HOT WEDGES!
AMERICAN IDOL (Wed Feb 3, Fox8- 4:30pm)
With venomous British judge Simon Cowell leaving the program (bitch spits so much acid he routinely has to battle a flamethrower-wielding Sigourney Weaver) this is probably going to be the final season of the American series, which will be bad news to tone-deaf exhibitionists but good news for everyone who actually likes music. Cowell’s posh brand of evil is negated quite effectively this year by the presence of supernaturally-nice new judge Ellen DeGeneres.
LANDMARK SEX: MARRIED TO THE EIFFEL TOWER (Mon Feb 8, Foxtel Bio- 5:30pm)
Fascinating documentary about people with Objectum Sexualis- rather than forming erotic attachments and relationships with other people, OS folks fall passionately in love with particular objects, be it a building, a bridge, a post-box or what have you. We meet Noishe, a woman who is romantically involved with the Eiffel Tower, actually marrying it in a ceremony some years ago.
LEFT OF THE DIAL: AMERICAN ALTERNATIVE ROCK (Thurs Feb 11, ABC-8:30pm)
Documentary about the American indie rock scene, starting with Nirvana and moving on to Pearl Jam, Soundgarden, Garbage, Ben Folds and others. It features interviews with Gay REM front man Michael Stipe, still-one-of-my-primary-celebrity-husbands Pearl Jam lead singer Eddie Vedder, Ben Folds, and the scariest woman in indie rock (even before she played a sentient urinal on TERMINATOR: SARAH CONNOR CHRONICLES) Garbage’s Shirley Manson. Note- if you tune in and recognize less than 10% of the featured bands, you are officially Not With It. You’re welcome!
STALE CHIPS
THE SIMPSONS (Wed Feb 17, Ten- 7:30pm)
This (too) long running show used to be the funniest program on television, way back in the heady days of seasons 5-11. We’re into season 21 now, and the laughs just aren’t there anymore; the 450th episode milestone will soon be upon us- divide that number by 100 and you’ll arrive at how many times you may smile (not laugh) in an episode these days.
MY FAMILY (Wed Feb 17, ABC- 8pm)
This once-funny British sitcom is begging to be taken out in the pastures behind BBC 3 and shot with a dalek gun. Stars Robert Lindsey and Zoe Wannamaker have been so aghast at the quality of the scripts they’ve actually refused to perform some of them.
JUICY JACKETS!
CASTLE (Sun Feb 28, Seven- 9:30pm)
Fairly amusing comedy/drama about a popular crime novelist recruited by the police to assist in a serial killer investigation, when the killings resemble something out of the writer’s books. Writer Richard Castle is played by Nathan Fillion, who as well as being a sci-fi/horror mainstay (BUFFY, FIREFLY, DOCTOR HORRIBLE, SLITHER) is almost ludicrously gay friendly (to the point of encouraging fans to look for homoerotic subtext in his shows) one of the nicest men in Hollywood, jaw-droppingly gorgeous and fond of wearing uniforms that might as well be sprayed on (not for nothing is his FIREFLY nickname ‘Captain Tightpants’)…
Gavin Pitts
