Every now and then all these weird things that I like will all converge at once and it will seem like the universe is creating art just for ME. Apparently Andre3000 from Outkast is set to guest star in the season finale of the Shield… as a comic store owner who is complaining about the hookers loitering outside his store. What part of that sentence do I not like? NOT ONE PART.

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I bought these Sandbaggers DVDs on Fraction’s recommendation about a few months ago but I’m only now getting around to watching them. He told me they were all about this crazy spy shit and it was British so you know it had to be good. After I mentioned to him that I bought the set, he was like “Yeah, it’s about as good as TV gets when it only involves a dude sitting at a desk for 60 minutes.” Um. Shouldn’t spy shit have a little running around or something?

Anyway, he was right and Sandbaggers is pretty rad, desktalking or no. It’s a really old series, so the production values are absolute ass on plastic for the DVD but it just kinda adds to the old skool PBS flavor. The Sandbaggers are the tiny, tiny Special Intelligence Section of MI-6 (I think I have that right) and the political side of espionage. No James Bond, no guns… one guy has a rocket launcher but never gets to shoot it. It’s really about dealing with different countries and their intelligence departments during the Cold War, about the phone calls and the budgets and the paperwork. There’s really nothing on modern TV to compare it to, except maybe those Taiwan/China or India/Pakistan episodes of West Wing. I know it sounds kind of boring, but how can you not be fascinated by Burnside, the director of operations of SIS? In one episode, a Sandbagger wants to quit to be with his family. What does Burnside do? He puts a tail on his fiancee and sweats her like she stole his bike.

It’s British. It must be good!

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Just when I thought all reality shows couldn’t really get much worse without actual death or dismemberment, Fox makes a liar out of me.

They’re starting a show called Joe Millionaire, which will be structured much like The Bachelor or Who Wants to Marry a Millionaire, where twenty or so women will vie for the affection of a man reportedly worth $50 million.

So what’s the catch? The guy is actually a construction worker that makes about $19,000 a year. If the final chosen woman accepts the marriage proposal, the bachelor must admit the truth.

I really hope this is the disaster it sounds like it’s going to be. While I normally think that people dumb enough to go on shows like this deserve what they get, I’m already feeling sorry for the eventual “winner.”

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Holy sweet jesus. Samurai Jack just may well be the coolest thing I’ve ever seen.

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I’ve never paid much attention to TV movies, especially the fantasy ones that have been airing lately, like 10 Kingdoms. In a slap to all Asians everywhere, there’s finally a TV movie for us. “The Lost Empire” where Greg (from Dharma and Greg) gets propelled into the mythical world of wacky Chinese myth. Needless to say, this stank to high heaven.

I didn’t watch the ending, but I’m guessing the white guy saved the world.

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Did I just see Tom Hanks sing the theme song to Transformers on the Tonight Show?

I think I did.

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Baby, it’s REALLY FRICKIN’ COLD outside. I’ve always considered myself to be fairly weather hardy for an Angeleno, but I’m about to crack. It’s been consistently cold and rainy the past few days and I can’t take it anymore. I caught a bug from one of my co-workers, so I’m starting to feel very sick again. Ever since I started working at the UCLA Hospital I’ve gotten sicker at a much higher frequency than I used to. I’m sure I’ll be the first American to die of ebola.

Since I didn’t leave the house this weekend except feeding times, I watched a LOT of TV. The best time I had was a couple of hours ago when I watched an episode of Jackass. The first segment reminded me that there’s very little funnier than a man getting hit in the genitals. Johnny Knoxville, protected only with a cup, got kicked, paintballed, sledge-hammered etc repeatedly. I feel for his girlfriend. If you watch the segment carefully, you can hear Spike Jonze behind the lens laughing his ass off.

There was also a brilliant episode of King of the Hill, where Hank became a pimp (hooker played by Renee Zellweger, archnemesis pimp played by Snoop Dogg).

Even the Simpsons was good tonight, unfortunately a rare, rare occurence these days.

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The SuperFriends are back. I couldn’t be happier. I’ve always loved Bruce Timm’s character designs for the Batman and Superman cartoons, and my favorite episodes were always the ones with the guest stars. Looks like the lineup is Superman, Batman, Wonder Woman, Flash, Green Lantern, HawkGirl and Martian Manhunter. Looks like the traditional “Magnificent 7″ lineup, except Aquaman gets swapped out for HawkGirl to squeeze in an extra female besides Wonder Woman. I agree with that, although I’d probably have gone with Black Canary or Zatanna rather than HawkGirl. I’m guessing characters like Dr. Fate and Aquaman will appear, since they’ve already shown up in the older cartoons.

Weeeeeeeeeee.

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I have seen the future of television and it is Temptation Island. It is trashy and horrible and utterly watchable. I hate myself for watching it. The basic concept of the show (if you don’t already know) is that 4 committed couples get taken to an island where they get split up and grouped with a bunch of attractive singles (of the opposite sex, of course). Then the couples get to see if they can stay together in the face of Temptation. Fox, as always, is the only network silly enough to actually air stuff like this. But thank you Fox.

At first, I felt bad for these couples because they looked like they were completely ambushed by the show. But then my finely tuned sense of schadenfreude kicked in and I started reveling at the stupidity shown by these people. I mean, who would volunteer for this?

I don’t see the future episodes being very entertaining though. It’ll be finely packaged melodrama like all the other reality television shows, and it will fall back in the pack.

In other news, two out of the five feet of my office chair have broken off. So now I have to kind of lean forward in this awkward way just to sit at the computer. I’ve had this chair for two years and it’s completely falling apart already. I think I sit in it too much. Anyone know of a good solid wood chair?

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