Results tagged “Random Idiocy” from The Mayor of Television

Those lovable scamps at PETA are at it again, pretending to be shocked, I tell you, that NBC has declined to run during the Super Bowl© an ad featuring lingerie models simulating sex with vegetables (and a pumpkin, which, technically, is a fruit) in an effort to promote - well, that's hard to say, but ostensibly vegetarianism.

We'll get into the NSFW particulars and images after the jump, but suffice it to say, PETA has a problem with centuries of food-chain tradition but has no qualms whatsoever about objectifying women as sex objects (which, come to think about it, also has a centuries-long tradition).

The shouting begins within four seconds. Within 15 seconds, the slapping stars. Kicking and punching begins at 33 seconds.

Welcome to Oxygen Channel's "Bad Girls Club," or, more to the point, "Women in Dire Need of Haloperidol." The producers of this concoction (who likely would've preferred the screaming start even sooner, but got all responsible-feeling and stuff and opened with an establishing shot) decided that seriously unhinged sociopaths should be rewarded for their extreme anti-social behavior with temporary residence at a posh mansion and TV cameras following them 24/7. If, in fact, you are sane, you don't give people like this a TV show and a mansion. You institutionalize them.

Meet your bad girls:

Sarah ("The Party Girl"): "My nipples are probably hard." ... "When I'm attracted to someone, I'm going to f@ck the hell out of them." ... (Belches.) ... "I'm more of a slut than a drinker."

Tiffany ("The Warden"): "I won't start sh!t, but I will finish it."

Whitney ("The Straight Shooter"): "The one person you should probably not f@ck with is me." ... "I'm a Boston chick, and that means, go f@ck yourself." (Whitney is genetically incapable of saying two sentences without using the word "Boston.")

Amber I ("The Control Freak"): "I'm very rude, conniving, opinionated ... I've a very bad person to know."

Kayla, AKA KC ("The Loose Cannon"): "Look bitches, I don't tolerate the bullsh!t ... I'm gonna f@ck you up."

Amber II ("The Firecracker"): "Sex is so much more fun."

Ailea ("The Instigator"): "It's so much fun to make people mad. ... 'I p!ssed her off - yeah!'" ... "I say things that offend people all the time."

As you've no doubt figured out, these women were cast for their utter lack of any redeemable qualities. When they arrive at their mansion, it's locked, so one breaks a window and enters. When a guy shows up to repair the window, another parades around topless in front of him. They get thrown out of two bars and one restaurant in the first episode alone.

The point of the show, I suppose, is to snicker with Schadenfreude at these blithering idiots' obnoxious cluelessness, but listening to them screaming at one another virtually nonstop and watching them throwing drinks almost as often becomes a wearying exercise pretty early on. I can't imagine having to be one of the show's cameramen and having to hang out with these abject harridans for hours on end - even a couple of the women themselves seem exhausted with all the drunken diva drama by the end of the first episode.

Naturally, the gals prove to be fairly interchangeable, making it hard (and pointless) to attempt to track their individual character arcs (that was an attempt at dry humor, because there are no character arcs, just nonstop venal, dim-witted pettiness). So here're just some random lines from the first episode that sum up the show better than I could ever bother to try.

"I'm going to use your beer bottles as a sex toy."

"We do what we want when we want."

"Did y'all see all the hooker shoes?"

"I think I need a vibrator because I've never bought one ever in my life and I really want one."

"I'm not used to trying to get people to like me."

"Maybe I'm high maintenance, you know?"

"I'm gonna kill someone. ... I'm nice today, but I can be a bitch from the hood tomorrow."

"Don't let me get drunk, don't let me get drunk. ... Yeah, I'm a bitch."

"If a black person walked in here, I'd treat them very, very nicely. Mexicans, a little bit different, because I think they're illegal."

"I'm about to go the f@ck off."

"They fightin'! They fightin'! They fightin'!"

"The black bitches should be gettin' along. And the black bitch is acting fake."

"How did you get such amazing boobs? I'm not used to everyone around me have such good ones, too."

"If it were up to me, I'd be naked all the time. ... Like misery loves company, nakedness loves company."

"Girls get jealous of me, no matter where I am."

"On God in heaven, I'm not going to hit you now, but you need to walk away."

"When I get angry, you don't want my blackout stage because I go nuts."

"I wanted to come here and party but right now I'm not impressed. I want to go home."

"I can't get over this - I've never been kicked out of so many places before."

"Are we going to be throwing drinks every night?"

- "Bad Girls Club:" 10 p.m. Tuesday, Oxygen.

Typealyzer, a new website, puts blogs on the couch and analyzes their personalities. So, in the interest of science, I offered this one up for its perusal, and this is what came up:

The Doers

"The active and playful type. They are especially attuned to people and things around them and often full of energy, talking, joking and engaging in physical out-door activities.

"The Doers are happiest with action-filled work which craves their full attention and focus. They might be very impulsive and more keen on starting something new than following it through. They might have a problem with sitting still or remaining inactive for any period of time."

Hmm. Clearly, this Typealyzer has no idea what it's talking about. Outside of walking my dog, all I do is sit on my can and type up this mirth-inducing prose for your benefit.

I decided to give it another chance, though, and typed in the Permalink for the previous entry in this blog, the "nice paranoid rant" (per a commenter) on "The World's Closing In On Me TV," and this was the response:

The Thinkers

"The logical and analytical type. They are especially attuned to difficult creative and intellectual challenges and always look for something more complex to dig into. They are great at finding subtle connections between things and imagine far-reaching implications.

"They enjoy working with complex things using a lot of concepts and imaginative models of reality. Since they are not very good at seeing and understanding the needs of other people, they might come across as arrogant, impatient and insensitive to people that need some time to understand what they are talking about."

Now we're getting somewhere. I entered my account of my hellish night on the red carpet at the "Twilight" premiere, and got this:

The Performers

"The entertaining and friendly type. They are especially attuned to pleasure and beauty and like to fill their surroundings with soft fabrics, bright colors and sweet smells. They live in the present moment and don't like to plan ahead - they are always in risk of exhausting themselves.

"They enjoy work that makes them able to help other people in a concrete and visible way. They tend to avoid conflicts and rarely initiate confrontation - qualities that can make it hard for them in management positions."

Again, hmm. Clearly, this blog is schizophrenic.

Finally, I offered up my "History of Television" series (as seen in the Tag Cloud), my ill-fated attempt to weasel my way into PBS's upcoming documentary on TeeVee or at least to write the companion coffee-table book. An expansive, sweeping narrative, it actually contained a fact or two. Typealyzer came back with this:

The Visionaries

"The charming and trend savvy type. They are especially attuned to the big picture and anticipate trends. They often have sophisticated language skills and come across as witty and social. At the end of the day, however, they are pragmatic decision makers and have a good analytical ability.

"They enjoy work that lets them use their cleverness, great communication skills and knack for new exciting ventures. They have to look out not to become quitters, since they easily get bored when the creative exciting start-up phase is over."

Ladies and gentlemen, we have a winner.

The L.A. Times floats a breathtakingly stupid theory - that our lousy economy is turning viewers off of reality TV. "As the Dow continues to spiral down and jobs dry up, viewers may have decided that their everyday lives already contain more reality than they can bear," the piece concludes.

Well, you have to write about something, I suppose. And so I'll write about this.

("It is easier for a couple of morons to pass through the eye of a needle than for a reality program to enter the kingdom of heaven." - Matthew 19:4)

First: Who in the world at this late date mistakes reality TV for reality? Even putting aside the heightened, overheated behavior on these programs, the fact so many of the shows offering rich purses for the winners of competitions would tend to nudge them towards fantasy, anyway.

Second: Even the Times admit they're discussing shows that have been on for a while and/or overexposed and, therefore, shows one would expect to lose some steam in the ratings. But the article in particular wrings its hands over the sorry fate of Fox's "Are You Smarter than a Fifth Grader?", without bothering to mention the fact that the show has been moved from Thursdays to Fridays this season, when far fewer people are watching TV.

Third: The notion that only scripted shows on the broadcast networks have seen an uptick in ratings - and only a slight one at that - has nothing to do with the argument and can be explained away by other things, such as most of the improved shows are relatively young, or Tina Fey's higher profile this fall elevating "30 Rock" or the hellacious marketing campaign lavished upon "Gossip Girl."

(And anyway, who says that "Gossip Girl" doesn't reflect reality? Oh, that's right - everybody.)

Fourth: It's yet another broadcast-network-centric story that while acknowledging that broadcast numbers are down in general, ignores the full TV spectrum. But maybe because that would torpedo the premise: Reality programs on, say, Bravo and Sci Fi (reality on Sci Fi? I'm still trying to get my head around that notion) are enjoying their highest ratings to date.

So, Mr. L.A. Times, sorry, but I don't see any evidence of a cause/effect between our cratering economy and a few reality programs suffering. Though, honestly, I'd be happy if anything could kill them off.

UPDATE: A subhead from today's Daily Variety: "ABC, NBC see boost in reality fare"

Are you a truly horrible person who nonetheless has somehow managed to con some poor guy into marrying you? If so, WE tv is looking for you! They'll be casting for upcoming episodes of "Bridezillas" at sundry Great Bridal Expos around the country, so just show up and, for good measure, punch out one of the production assistants, and you're in!

Locally, WE tv will be looking for harpies on Saturday, Nov. 1, from noon-4 p.m. at the Sheraton Gateway, 6101 W. Century Blvd. in LA, and Sunday, Nov. 2 from noon-4 p.m. at the Anaheim Convention Center at 800 W. Katella. Click here for more information or an auditioning location near you.

But, ask yourself: Do you really want your enduring contribution to Western Culture to be behaving like a spoiled sociopath with anger-management issues on national TV?

If so, good luck!

NEW YORK (AP) - Fox Sports executives, panic-stricken over the prospect of an historically low-rated World Series between the Philadelphia Phillies and the Tampa Bay Rays, are resorting to drastic measures to assure a more potent match-up in the Fall Classic.

"We have research that shows if the Phillies and the Rays play, not even certain members of the players' families would watch," David Hill, CEO of Fox Sports, said late Tuesday, after the Rays beat the Boston Red Sox 13-4 to go up three games to one in the American League Championship Series. In the National League, the Phillies also lead 3-1, over the Los Angeles Dodgers.

"A Phillies-Rays match-up benefits no one - not the fans, not the Fox Sports production crew who enjoy partying in cosmopolitan cities after a game, and certainly not the great sport of baseball, the American pastime, for chrissake," Hill continued. "Is Tampa Bay even really part of America? I haven't checked."

"It's clear that a Dodgers-Red Sox Series would capture the imagination of Americans in a magical way that Philadelphia and Tampa Bay couldn't even hope to aspire to," play-by-play announcer Joe Buck said. "The high drama of pitting Manny Ramirez against a team he soured on and a city that now hates him is off the charts, before the first pitch is even thrown. And in America, you give the people what they want, or they turn on you. If they want a nice lobster meal, you don't hand them a sh!t sandwich. If they want Hillary Clinton, you don't offer them Sarah Palin - you saw how that's turning out, so you don't want to irritate sports fans with an inferior World Series."

After a hastily arranged brainstorming session, Fox executives, working in conjunction with MLB league officials, hit upon a plan to replace the umpires with characters from Fox programs. Characters to take the field to umpire the remaining games in the respective series include flibbertigibbet Marge Simpson, "Family Guy" patriarch Peter Griffin, Chloe, the petulant computer whiz on "24," Walter Bishop, the wacky mad scientist on "Fringe," Gregory House, a pill-popping crank and avowed Red Sox fan, and "American Idol" whack-job Paula Abdul.

"Look at the umpiring during these series - it's been nearly impeccable, and that's really hurt the Dodgers and the Red Sox," Buck said. "They've been reasonably consistent in calling balls and strikes, replay has shown that they got most close calls correct, and the umpiring crew masterfully defused a potentially incendiary situation in game three of the NLCS when Shane Victorino responded angrily to the high-and-tight pitch. Ordinarily, that's the sort of umpiring you want, but these are not ordinary times. These new umpires, with their unhinged or depleted mental capacities, should prove capable of throwing the games in the Dodgers' and Red Sox' favor."

"This is a perfect arrangement for us, because this way, we'll be able to give America a compelling World Series for the ages, and at the same time, we'll be able to aggressively inject the Fox brand into the proceedings," Fox Entertainment chairman Peter Liguori enthused. "Baseball fans will be introduced to some of the colorful characters that populate Fox's stable of quality programs and, who knows? Maybe when the series is over, they'll be inspired to stick around and watch an episode of "Fringe."

Bud Selig, Commissioner of Major League Baseball, said, "Sure, purists of the sport may kvetch over this arrangement, but surely, purists would also prefer to see the Red Sox and Dodgers duke it out in the Fall Classic. So, really, this is win-win for everybody."

"I'd love to play in the World Series, but I understand why Fox and MLB are doing this," said a player on the Tampa Bay Rays that no one has ever heard of. "I wouldn't watch a Rays-Phillies match-up, and I'd be playing in it."

Also tapped to umpire will be fifth graders from "Are You Smarter Than a Fifth Grader?" who live in the Southern California and Boston areas.

(Aspiring actors trek to audition for the upcoming show "Two and a Half Hoboes.")

Responding to the abysmal news from the global markets, the networks have announced new programming to reflect our current economic calamity:

ABC: "Who Wants to Be a Hundred-aire?" Contestants answer questions in order to win the grand prize of $100. The only difference: No lifelines.

Fox: "Are You Smarter than a Financial Executive?" Sample question: "A prospective homebuyer wants you to lend him money with no viable assets to borrow against. What do you do?"

CBS: "The Desperate Race." Contestants traverse Dust-Bowl America by jumping train rails to wretched destinations in search of such exotic prizes such as tepid canned soup and melon rinds.

(The first contestants in this leg of the race are treated to crusts of stale bread!)

The CW: "Underprivileged." An over-educated young woman gets a job tutoring spoiled brats in one of Palm Beach's nicest refrigerator boxes.

NBC: "The Biggest Loser." Instead of weight - heck, anyone can lose weight when they can't afford food - participants in this show strive to lose the most money on the stock market. In case of a tie - and there'll invariably be a tie - the winner/loser/whatever-you-want-to-call-it will be decided in a Thunderdome-style cage fight.

MTV: "My Not-Entirely-Miserable 16." Extravagantly pampered teenage girls celebrate their sweet-16 birthdays with their surviving friends, feasting on food scraps scavenged from abandoned factories and listening to 8-track tapes in a rusted-out '72 Chevy Vega.

(She may be enduring hard times, but this young beauty is enjoying a 16th birthday she'll always remember.)

VH1: "Worst Week Ever." Emaciated comedians make jokes about the pop-culture events of the past week, all involving starving children and breadline riots.

National Geographic Channel: "The Dog Caterer." Cesar Millan can no longer afford to rehabilitate poorly behaved dogs, so he comes up with vaguely acceptable recipes so the pooches' owners can feast on something besides paint chips.

G4: "Tech Toys." Examining the latest in technology, such as sticks that can both hold your bindle and ward off foragers trying to steal your moldy carrots and iPhones that no longer work but can be used as pillows.

Sci Fi Channel: "Are There Any Cylon Overlords Out There Who Want to Enslave Us for Three Squares and a Cot?" The producers of "Battlestar Galactica" decide the scenario proposed by their show wasn't so bad, after all.

Also, CNBC and TV Land will merge to create a nostalgic channel offering reruns of old financial shows in which experts discuss bull markets. All the home makeover shows will be cancelled because no one has any houses to remodel. And Comedy Central will rename itself Sorrow Central because no one can laugh anymore.

Miley Cyrus celebrated her Sweet 16th last night at Disneyland (though she won't turn 16 until November), probably a last-ditch effort by Disney to keep her on her show. She's been accused of growing up too fast quite a bit over the past year, but then, consider the sort of product associated with her that has actually been sanctioned by wholesome Disney.

Subject header to an Email I received from CMT's publicity department:

TOBY KEITH'S HIT SUMMER FILM "BEER FOR MY HORSES" TO PREMIERE ON CMT

Fact check: After eight weeks in theaters, the film had made as of this past weekend $616,411. Either CMT has a most curious notion as to what constitutes a "hit," or they consider the people to whom they send their press releases to be one of the lesser mammals.

On the other hand, if "Beer For My Horses" continues to rake in the cash at that rate (which of course is not likely), it'll only take 131 years for the movie to match the box office take of "The Dark Knight."

(What are they drinking at CMT?)

If so, we may have the perfect gig for you: They're auditioning contestants for the next cycle of "Hell's Kitchen," which stars unhinged celebrity chef Gordon Ramsay as a man who copes with his anger management issues by loudly and bellicosely belittling contestants on his cooking show.

Auditions are Monday from 1-5 p.m. at The Conlin Company, 11825 Major St. Ste 106, Culver City, CA 90230. More info here. Bring ear plugs.

Stocks plunged 777 points today on news that a judge granted NBC-Universal an injunction against allowing Lifetime to grab its Bravo series "Project Runway" next year. What was supposed to be Lifetime's first season of the show is already in production.

Legal and financial stuff is always boring, but essentially, the Weinstein Company sold the show to Lifetime without allowing Bravo to bid on future seasons first, and that's just impolite. And you know how some court cases just sit stranded in the American Justice System for forever? Well, that's not going to happen here, because "Project Runway" is just too important for the American people not to get to watch it in a timely fashion, so they're going to speed this one through the courts.

Of course, given the fact that there's no economy anymore, here's what they'll be designing next season, whether it's on Bravo or Lifetime:

It's like shooting moose in a barrel, but she's awfully good at it.

I've been sitting on this for a few days, trying to figure out a decent joke about it, but it's basically a joke in and of itself and so I'll just present it as the Fin de siècle crap that it is:

There's this thing called the New York Reality TV School, dedicated to training its students to behave in a fake enough way to land a spot on a reality show. From its literature:

"Every week thousands of people audition for Reality TV shows, (sic on the comma) the competition is fierce and the odds of making it past the first round of submissions are slim. Do you know what it takes to get noticed? And if you are fortunate enough to be called in, will you be able handle the pressure of this once in a lifetime opportunity?"

Lesson #1, I'm guessing, is changing your resume so that instead of "Aspiring Actor," you pawn yourself off as "Bartender," "Consultant," "Activist" or "Professional Goatherder."

(It may look like random chaos, but it's actually an intensive tutorial to help students prepare to make themselves look like utter fools on TV. Mission accomplished!)

There are one-time workshops ($139) and five-week courses ($299). From the syllabus:

"Students will explore on set behavior and will also learn how best to make a tape for submission with hands on exercises and the shooting of an actual tape. We will show how to make the camera work for you once you are on set and further explore: blocking, staging, wardrobe details and personally tailoring your look to your advantage."

Yes, blocking, staging and tailoring your wardrobe are all essential in preparing for reality shows. Who knew?

It will come as no surprise that Donald Trump is a celebrity spokesman. So you know it's classy.

So that's bad enough, but hey, if people want to throw their money away for a chance to humiliate themselves on national TV, that's their business. But, now there's going to be a reality show about the reality-show school.

Robert Galinsky, who created the school, does a pretty good job of describing what the show will be when he calls it "an uber-meta-circular-clusterf@¢& of camera seducing camera seducing cast seducing viewer."

Galinsky's next project is a school for people on how to watch reality TV without getting the urge to plunge knitting needles in your eyes.

So John McCain "suspended" his "campaign" "yesterday," in order to save the economy and the human race. That meant canceling his appearance on "Late Show with David Letterman," to which Dave took umbrage:

To be fair, it makes sense for a Presidential candidate, in the middle of a crisis, to be interviewed by someone who seems like a real reporter (or, at least, Katie Couric) rather than a late-night comic. On the other hand, if a candidate "suspends" one's "campaign" and then issues "talking points" about said "suspension," as McCain did, then that's not really suspending a campaign, just coaxing it in another direction and hoping for some heretofore unrealized traction. (Oh, and Presidential debates have been conducted during crises before in America's history. Lots of things happen during national crises. Like, I haven't suspended this blog to save the economy.)

That Letterman replaced McCain with MSNBC's Keith Olbermann speaks volumes. And Olbermann was on his best behavior, perhaps saving his vitriol for his own show:

A reader wrote in:

"So I'm watching Conan O'Brien (last night), and just as he launches into what sounds like a funny routine about smashing together 'celebrity douchebags' in a collider, NBC 4 cuts into the broadcast with Colleen Williams. She states, 'We'll be going back to Conan in just a couple of minutes. Right now, in New York, though, Conan is doing a comedy routine about trains crashing. And we feel with our recent train collision here in Southern California, it is just not appropriate for us to show it. In the meantime, though, here are some of the stories making news this morning.' ...

"I'm sure some viewers were annoyed at missing the routine, while others might have appreciated the sensitivity. ...

"(By the way, I DVRed the episode, so the quotes from Colleen ... are accurate.)"

Well, we checked out the offending clip at NBC.com's page for Conan's videos, and after some false starts (DSL collapse, NBC misidentifying the episode's segments - the bit in question is in the episode's first segment, not the second, as labeled), were shocked beyond all rational thought.

Well, not really. KNBC was erring on the side of caution, but, given how big a story this was locally and how disturbing the original images were, I suppose I can sort of understand why they did it. Since those with sterner constitutions can find it online, no First Amendment harm, no First Amendment foul. I guess.

(Conan had something similar happen a few years back when he hosted the Emmys - he shot a pre-taped bit featuring the plane crash from "Lost," and a plane crashed somewhere that day, and some people complained about the insensitivity, and other people complained about the people who complained, saying we're a nation of whiners or something.)

"We just thought it would be fun to smash things together at high speeds," Conan explains of his celebrity douchebag super collider. They had previously sent Spencer Pratt and Dog the Bounty Hunter careening headlong into one another, he explained, but unfortunately Pratt survived the collision, so they brought him back to smash into magician Criss Angel.

Promising "complete douchebag evisceration," Conan introduced his super collider - toy trains on a track with photos of Pratt and Angel affixed to the front of the trains. Conan was careful to insist that what we saw was, in fact, not a train set: "Do not be fooled. That is a super collider built by MIT."

"Jordan, our somewhat anal retentive producer," as Conan introduced him, emerged and declared, "Conan, I'm sorry, I can't let you do that. ... It could tear a hole in the douchebag continuum," a riff on the recent unfounded controversy surrounding the Large Hadron Collider in Switzerland and France.

Conan explained, "Tonight's experiment is being closely watched by douchebags all over the world," introducing images of Paris Hilton, Gene Simmons, Ryan Seacrest, Iranian president Mahmoud Ahmadinejad and Geraldo Rivera eyeing the experiment. The trains circled the track, hit one another and burst into flames. The others then exploded, as well as Conan's producer.

In all, a pretty innocuous (and only slightly amusing) bit - the idea was better than the execution. Unless you lost a loved one in the tragedy, your mind probably wouldn't have immediately wandered back to the incident, but then, if you lost a loved one in the tragedy, you're probably not watching Conan O'Brien at this point, either.

Perhaps the train angle was just subterfuge - maybe KNBC is staffed with a lot of douchebags who took umbrage with being treated with such disrespect.

What do you think? Was KNBC displaying appropriate sensitivity in hiding this fairly juvenile joke from local viewers? Or were they being overprotective parents who force their kids to wear raincoats because there are a couple of clouds in the sky?

The Washington Post's impeccably droll Lisa de Moraes has declared today David Caruso Day. (We would've posted this earlier, but the blog server was down. Still, there's plenty of time to join in the fun.) Some of the tips:

"When speaking, head must be cocked to one side, hands on hips (aka Caruso Handles).

"If you are using more than 10 words in a sentence while speaking, you are doing it wrong. ...

(Every single publicity still of David Caruso looks like this. Every damn one.)

"At least 75 percent of statements made in the course of the day by participants must be delivered as a question. Example: 'It's ... cold outside?' ...

"When speaking to someone at length, you must first address the person's feet, then slowly look up and, before making eye contact, look away, then walk out of the frame. Exception: It is acceptable to look a small child in the eye."

Further assistance in perfecting your Caruso can be found here (it's old, but it's still great):

In the meantime, there's tonight's season premiere of "CSI: Miami" to consider. Horatio (the name they call Caruso on this show) was shot at the end of last season, but, even worse! His sunglasses got shattered.

So, tonight: Horatio is put in a body bag. No! you gasp. Yes, I must sadly report. Even Emily Procter is upset, and I hate to see her upset.

OK, so not to give anything away, but, well, Horatio's really not dead. (Oh, wait - that gave it away. Sorry.) See, he was working on this case and decided that he needed to do some investigating incognito, so he faked his death. But: He staged his murder - he took a bullet to his flak jacket - but somewhere where there were no witnesses? And broke his sunglasses, to boot? Couldn't they just ring up the media and say, "Oh, bad news - could you report that Horatio's dead so we can fool some bad guy he's after?"

Anyway, they try to cover that up with some editing so disorienting I thought the disk had some sort of glitch in it that was causing it to skip. And I was watching a rough cut, but boy did I have to ride the remote's volume buttons, because the episode's all whisper whisper whisper EXPLOSION GUNFIRE EXPLOSION GUNFIRE whisper whisper EXPLOSION GUNFIRE EXPLOSION!

Just another day in Miami.

- "CSI: Miami:" 10 tonight, CBS (Channel 2).

Here's a slightly expanded version of something running in tomorrow's paper:

After the deadly opening featuring the five nominees in the Outstanding Host of a Reality Series category, it's safe to say the Academy of Television Arts & Sciences will go back to having someone with an actual sense of humor host the Emmy ceremony next year.

"American Idol's" Ryan Seacrest (who hosted solo last year), "Deal or No Deal's" Howie Mandel, "Dancing with the Stars"' Tom Bergeron, "Project Runway's" Heidi Klum and "Survivor's" Jeff Probst co-hosted the ceremony. After their opening segment, they remained largely in the shadows, appearing just long enough to introduce the celebrity presenter of the next trophy.

But the damage had already been done - the five's opening bit was a flat-footed disaster. Introduced by Oprah Winfrey, the five shuffled onto stage sheepishly. "Something I've learned from television - never follow Oprah," Seacrest said, awkwardly, to not much of a response.

"We feel like the step-child of television and we thank you for making us feel welcome," Mandel said, prematurely, as that welcome feeling would soon reveal itself to be all in his mind.

"We wanted to make this night special," Probst, well, lied. He, Seacrest and Mandel spoke over one another, then Probst confessed: "Two minutes in, we have nothing for you."

"Check the teleprompters," Seacrest said, assuring his audience that the five co-hosts couldn't be bothered to come up with something remotely entertaining for a vast worldwide audience.

"We are on Sarah Palin's bridge to nowhere," Mandel joked, wanly. "The government can't even bail us out of this."

After a little more busking, Probst announced, "By doing nothing, we have fulfilled our obligation," and he, Mandel and Seacrest fled the stage, leaving Bergeron and Klum alone. For some reason, William Shatner then joined them onstage, and Bergeron and Shatner tore off Klum's tuxedo, revealing a short little spangly number underneath. It was so embarrassingly leering that the lecherous, sexist '60s gents of "Mad Men" would've cringed.

The torpid opening received an instant pan from the evening's first winner, "Entourage's" Jeremy Piven: "What if I just kept talking for twelve minutes - what would happen?" he asked after a joke in his acceptance speech fell with a thud, then answered his own question in adding, "That was the opening!"

Backstage, Piven continued the thought: "I thought we were being punk'd. I was confused. It was like in 'The Producers' when they do 'Springtime for Hitler' - (you wondered,) 'What was actually happening right now?'"

Later, Probst, in accepting the first Emmy for Outstanding Host of a Reality Show, acknowledged their failure by addressing Jimmy Kimmel, who presented him with the trophy. Probst told Kimmel, "You tried - you told us the 'nothing' bit may not work, but we stuck to our guns."

And in the process nearly ruined the evening and underscored for millions of viewers just why they loathe reality TV so much.

The other asinine thing from the ceremony - which had to hurdle through the last few categories because it was running behind - was how it was padded with clips from old shows, ostensibly tied together from the theme of, uh, set design? Without, um, actual sets?

For no discernible reason, they trotted out clips from "Seinfeld," "Desperate Housewives," "The Simpsons," "Rowan & Martin's Laugh-In," "The West Wing" and "M*A*S*H." Then someone from those shows would present an award (the "Laugh-In" cast yokking it up not just old-school but Jurassic-school about today's best TV comics - Stewart, Colbert, Maher - was especially distressing), except for "M*A*S*H," which inexplicably segued into Sandra Oh and Patrick Dempsey presenting an award. (Oh, I get it - they're all TV doctors. Idiots.) For the zillionth time: Why not scrap the bells and whistles dragging the production down and just focus on the awards?

"It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia" is such a high-energy, high-wire act that it's bound to fall sooner or later, but here we are as it's about to begin its fourth season and they're still finding new ways to shock and appall - and, oh, yeah, amuse - us.

The show features monumentally stupid and venal characters doing foolish and awful things in a manic, cartoonish fashion. It's not a show for grown-ups, though one of the funniest things about it is imagining someone tuning in because they liked that funny little Danny DeVito on "Taxi" and are expecting more of the same, only to have their head explode.

(Many episodes end with a variation on this theme.)

Tonight, two new episodes debut. In the first, Mac (series creator Rob McElhenney) and Dennis (Glenn Howerton) decide to go all "Most Dangerous Game" on us and hunt their childhood enemy, the homeless priest Cricket (David Hornsby). If they catch him, they have further indignities to launch upon his person.

Cricket's unclear on the concept, so they tell him, "If I were you, I'd spend a whole lot less time asking questions and a whole lot more time running."

Meanwhile, Charlie (Charlie Day) and Dee (Kaitlin Olson), believing they've become addicted to "human meat," head to the local morgue, where the attendant, bored, tells them, "Fifty bucks gets you 10 minutes alone with one of the bodies." Let's see "'Til Death" do a cannibalism storyline!

In the following episode, Mac, Dennis and Charlie come up with a fairly hare-brained plot to profit off the oil crisis, while Frank (DeVito) waterboards Dee - his own daughter - in a particularly unsavory location.

Stumbling upon Frank's nefarious lair, Mac's less interested in Dee's distress than in asking, "Does that waterboarding thing work?"

Frank, exultant, replies, "You bet your ass - I got Dee to admit to things that she never did!"

Usually, "wrong" isn't intended as a compliment. It is here.

- "It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia:" 10 and 10:30 p.m. Thursday, FX.

From CNN.com:

In addition to a couple of other things, Sarah Palin is famous for giving her children names that ensure they'll be taunted at school, names like Track, Trig, Bristol, Arcade Fire and The Google.

Now, everyone can get into the act with this ingenious Sarah Palin Baby Name Generator.

From this moment forth, please address me by my new moniker: Skein Chug Palin.