreams off their bucket list and with every one, they'll help someone else knock one of theirs off too. I know, it feels very strange that I have such feelings about such a positive feel-good show, but I have a inkling that MTV will tramp it up a little bit. Maybe one of them will want to see a donkey show and I can be disgusted/offended but at the same time discover the lowest point in televised exploitation. It's the anthropologist in me I suppose.
