olympics 2012

the title of this blog was almost #NBCFail and it was challenging not to title it that... had i posted background tv entries here since the last entry, at least one would have been title NBCFail... #NBCFail has become the standard bearer internet hashtag on twitter and other places representing critical and public opinion on the atrocious production of the 2012 olympic games that nbc presented... it is so sad on so many levels...

saddest of all might be the arrogant ignorance... disrespect of nations, of races, of sports, and of athletes permeated the broadcast right from the opening ceremony to this point, less than 48 hours before the closing ceremony... the five hour time delay was a challenge to overcome, but nbc pretended it was not there at first, presenting the replay on prime time as if the events were live... nbc was obviously oblivious to the real-time world we live in now that twitter, facebook, and thousands of other websites that report on world events as they happen...

the editing out of specific moments, the jingoistic and even borderline bigoted commentary, the arrogant bias of commentators was not only unprofessional, it was insulting... luckily we've come a long was as a species for some of the comments might have been international incidents a half century or century ago... those of you who think i am overstating the offenses, i suggest you study history and look closer at the major faux-pas that nbc presented in from of more than a billion people around the world...

expert commentators did not seem to know what was going on and they were not fed interesting facts or information, they were permitted to babble and too often made mis-statements that were ridiculous and embarrassing, the women's vault comes to mind... the commercials, more than 33% of each hour, were ridiculously placed, edited into the tape delay so often they dominated the viewing experience which was not only frustrating, but insulting at times (the grinning monkey on gymnastic rings following the grinning african american gymnast comes to mind and the commentary leading up to the commercial could not have been scripted to be more racially provocative)... it was obvious that the people responsible for putting the overly edited excerpts of the days events were way over their heads and not paying attention to the presentation they were producing...

the droning ignorance got so bad i kept the olympics on without sound for most of the second week... yeah, ratings were high, but customer satisfaction and memories of insults and frustration and annoyance will last a lot longer than the days ratings...

this production may be a sign of how out of touch corporate america is...

there are thousands of links i could add here to the detailed and valid critique others have posted as they dissected the nbc coverage... but i am not going to put the time in to do that tonight... i just wanted to record that the background tv for the last two weeks, mostly, has been the worst olympic tv coverage i've ever seen and this goes back decades (1976 may still be one of the best, partly because of nadia, but the sad truth is abc did an infinitely better job of producing the olympics every time they did it without the current technology, technology that was too obviously absent from the 2012 #NBCFail broadcast...

hopefully i will not feel the need to vent any more than i already have... tv, even tv just kept on in the background for listening and sporadic viewing, should be enjoyable, not irritating... the sponsors and nbc will be remembered with frustration and avoidance for a while... sponsors are lucky we have such short memories... nbc sports, you're done for me, even on background tv...

protect the children from the children

ridiculous as it is, watching a harry potter marathon on the abc family station (missed the first four though cuz i watched other stuff last night and slept today, but i know them well enough so it doesn't matter and in fact, it is better that way cuz...) is a clear reflection of the fears and delusions most humans accept as right and truth and reality... i refer mostly to the editing for television, not to the stories themselves... as if the movies that millions of children were brought to by their parents numerous times were not edited properly, the tv editors (are they just protecting their jobs as those layered in bureaucracy do or are they puritanical control freaks driven by their own perverse fears - or what?) randomly (though they would claim carefully selectively) chopped out lines and bits of scenes that ultimately change the entire experience so beloved in the movies...

because it is so much safer to stick our heads in the sand, after all...

still, it makes for good background tv as it reminds me of the characters and stories i enjoyed when they were a bit more whole... one more theatrical series of stories i wish someone who was into them would share with me...

oh no, not bones

one of the most rational shows out there, one of the few shows with an atheist main character, and in one of the most critical episodes they go right for the jugular mimicking the biblical birth of jesus story - how could they destroy the character development so much in one simple episode?...

the story line was as stupid as stupid can get what with bones walking through a prison accusing people of all sorts of things while present and in the climax, walking through a prison cafeteria riot shouting out an accusation that one of the prisoners murdered another while the prisoners held back booth (other main character) and then, not ridiculous enough, she goes into labor as she is stepping over prisoners who are laying on the ground because the guards pulled their guns to quell the riot and that is just the set up for the next ridiculous manipulative pandering...

on the way to the nearest hospital, ten miles before getting there (so less than 10 minutes away) they stop at an inn, yes, an inn (was that brennen's inn?) and the inn is full, yes, the inn is full, but the stable behind the inn is available and the baby is born without any assistance, no one from the inn calls the hospital less than 10 minutes away, and not even booth (who was arguing the whole show for medical care at birth while bones was insisting on having the baby without medical care at home) calls the hospital and wonder of wonder, miracle of miracles, all is well...

next scene they are home, bones carrying the baby as if she didn't just give birth in a stable, and there's a surprise party... somehow the baby was cleaned up, cord cut, afterbirth cleaned up, and so on... absolutely amazing how this episode betrayed the character and theme of the show with such a far fetch, illogical, and irrational series of decisions, reactions, and coincidences...

but i suppose that's the leap of faith mentality that overrides logic and good consistent creativity, storyline, character development, and professionalism... so disappointing... so sad...

another show takes a nose dive off my list of top shows...

sigh, are we laughing yet?...

ok, so don't just take my word for it... a quick search reflects audience reaction... initially the tv news wrongly reported higher ratings when the actual audience share went down for that show and has been dropping since the show to the lowest (about 20% the previous 6 year average)... the episode synopsis tries to paint the show in a positive light, but looking at the comments from actual fans (as opposed to professionals paid to support the telivision industry), the fan response was not good which actually reflects the actual lower audience share...

.....

Epilogue:
ready for this?... i suppose it is a sign from jesus himself that the next show i found scanning the tv was angels and aliens, which combines not only accepting the bible as actual historical events and using it as evidence of alien visitation... robert klein sounds now as we collectively chant: 33rd parallel, 33rd parallel, 33rd parallel...

ok, taking the concept seriously for a moment... hey, if aliens were the source of the bible and they watched the reactions of the human beings they visited, i'd have given up on humanity for a while too... at least until the collective mental illnesses (paranoia, delusions, add, etc) and ignorant knee-jerk hostility subsided a bit...

human minds are amazing in their creativity to prove what they want to believe i find it sadly amusing (at least i am not offended, aye? :)

x-what?

ever notice how utterly repressed scully was in the x-files?... i mean, she had all of these haunting issues and did so much to distract herself with pseudo-science (the show really had no science in it, i mean, compare it with csi or ncis, it was geared toward conspiracy theory lovers and people who probably watch all the ghost and paranormal shows now... i wonder sometimes, now that time has passed and i see reruns in a different light, why i liked it so much... it was in that film noir stylee i supposed that made it a bit intriguing, but the acting, well, as much as i loved mulder and scully at the time, was pretty flat, stoic, and adversarial... so different than the family devotion feeling the acting and characters share in ncis...i guess it was the odd storylines that bordered on on outer limits and other exploration of the unknown shows that i enjoy... maybe i felt a little sorry for scully and related to the quixotic quest for truth that mulder portrayed... the government conspiracy stuff gets old fast for me, but it played it's role in the attraction from time to time...

oh well, stuck here with my injured foot i am watching way too much tv and overall, tv has been unsatisfying for me today, but x-files going down the tube?... maybe watching a dozen episodes would return the show back to it's top ten place in my list of favorite hows, but i think for now, it drops out... not that this is earth shaking news or anything, but then, this is just my background tv blog, so what did you expect? :)

thank goodness for youtube :)

so many missed moments here

in the land of tv, background tv mostly, but still tv... tonight i watched eureka and was once again disappointed in the recycled storyline and lack of imagination and lame desperate grasp for plot by adding pandering to paranoia with sinister secret big brother controls, terminator, independence day, and as far back as brave new world and so many other stories told this so much better... it was bound to happened, they basically told us they ran out of imagination when they suddenly announced the show's cancellation at the end of the fourth season... so little in the human mind beyond sex and violence and paranoid conspiracies...

wish someone would put a series together based on heilein, bradbury, asimov, and others...

what are you watching lately?

human ego

after months of forgetting i even have cable, i put aside the video game distraction and watch the odder side of tv, sci fi, being human and lost girl and sure, always the outsider with some deep dark secret super power, are we really such an egocentric species that it has to be all about being human?... add the stupidity of self-destruction and the weepy emo weakness of the glimmer of potential for goodness and any non-human species with superior senses or powers feeling like they are missing something is as delusional as the typical human... but then, these shows are made for humans by humans, after all... duh...

is it the fear of the aloneness of reality that drives humans into the blind acceptance of self-destructive seductions or pathetic delusions just to give us the sense of belonging and being right and not being alone and... whatever?...

or something like whatever...

instant eh...

ok, so i took the day off and am relaxing and wrote most of the morning and decided it was time for lunch and since there was nothing on tv and tv keeps me company when i am eating alone, i decided to check out the in demand stuff and found once upon a time, a new show i wanted to see and so, on it went...

that was about five minutes ago...

and here i am already, the first scene turned me off enough to come here and put the tv where it usually resides, in the background... alas, leave it to tv writers to start out programmed and predictable and standard and unfortunately, formula...

. . .

scene two appeals a but more because i love the main character's face (a favorite from house... i never watched how i met your mother cuz i am not much into formula sit-coms and i didn't know she was associate producer on glee which surprised me) and while i don't like the over-done naivety of the teacher (i never watched the stuff she's been in, ed or big love, so she is brand new to me), i love her face too, so there may be some hope as faces are a primary attraction for me to continue watching something and there is the appropriately named mr. gold (rumplestilskin) who played a good love-hate character on star trek:universe and has been in a bunch of films, but they need much better writers to really become what i would have hoped this sort of idea could become and it is a wonderful idea...

it'll take more suspension of reality than it should (because of the poor writing and mediocre acting, especially of the male lead and evil witch - so far), but i will probably give this show a show if only in on-demand when i have time and in the background... would be more fun with a tv-watching partner of course...

i think i'll put the last four episides of fringe on in the background now...

sci-fi channel fail

maybe the sci-fi channel is right, maybe the average or mass of sci-fi (or syfy) viewers have adhd, or very low iqs, or at the very least a very limited attention span and minimal standards... that may be why the sci-fi, or syfy channel programmers can get away with putting on so many b horror films and wrestling, as if some who is into science fiction is obviously into crappy horror films and the scripted macho homo-erotic wrestling soap opera... if they only knew that the horror and wrestling just turns off the real science fiction mind that craves intellectual (as in scientific) creativity... science fiction, get it?...

what's worse is a true horror film fan laughs at the stupidity of the syfy channel as they edit out most of the really horrible horror scenes that most blood and gore horror fans are horror fans for, to see (or dare themselves to watch)... so there are the two main segments of the syfy audience that the brilliant syfy marketers are trying to reach, turned off... and as for wrestling fans, well, divide the market even further...

what the true science fiction fan wants most is another science fiction channel that actually produces and shows science fiction... imagine bringing bradbury, asimov, and heinlein to life... imagine turning the classic stories of these guys into visual productions today... or these guys... there are so many more... even sprinkling in some fantasy if only to prove the true fans know the difference...

of course there is a fair measure, maybe a good measure of false harrah in the sci-fi literature... plenty of sappy soap opera drama and bad writing, i mean, just because an author has a genuine wish to explore the unknown and create a new world, a new idea, a science fiction story, does not mean the author can...

but at least we can stop pretending blatant horror (which sometimes has storylines so banal that they make porn writers seem creative) and wrestling stories (which is basically softcore porn for every sexual orientation and alternative lifestyle with even less storyline) are in any way appealing to the true science fiction fan...

then again, there is the star wars generation (oh, did i open up the can?)...

lol :)

classless whores

jay leno
nancy grace
WKMG Orlando
CNN
and of course, everything FOX

jay just couldn't wait to stick it to casey anthony, using her to try to be clever, something he so rarely is even with the tonight show writers (though i think the best left not long after johnny retired)... and when the audience sat there silently he did not show any respect or find a clue, he asked if his mike was working, the oldest most pathetic bit of desperation a comic grasps at to bully an audience into applauding after he repeats it... so typical of an insensitive egomaniac... or a republican...

who the fuck is nancy grace?... she comes off as a clown faced know-it-all who epitomizes the adage if you can't do, you critique and represents the worst whoring of the legal profession... she will say anything to get an audience and panders to the lowest ignorance and fear-based hatred in insecure people... she is a master baiter, a masturbating her audience of melodrama junkies with finger-pointing and table turning arguments so typical of the religious right culture that has god to defend them so they don't have to be held accountable for their gross irresponsibility and hypocrisy... the only reason i even heard of her is as one more self-righteous angry nobody waging her tail chasing the casey anthony bandwagon...

my dog makes more sense...

and then we come to the right wing media, the fair and balanced news corporations, which, whether we acknowledge it or not, includes CNN cuz, well, have you ever seen what ted turner does to movies?... control freaks think they know what everybody else needs and their blatent patronization of the stupidity so many wear as a badge of honor... fat jobless irrational pathetic people with obviously no lives to live of their own chanting appeal outside of the courthouse and the news media soaks it up... irresponsible parents bringing their children to the spot the decaying skeleton corpse of a child was found, innocent children exposed to the news media wondering what the depressing emo-circus is about, the emotional abuse carved into their helpless mindless faces...

and everyone except the judge and jury so certain she is guilty... everyone except the unbiased people who actually saw the evidence that the state, in all it's arrogant cockiness, presented... everyone except those who actually know acts astonished that those who actually weighed the evidence without emotion of the lynch mob mentality americans so dearly love could possibly come to a fair verdict...

and now, the news media will milk the aftermath, the tragedy... the noble fourth estate will haunt the mother who lost her daughter and the parents and anyone who dares consider that the evidence proved beyond reasonable doubt that there was reasonable doubt that she did it... americans addicted to watching other people's pain and suffering, maybe that's why we kill so many women and children all over the world every day, we are junkies for the pain, the tragedy, the suffering victims... so addicted are we that we must create victims just to find villains to hate...

pathetic human waste...

never liked leno

not from the very beginning, his humor was patronizing and condescending and his insecure ego always spoiled his comedy for me, but then, that could just be my imagination... or my perception, being me and all... anyway, tonight he again showed me why i don't watch him even though i used to love the tonight show... it was so obvious that nbc forced the four finalists from the voice on him as he disregarded and dismissed their performances with a cursory calling of their name introduction and then leaving them unmentioned (and even cutting them off) when he went back to talking with his guests... he is such a turn off for me that i don't even watch when someone i like is on his show because he ruins it for me with his disrespect and phoniness... and he did it again tonight... he won't be on the tube again by my choice...

dia, meanwhile, was so nervous, stiff, and incongruous... they dress her up like a conservative little kid from the sixties and then she sings an alternative anthem from the nineties on a show for grandmothers, definitely not good marketing... she should have done a song from the audience's generation or at least a throw-back like time after time that javier did... oh well, another blown opportunity cuz she just isn't ready, but someday, hopefully, she will get it and her magic will burst out just right...

i can see it, which is why i watch her... even on leno :)

human fears

the fear of nudity and more, the fear of not being perfect, especially not being in a perfect body (whatever that is) by current human standards completely dominates almost every media presentation and human activity... i can sometimes, when sleepy and easily distracted (and that does tend to happen), appear fascinated by the ritualistic lambasting and criticism of the supposed imperfections and the narrow minded idolization of the supposed perfect bodies...

something called the 25 most memorable swimsuit moments bring this to mind... the odd thing is that most of the people these media whores call hot or perfect are usually not attractive to me at all... though ok (oh kate), kate hudson is an exception...

ironically or not, it is my natural aversion to fat cuz instinctively i knew fat was a sign of laziness, apathy, low self-love, and unhealthy habits that lead to the lack of appeal for fat boobs (and that is what boobs are, the bigger they are, the more fat they contain, like it as most are trained to do or not), while a few inches below (abs) the slightest bit of fat is repulsive to most, which is completely illogical and another sign of the sheep-like blindness that most humans follow...

and let's not even mention that the show glorifies nipples and yet blurs them because, omigosh, we can't show nipples to children (ummm, breast feeding?... to debate the arbitrary definitions of sexy and sleazy, naughty and slutty, or whatever ridiculously (actually) meaningless words humans create to avoid these fears of sexuality and nudity, well, to me it's just stupidity... yeah, the illogic is so hypocritical as most fear-based thoughts are)... so i toss between laughing and feeling sad about this human fear and confusion...

oh, but they finish with phoebe, redemption?... though it was always her face that came first and her butt that came second for me, pun (and bun) not necessarilly intended (oh did i just give in to the attempt at a clever quip based on double entendre that growns with failure?... nyuk nyuk, right)...

maybe it's time to wake up and do something healthy, aye? :)

ncaa championship?

wow, i couldn't keep my eyes on the tv even when i tried and i thought i'd want to watch the ncaa men's chamionship game but i've never seen such a poorly played chamionship game in any sport... 18% shooting for the game and that was with a big spurt in the forth quarter... through most of the game they had no (zero) points in the paint and were shooting under 10%... they went 1 for 20 shots from 2 point range before they hit their second 2 point shot in the second half... and they were leading 22-19 at halftime on a last second prayer three pointer... i feel sad for the butler team... heck of a night to have your worst game of the season, maybe ever...

and conneticutt was hardly any better... 53-41 final in a national championship?... pathetic... maybe this is the most mediocre ncaa bastketball year ever, or at least in a very long time... embarrasing all around... a number 8 team and a number 3 team in the championship and neither played like they belonged there...

wish it was not so...

remembering snl

a long long time ago (and i don't mean american pie or even a linda ronstadt song), i found myself semi-wasted after a tour in the us army where drugs were easier to get than sex, but just barely, and both were a lot easier to get than arrested for carrying a gun on a white house tour, but that’s beside the point… where was i?... ah yes, remembering snl… i started this entry an hour and a half ago… and with jim carrey as the guest host, i decided to watch… a bit earlier i was on my way out to play games with friends when the jets-colts game got interesting so i decided to continue watching and by the time it was over, i decided to cook some dinner here and watch snl…

it was a long long time ago (is this where we came in?) when i was sitting home, or perhaps i was in pompano beach visiting friends, memory is not perfect and location was not as important as the memory of the feeling, the gleefully awakening of the feeling of revelation when something new emerges from the ether (or everything outside the head) as i watched the first episode of saturday night light… that first show was followed by week after week of the most different comedy i had ever seen on television and for almost two years i was drawn to watch every almost saturday night…

tonight was, as has been the case every year since those first shows, disappointing, but in that it rekindled memories of the original gleeful feeling, it was well worth staying home for… and here i am now, remembering another fond memory, lays barbecue potato chips, while eating the baked version thinking how lays baked barbecue potato chips taste much like pringles, which is quite disappointing as well… with each passing year everything seems to be more and more processed, less and less fresh, and i wonder how long the human race can continue like this…

and when will the next gleeful awakening feeling of revelation come? :)

sg:u

star gate: universe is still as it first came across to me, a cross between several popular shows of the day, especially what i've heard of lost and that taints it for me for i never could find my way into lost as it reminded me too much of survivor and that was just a step away from big brother and all the other psuedo-reality shows that were pandering to the most banal base aspects of human stupidity and fear and stereotyping... and then there are slightly religious undertones showing through that are even worse, but that is the worst part of human creativity, the lack of it... always returning to the same fear of death and the walk into the light explanation for what happens after death, complete with angel wings for those who need them...

but it's all that's left of the star gate series, so i'll keep hoping there is less focus on the same old same old human archetypes and a chance there might be an original thought, the hope of sci-fi dreamer...

missing craig, but...

disappointed in him even more... first off there was a fun happy birthday video floating around facebook and youtube and mentioned on twitter, all places craig exploits on his show so it would seriously surprise me if craig did not know about the happy birthday video created by his devoted fans...

and then, someone at warner brothers or another greedy company shut down the youtube channel that had been sharing craig with the world (many millions of views by people who cannot get craig on tv) for some bogus control-freak reason (cuz going viral on youtube certainly helps a publicity machine and profit margin)... the disappointment was craig's silence on the shut down even as many hundreds of his faces expressed sorrow and even pain at the loss of the abil;ity to see his show... i mean, he could have at least joked about the conspiracy to stop his world domination or blame it on that conan guy or something clever to nudge youtube about the action... i never expected craig to be politically correct or so out of touch with his fans...

so i am missing watching him because i am getting to sleep earlier these days, but i am still quite disappointed and not as big a fan as i was last week before he dissed his fans with silence just when they needed him most...

where are all the heroes?...

the sub show, i suppose...

narf :}