Weekly Bad TV Round-Up 9/25 - 10/2

This season, television has a lot to offer in terms of bad shows. It’s fun to watch, but there’s too much to keep up with (and besides, the human brain can only watch so much Jersey Shore and shows full of jokes culled from anonymous comedy writers’ bags before… um, I’ll think of it later). This isn’t meant to be a comprehensive survey by any means. A lot of shows slipped through the cracks because they weren’t worth sitting through just to watch Buffy speak to her twin or hear Ted whine about girls. Also, the list will change each week depending on what CPT’s brave enough to sit through or stupid enough to write about. The round-up is simply skeet-shooting a few bad shows into blog oblivion while the rest of them thud onto the network floor.

Two and a Half Men 9.02

2 Broke Girls 1.02

Happy Endings 2.01

Whitney 1.02

Jersey Shore 4.09

Here we go:

Two and a Half Men 9.02 “People Who Love Peepholes” (Monday 9/26)

The first scenes are important in plot-driven shows, so naturally I was worried that I missed the first segment of this week’s Two and a Half Men. Thankfully, the episode wasn’t full of the heady, high-brow stuff we’ve come to expect from the show that used to star Charlie Sheen. So what happened? Has the show’s dynamic changed a lot since they replaced Sheen with Ashton Kutcher? Well, I don’t remember what happened on the season premiere last week, so not really. But apparently Alan is now living with his mother, and she is still mercilessly cold, warning Alan not to worry if he hears her yell during sadomasochistic sex with her date later. Understandably eager to leave, Alan accepts Walden’s (Kutcher’s new character, who, let's face it, is Kelso) invitation to hang out when he drops off books from Alan’s old house. The two aren’t long driving before Kelso starts getting sad about his ex-wife and makes nervous Alan even more nervous by speeding up to 112. In his distress, Kelso goes to his ex’s house and forces Alan to hop the gate with him before she zaps them off with electricity. Inside, we meet Kelso’s ex Bridget, played by Judy Greer. She tells him he’s childish, and he of course denies while making silly noises to stop the buzzing in his ears.

The show’s dynamics have definitely changed, probably because Kelso’s comedic timing is way better than Charlie Sheen’s. We see the 70s Show-nurtured instinct when, before storming out of the house, Kelso disappears off-screen and re-emerges unapologetically carrying out the super soft toilet paper roll he asks Bridget about earlier in the episode. That was decent enough. I also cracked my first ever smirk at the show when Jon Cryer makes an unexpected if unsolicited reference to his career-defining role with the line: “Back in high school I was dating a poster of Molly Ringwold.” For a second, I was wondering if the show can eschew its cheap one-dimensional gags for competent mediocrity (there’s a difference, right?). But then, after Alan and Kelso leave Bridget’s, the camera cuts to them: surrounded by empty beer bottles? check; naked? check; lying in each other’s arms in a lawn chair on Kelso’s patio? check. Well, come on, this aint fuckin Shakespeare.

Exhausted after a really really funny episode.

Things to still not care about for next week: If Bridget and Kelso will reconcile their differences and get back together. Where the fat kid was this episode.

2 Broke Girls 1.02 “And the Break-up Scene” (Monday 9/26)

Fighting for airtime.

I watched this with the sound off because I was doing something online and talking to my friend on the phone. I feel like that was enough though. In one of the first scenes Kat Dennings was waiting on a table of four young blondes wearing fedoras. As the hot-in-a-not-hot-way anti-rebel rebel, Dennings’s character was being snarky about how hip and hot they all were. She don’t take no shit! She got in a fight with her blonde coworker who was recently cut off by her rich parents. I’m gonna go out on a limb and say the argument had to do with how over-privileged but ungrateful the blonde one is and how much of an underdog but tough Kat Dennings is. I guess that’s what happens when you invite a homeless coworker who you don’t like and have known for a day to come be your roommate. But even though Dennings’s character is really tough, you know she’s got a huge soft heart (not to be confused with her awesome yellow tits) and the two friends reconcile during the night in Dennings’s bed. Oh yeah, there was also a horse in their apartment. Don’t know why, but it was probably a Family Guy­-esque non-sequitur that reflects co-creator Whitney Cummings’s top potential.

Things to still not care about for next week: If the horse will become TV’s next big star. When will the main characters make out.

Happy Endings 2.01 “Blax, Snake, Home” (Wednesday 9/28)

Happy Endings continues to investigate complex dynamics between men and women, and gay and black bros.

I wonder what TV critics did before the internet? They probably paid close attention before passing judgment, or only wrote about shows they really liked. Well, neither of those applies here, and thank god, or I would have had to take notes sorting out what was what and who was who (besides Elisha Cuthbert <333) on the season premiere of Happy Endings.

The show is about a group of mutual friends who originally came to know each other through a central couple, reports Wikipedia. After the break-up of Alex and Dave, respectively played by the girl who won’t stop begging to fuck me and some guy, group dynamics get awkward and a sitcom is born. It’s a single-camera series, which mean it tries just a little harder—hard enough, at least, to be renewed for a second season.

The second season premiere largely revolved around back-and-forth bickering between Alex and Dave, which gave me a pretty good idea of what I missed the first season. While the two cathartically release pent-up frustrations over dinner with Alex’s sister Jane, gay Max worries that he’s growing apart with his black bro Brad (who Wikipedia tells me is played by Damon Wayans, Jr.), and Penny (who seems like she almost made the cut for a part on Glee or the role of Artemis) fears she’s becoming a spinster in what she suspects to be her haunted new condo. But don’t worry, the show delivers on its title’s promise. Brad reassures Max they’re still chill and we learn blacks and whites can be friends even if they can’t have movie night as often as they used to. Alex and Dave also become civil (for now…?!) and Penny sees it’s all in her head after sane control freak Jane shows everyone they’re acting like assholes.

Judging from the characters and the style, the show’s directed at young professionals, and people who want more quick-paced, subtle-style shows. It falls short for both. Yuppies looking for Novocain after a tough day of data analysis can just watch How I Met Your Mother, and people who want clever, ironic single-camera shows can just watch Modern Family or Parks and Recreation or, if they’re real sentimental, dust off their Party Down DVDs. Happy Endings is too ambitious to be super accessible, but not talented enough to realize its ambitions. But I guess it does have a slight charm. The characters could be a lot less fleshed out and the acting could be way worse. If you’ve got nothing else going on on Wednesday or can’t wait another six days to watch a cute girl act silly (who makes these?), watch Happy Endings.

Things to still not care about for next week: How will Alex and Dave alienate their friends. How will Penny’s insecurities manifest.

Whitney 1.02 “First Date Do-Over” (Thursday 9/29)

Wait. Whitney is... staged?!

This week Whitney delved into another bourgeois insecurity about her relationship with Alex. Distressed that they had drunken sex the first night they met, Whitney decides the most natural thing to do is a first date do-over. At a restaurant, they fumble around, getting as unnecessarily elaborate as doing a time-in/time-out thing to indicate when they’re on the first date and when they’re in reality. Alex, bored like us by his girlfriend’s retarded idea, makes up stuff when Whitney asks him about himself. Whitney, annoyed like us by how unfunny her boyfriend is, mixes past and present by the end of the night and doesn’t invite Alex into the apartment they share because, wait for it: it’s only the first date. The rest of the episode, the two get advice from their friends about what to do. Whitney dresses slutty and Alex plays it cool by acting disinterested. They keep this back-and-forth up until, at a club with their friends, Whitney and Alex organically fall into a first date do-over, talking over drinks and sharing a romantic kiss. See, Whitney? Don’t feel bad because you guys fucked the first night you met. You and Alex have it in you to have a trite first date like every single boring couple.

Things to still not care about for next week: How many times can Whitney try to re-ignite the spark before it turns into relationship sabotage.

Jersey Shore 4.09 “Three Men and a Snooki” (Thursday 9/29)

It's not easy being Snooki. Photo taken in Florence.

One of the impressive things about Jersey Shore is how it humanizes this ridiculous group of people. MTV finally got the formula right after years of producing terrible reality shows. What did they do right this time? These particular guidos are already celebrities in their own minds. Their larger-than-life personalities transcend any attempts MTV might make at scripting the show. Their cheesy arrogance and their outbursts are the real-life version of what MTV tried to create in the awful dialogue of Parental Control and Room Raiders and other dating shows.

On this week’s episode, the emotions were very real as Snooki cried for half the show. Last week, her gorilla juicehead boyfriend Jionni angrily left after she drunkenly lifted her skirt dancing sexy for him in a club. A guido with old-fashioned values, Jionni departed this week on rocky terms. Snookums continues being sad for a little, but eventually tells Jionni they’re taking a break, and crawls into Vinni’s bed, where they smoosh. 

Thankfully, everyone else helps out this episode. Sam and Ronnie remain calm, reeling their pettiness in and blossoming into something like adults. Deena tries to get dick again, and fails after Pauly D casts her out of his bed as politely but directly as he can. J-Woww continues to emerge as the sensible matron, annoyed that she has to babysit two meatballs, mediating negotiations between Jionni and sniveling Snooki, and buying sloppy Deena a pregnancy test after she confides in Jenni that she might be pregnant. The Situation, aware that he’s disliked by the entire house, remains at bay, participating so far this season only to get a mild concussion and to sabotage Snooki’s relationship (motives still unclear).

It’s tough putting Jersey Shore in this bad TV round-up. But it seems vainglorious to devote in-depth blog posts to it. It’s all yours, American Studies majors.

Things to still not care about for next week: If a devious Situation will rear its ugly head. If Vinni will stop thinking he’s way cooler than he is.

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