During the 2007 Writer’s Strike, many of the striking writers decided to band together and work on a project called “Strike TV”. They were going to head off on to the Interwebs sans all that big Hollywood funding, and just drop a big bowl full of awesome all over our laps.

Now the shows are finally starting to appear online at Strike.tv and its time to take a look at their handy work.

The first one I’ve watched is “House Poor with Mindy Kaling”. I love “The Office” and Mindy writes a great deal of it – so this one should be a winner right?

That was my thinking going in. After watching it, though, I don’t quite understand why this didn’t come out the week after they shot it.

It’s pretty simple story and premise. Mindy has recently purchased a house from a fellow writer, and doesn’t have the money to fill it with stuff…so she does various things to attempt to get furniture and what-not for the house.

In this episode she fakes being pregnant and registers at furniture stores, expecting her friends to buy her elaborate gifts.

It goes south pretty quickly, though, and she reveals that she isn’t actually pregnant, and they leave.

That’s the entire episode, which only runs 3 minutes and 11 seconds.

Overall there wasn’t much about this that was compelling to watch. The actions of Mindy’s character didn’t seem too far off actions her character on “The Office” might take, but the show is so compact that you don’t have any real interesting moments for a story to be put together. It’s essentially one joke “a woman fakes a pregnancy to get furniture for her new house” and that’ it.

I didn’t hate it. I find Mindy to be funny and charming (especially when she’s being heartless and self centered…as her character is in this), but I just wish there was more to it.

If you want to see it for yourself you can check it out at Strike.TV.

Last night during the first round of “American Idol” auditions, Fox ran a new promo for Joss Whedon’s upcoming “Dollhouse”. This preview does a good job of explain just exactly what the series will be like, but I think it’s pretty clear there’s going to be a much to the show that just this.

Being a huge fan of Whedon’s other projects, I can’t help be get a little more interested in this as we get closer to its launch. I hope the series manages to find an audience with its first 13 episodes – I’d hate to see this one go out like Firefly.

“Knight Fever” (se05,ep06)

I wasn’t really sure why NBC decided to run an episode of “Knight Rider” on New Year’s Eve. It seems like a really bad time to air a new episode of any show – much less one that’s struggling in the ratings.

After watching it, however, it seems to make perfect sense. This episode is by far, the worst of the season – so running it on a night when most people won’t see it was probably a good decision.

The plot of this episode revolves around a techno virus that infects anything with a chip in it. This was originally supposed to be an episode much closer to the pilot (like episode 2) and that’s pretty clear, even though heavy reshoots have been added to place it after the reveal that “KARR” from a few episodes back.

The virus leads Sarah, Michael, and Sarah’s dad to an ex-boyfriend of Sarah’s that ends up being responsible for the whole thing. The virus attempts to get on the Internet to spread all over the world, KITT ends up getting sick…you get the idea.

Every hoaky thing that people have complained about since day one of this show is all here. There’s even several references that seem to indicate the original series never happened.

This episode is bad enough to have been an episode of “Team Knight Rider”.

It pains me that a good actor like Bruce Davison is leaving the show soon while the absolutely god awful Smith Cho is staying on. I WANT to like her character, but the performances are so bad I just can’t. I can’t wait for next week – the episode HAS to be better than this.

The “reboot” can’t get here fast enough.

Entertainment Weekly has posted an exclusive clip from Joss Whedon’s upcoming “Dollhouse” series. The clip didn’t grab me at all (and this is from a guy that is currently re-watching “Buffy”, “Angel”, and “Firefly” at the same time). I’m not terribly excited about the show, BUT I will say that the promo that is embedded above, does make me feel a little better about it.

I’m interested in the show promoed above, but I don’t know how well this is going to work. Joss has been describing the show as kind of heady, and with all networks looking to make budget cuts, I’m betting the kill switch is going to be ready to flick very early in the game here.

I hope that the show does well enough to get some time for Joss to explore what he wants to with this project. I’d love to have another great Whedon produced program on the air – and I certainly hope this one is it.

Survivor Gabon Finale

Beginning with a two hour season finale episode and then wrapping up with an hour reunion episode, Survivor fans were left wanting very little at the end of Sunday night. Too top it off, the Sprint player of the game, and therefore most popular player with the audiences, namely Bob, won! Congrats buddy. For a 57 year old man that seriously seemed to be in it strictly for the adventure of a lifetime, you’ve got to give the guy props.

I have to admit I was shocked and a bit angered that his second biggest threat turned out to be “is she still here?” Susie, but apparently the jury had had enough of Sugar and they weren’t feeling too charitable. Speaking of sour grapes, Corinne will, I’m sure, go down in flames as the most evil chick ever to make it to the Survivor jury. So, okay, she’s truly evil and quick to throw Sugar’s dad’s death in her face with a “get over it” ‘tude, but what’s worse is that she LOVES being evil. The more the audience boo’d, the happier she got. I hate people like that. A family member or other loved one should have put her in her place long ago. You can’t get through life only on good looks, so I have no doubt in my mind that eventually she’ll learn what goes around comes around.

Mostly I’m disappointed in Matty’s vote. I mean really Matty, who do you think it was that orchestrated your very last hope of making it to the top three with a tie vote that allowed one last challenge? I firmly believe that if you can repay someone for a random act of kindness you definitely should. Instead he was borderline mean during the closing arguments. Granted, Sugar was a bit aloof, but I think you just have to understand her personality. She’s calls it like she sees it and she’s not going to apologize for that, yet she still has a heart (unlike someone like say, Corinne). So no, she didn’t gravel, beg or plead. Right through the very end she held her dignity. But Bob held the big bag of money.

Either way I, along with the rest of America, saw a very happy and satisfying conclusion to Survivor Gabon. Can’t wait for Brazil!

This time of year there is little new to watch on television. It’s mostly Christmas movies, Christmas specials, and you know…repeats of those Christmas specials. There are some great ones…and some truly, truly terrible ones.

There is no Christmas special – in all of history – quite as terrible, though, as the “Star Wars Holiday Special”. You can find the special in its entirety on YouTube…but I doubt you’ll make it all the way through it (without drinking). So I present to you this video (above) which has about 5 minutes of the special, which should give you an idea of just how bad it is…and my friends…it is bad.

Good luck.

After last weeks thoroughly satisfying but seriously overwrought episode, House is getting back to the formula. Someone gets a strange illness, House and team misdiagnose the illness, House is a jerk, patient almost dies and finally House has a break through. Happily, they through in a nice curve to keep it interesting.

After last week’s explosion, Cuddy is left without an office and decides to invade House’s, setting off war of wills. It gives House reasons to yell things to Cuddy like “Have you seen my balls?” loudly. Much to my delight, Cuddy gives as well as she gets and it leads to some fun banter and pranks between the star crossed couple. It leads to a moment of closeness between them, but it amounts to little more than a boob grab and a nice gesture from House.

The strange illness comes courtesy of a personal trainer who randomly passes out while working out. Years earlier she had her stomach stapled and the crew begins with that. Although it does expose her hypocrisy, it doesn’t do much to explain the crazy illness. The fear of being caught in her hypocrisy is eating her alive and as usual her health is spiraling down. In a twist, it becomes clear that it is a lack of carbs and sugar have caused her liver problems and in order to get well she has to get fat again. She’s so shallow that she refuses.

Thirteen has entered Foreman’s clinical drug trial for her terminal illness, and in turn we get some background flashbacks of her mother as she struggled with the neurological illness. It gives a fairly shallow character more development and it is welcome.

Kutner has picked up a side business diagnosing patients over the internet using House’s reputation. Eventually a patient comes to see House in person as she isn’t satisfied with Kutner’s side business. The whole thing blows up in his face when the patient dies in the hospital. It seems like the end until House reveals that the whole thing is a gag. Its a nice piece of side comedy and pretty well pulled off.

Now that My Own Worst Enemy has been canceled, it seems to finally be interesting. Edward is hot on the twisted trail of his parents killer and it leads him to go rouge and accuse Trumble, the head of Janus, of having some involvement in their deaths. After kidnapping and pistol whipping him, it becomes clear that killer is on the loose and in Rio. Trumble forgives him and sets up an opportunity for Edward to get his revenge.

Sadly, Tom/ Raymond dominate the episode. Tom’s wife is the victim of a carjacking and smashes one of the robbers with her car. In order to protect the company and any exposure, Raymond the dumpy super-spy and not Tom the dumpy family man has to take car of the wife and the chicanos who robbed her.

After some general meaningless scenes involving a nasty Camero and Henry’s son its clear that the whole family element of this series was flawed from the beginning. I just can’t seem to care about these people.

Henry heads to Rio hoping to change back into Edward in time for the revenge killing. Its evident that Henry is going to have to be the triggerman. In order to get maximum unneeded drama, Henry approaches the killer while he’s overlooking a newly born grandchild but can’t pull the trigger. While relaxing with a bottle of tequila in the hotel, Edward gets attacked by the killer. After a struggle, Edward takes him out with the broken bottle.

Trumble’s shady dealings continue and as the episode ends it seems he has once again used Edward for his own purposes. This is a legitimately interesting way to go for this series. Sadly, it took them seven episodes to get to the point where I was properly interested. There was noticeably less switching back and forth between Edward and Henry and I think it helped the show. The whole idea of these split personalities are fairly lame and the less we deal with it, the better.

“Don’t hate the player, hate the game.”

We’ve heard it time and time again, yet when it comes to Survivor, no other phrase rings quite as true.

In tonight’s episode the united Nobag went all out to get rid of their own personal “troll” Randy. First, in the auction, Sugar not only went out of her way to up Randy’s bid for beer and peanuts, but also started the big cookie controversy. Just as the tribe members were tired of hearing about it, as am I so I won’t go into that in depth. Let’s just say Sugar held back Randy’s cookie and elementary school drama ensued. Whatever, moving on.

Of the whole group, Corinne was the only one who bought anything worth saving at the auction, when she used all of her money to purchase a leg-up in the immunity challenge. This allowed her to skip straight ahead to the final round of the challenge with only Kenny and Matty as competition. Unfortunately for both Matty and Corinne, skinny and smart Kenny didn’t need much time at all to assemble the pieces and raise his flag mouse-trap style allowing him to take home immunity. Which, by the way, he didn’t for one second need.

Once back at camp, it didn’t take a fool to realize that the irritating Randy was on the chopping block. In a very wise move on Bob’s part a brief alliance was formed between himself and Sugar. One had the real idol, the other had a home crafted one. While still maintaining to keep her own true idol a secret from Bob, Corinne and Randy, Sugar was able to easily convince Bob that it would be in his best interest to pull a quick-one on Randy and offer up his fake idol as the real one.

Now, this is certainly not the first time such a move has occurred on Survivor, and sad as it may be to believe, I’m sure it won’t be the last. But holy-moly when Randy stood up smug and absolutely giddy with happiness and presented that fake idol as his saving grace in tribal I thought I’d pee myself. Speaking of which, I think Sugar or Crystal may have. It was all too funny and too damning for Corinne.

In any case, nasty ol’ Randy is now a very important member of the jury and much to my initial surprise I do believe Miss Sugar may win this yet. We shall see…

(S02E05) “Let It Go”

Finally, the characters of Private Practice get down to the core of what gives a show it’s heart. In tonight’s episode, we were allowed a real glimpse of the key player’s personalities.

In the sub-plot surrounding Violet we receive confirmation that she was once raped. While we still don’t know the full-extent that this has effected her, it’s obvious that this part of her life is painful and not fully understood by many, with the exception of her old college friend. Sadly her one time confidant is now running for congress and will do just about anything to erase her own painful past, including sacrificing Violet’s job. Time will tell, but this may just be an opening for a major move in Violet’s life. I don’t suspect that she’ll leave the show, but she may be forced to leave the practice.

Also finding that the ties which bond them can, and sometimes must, be severed, Naomi and Sam officially call it quits. This only occurs though after they not only full themselves, but also their daughter who has hopes of her parents reuniting. As this storyline progresses, one can easily tell that explosions may occur as both Naomi and Sam begin to date again. After all, nothing that happens in this practice is ever truly private.

In lighter news, Addison steps up her game and takes on her role as a leader without hesitation. After hours of sleepless nights she not only has an idea of how much money the practice will need to survive, but also an unpopular idea of how to obtain that quick cash. This includes leasing out the fourth floor she didn’t even know they owned until tonight. Speaking of fourth floor plans, could Charlotte be getting in on that action with her new job opportunity? Looks like a possibility to me.

Now, no Private Practice review can be complete without at least a small grumble from this writer. Tonight’s is quite valid, as the message the show sent out tonight was completely misleading. You can indeed get the HIV virus from oral sex. So here’s a clue to Cooper… put a cap on it. What’s more, just because you’re on the pill doesn’t mean you can’t slip up and get pregnant. Something to keep in mind Charlotte.

I personally feel that if you’re going to represent a very important issue as a doctor’s office, no matter how fictional, you should take it on with some sense of responsibility. There’s one too many kids out there who get their facts from a TV screen. Why add to that confusion?