Febuary and Nothing to Talk About

I've been oddly uninspired. Soon I'm going to need to talk about that blog post I've written and subsequently decided was too shit to post, maybe that one relating my adventures in PC cricket games that I thought was too disturbing to post, actually finishing my review of End of Time which bafflingly was more difficult for me to write than a bit, maybe talking about the now 6-part novel series forming in my head, which is essentially Sharpe transplanted into a very un-fantastical fantasy world where Roman-expys enslave the 'Fey', kick arse and it turns out the Elves are the badguys, or maybe just try and work out who Robert Lindsay was a dead look-a-like for when I just glanced at the telly and saw it's a gimmick episode of My Family set in the future with Clive "Mr Copper/Jobel/Richard Bucket" Swift in it.

Was it Ian McKellen? Richard Gere? That old bloke from Wild at Heart? A combination of all three? Dave Allen? Dudley Moore in that sketch where he plays Roger Moore's housebound father? Robert Lindsay with talcum powder in his hair? HENRY KISSINGER???

Hmmm... what else? Oh, I can't get a Tax File number because I don't know where the fuck my birth certificate is. Better yet, it's apparently MY fault, even though I was never the one who stored it anyway. If I can't get a Tax File number I can't work and I guess I'll just starve to death in my own filth.

I've been working on a game. A lot. That's why I get distracted. It's not a project I want to talk about because of slightly possible legal issues and I also shot my mouth off in an unwise manner late last year only to get quoted verbatim on a podcast. Thank Christ it was the sort that nobody listens to do.

I played through The Tales of Monkey Island a way back and it was incredible but nobody will really care.

I've been working on another game, barely at all. That one I can talk about - Secret Agent on Roller Skates. It is completely retarded, and I hope it will give it enough charm for people to like it when/if it is released. Hint: the secret agent is on roller skates so I don't have to animate him walking. In spite of this the game contains a far minor character who DOES walk around, and a muppet like automaton who I had to animate tearing a hole through reality and climbing into existence, which was significantly tougher to draw. No logical explanation is offered for why exactly he works in an art gallery while apparently inhabiting another dimension.

But for all of that, it suddenly struck me that I never ranted about Hollyhood - the worst TV show ever created. A bizarre oversight but then a lot of stuff I have meant to rant on has gone by the wayside. Remember when my music video reviews were meant to be a regular feature? No? YANA.

This springs from the same font, back in my gymasium days, forced to watch whatever bilge was on the TV screens a nightmare made worse when the Weird Foreign Guy was around who did not know how to operate the TV and was convinced there were only three channels on Foxtel.

To rate what was on offer -

MAX a station that shows music from MORE THAN ONE DECADE. This was the true meaning of awesome. Something of a mixed bag in the offering, especially with their "Lunch on MAX" sessions where they play one band/artist for an hour. The Bruce Springsteen one wasn't too enjoyable, but then they did Icehouse. Fuck yeah. Videos MAX gave me that nobody else had the balls to: I Can't Dance, Karma Chamelion, The Street Cafe, Song For the Dumped, and Take On Me.

V2 came next, being nearly entirely music videos. That mightn't sound too appealing, but really the alternatives on pay TV seem far less entertaining. I don't remember ever having to watch a horribly produced and braindead show on this channel, just occassional ad-breaks and 'special presentations'.

V the ORIGINAL, you might say. Channel V that is. Nothing to do with aliens or mask-wearing anarchists. Nearly all the same clips as V2, played with less frequency, more stupid shows. I don't remember any of the shows being THAT bad, though, and often thankfully brief. The inclusion of James Mathison, though, can bring anything down to subterranean levels. He is the man with the world's most punchable face.

MTV in spite of its reputation, nearly no music videos AT ALL. One clip between every 2 20 minute shows. What made this excruciating was not only the quality of the shows - Jackass was the highlight, in contrast to Cribs a show where people in the arse-end of celebrity show you how much shit they've got in their house and how it relates to their own superiority to you personally - but the fact that they play six episodes in a row for the one program, to make sure any enjoyment potential gets syphoned out of it.

The Lifestyle Channel - endless armies of orthodontically manufactured Americans who laugh at everything going around the world to embarass themselves in front of far more dignified locals. Highlight was a transatlantic fuckwit angering a crowd of Frenchmen by destroying the first bottle of wine from their vineyard and effectively destroying the ceremony. Lowest point was predictably awful Blair Witch parody when one of the hosts stayed at "The most haunted castle in Britain" Leave parody to those without congenital brain disorders.

National Geographic - you would think, given their magazine, this would be top of the list. Smart, informative, painstakingly researched, economically presented... no. The better name by far would have The 24/7 Steve Irwin experience. I mean literally nothing but Steve Irwin. At least give me some fucking Mark Strickson or even Naomi Robson!


MTV nearly gets on the bottom because of the nightmare day I had when the show MTV were playing nonstop was Hollyhood. Looking at Wikipedia is a bitter-sweet experience. Firstly, I see that this awful show only lasted for 8 episodes in 2007, heartening news for this show looked like the nadir of humanity to me and it's good to know we're metaphorically climbing out of the slime having cancelled it, but it also frustrated me that clearly I happened to be at the gym when MTV was showing THE ENTIRE RUN back to back.

Hollyhood was a 'reality TV show' following a household of complete wankers, as most of them do. The wankers in this case were a hip-hop group apparently called Three 6 Mafia who we are led to believe homo-erotically live together in a mansion draped with disgusting status symbols and are never seen doing anything vaguely close to work or music.

Annoyingly my mind is fogged by the mists of time as to the true extent of the shows awfulness, but I remember clearly the first disturbing episode was 'Juicy J's morbidly obese person IT manager proposing to his even-more-morbidly obese love interest, whilst being stalked by the other members of the group and their 'crew' in a black van with CIA-esque surveillance equipment, pissing themselves laughing. After the proposal went successfully we were treated to infared night-vision footage of the two in bed, a disturbing enough prospect as is, that managed to become more so when it appeared that 'Computer's woman was dishing out some good ol' domestic violence.

What. The. Fuck.

That's a summary of what was going through my head during my bicep reps exercises and for hours afterwards.

The thing that really disgusted me about Hollyhood, aside from sheer awfulness, the stereotypical behaviour (or 'cooning' if you like Uncle Tom parlance) and ludicrous attempt to make rap video world seem even close to reality, is the fact that it is one of so many American shows that wear the badge of a 'reality show' as an excuse to feature shithouse writing, shithouse acting, shithouse production values, shithouse editing, shithouse direction and a shit house full of shit people.

The second episode I had to watch, where a Doctor with ludicrously hot and barely-attired nurses who had no problem having his entire check up of DJ Paul fimed in spite of the fact there's such a thing as Doctor-patient confidentiality informed Paul he'd need to go on a diet with the delivery of Chip Jamison on his death bed. The plot was that somehow Paul was to convince his crew that the Doctor had told them ALL to lose some weight. This makes no sense at all, as you realise because of your functioning cerebral cortex. And so there was a competition, forming the 'plot' of the worst sitcom ever.

Incidentally, 'Computers' the morbidly obese IT guy won the compeition. He had to, right, because the fattest guy will always win. Presumably his prize was to get the spy cameras removed from his bedroom for the night.

I thankfully got to leave the room before the horribly Three's Company-looking episode in which Juicy J asked out Ashton Kutcher's PA and presumably would have a date that went horribly wrong, possibly with his crew monitoring from the command vehicle.

Possibly the worst thing is that I'm sure there actually dozens of shows just as bad out there on satellite television and I've just been living in blissful ignorance.

It will be funny if the Hollyhood fanclub find this post and take me to task for mixing up the details of their favourite show.

And, yes, I recognise the irony of a blog post entitled 'Nothing to talk about' which actually goes for 1600 words. My fingers hurt.