Recently in We are TV Category

The first question really is, how did this show get on the air? It started when Foxworthy and friends turned "red-neck" into "blue collar" and did a national tour, The Blue Collar Comedy Tour, grossing more than $15 million. Then, based on that success they put out a DVD of the tour and sold more than a million copies. Comedy Central aired the DVD and it got the highest ratings of any film they have ever shown. So it was inevitable they'd end up on TV (at least it's not a reality show). It's the WB's biggest comedy hit ever, and a Newsday.com story says "Nielsen ratings have validated the network's faith in the rowdy sketch series," but doesn't offer any numbers. After the success of the July premiere the WB ordered 22 more episodes.

Wow, it's that popular? The show seems to be panned by critics, getting only a half star on a scale of one to four from USAToday, "It's possible the material would improve if those fans were a bit more demanding -- like, say, by not breaking into uncontrolled hysterics at baby-vomit jokes." Variety says, "It breaks no new ground ... jokes about gravy and fat people ... come off as puerile and insubstantial. ... one step above a pie in the face or a kick in the groin ..."

But it turns out the real trick to the "success" of the show is that it's only really being compared to other WB fare. Chicago Tribune television critic Steve Johnson says, "It debuted miserably last Thursday, although it drew strong-for-WB ratings." Now that broadcast has five networks (ABC, NBC, CBS, FOX, UPN, and the WB) even a primetime show can shoot for a small slice of the pie. And it's not like most of us will ever watch the show since Survivor is on at the same time.

The show makes a lot more sense when you think about the target demographic (poor suburban and rural families) and the other shows battling for viewers during that timeslot. I imagine CBS is happy with Survivor, and The O.C. on Fox is some kind of cult, and anyone not happy with those two options is more than pleased to get a minor Friends fix from NBC's Joey, and for the those seeking truly trashy tv, ABC has Extreme Makeover. Broadcast is increasingly looking like cable, where any taste can find its flavor, including poo.

by fiona garlich

Please do not ever watch the show Medical Investigations. It is stupid and ridiculous and is clearly only capitalizing on the nation's current obsession with medical crime dramas. But this time its not just one crime, or one patient; the safety of the entire nation is at stake, and the show will not let us forget it.

It mades it debut last night after the season premier of The Apprentice, which I unfortunately misssed. Instead, I caught the opening scene of M.I., which featured a very intense and angry looking blond man who was watching his son suck at little league baseball. Then the man got a phone call, then the man gave some very intense advice to his son at the plate, then a helicopter picked the man up practically in the baseball field, and then his son hit a home run.

Who is this man? Apparently he is the leader of an elite team of doctors who work for the government. He is also a domineering asshole controller who looks like a complete psycho even though maybe he is supposed to look ruggedly handsome and who is in charge of making split second decisions and giving orders to his team-mates, also very smart doctors, without saying anything nice or positive to them, because "someone needs to make the call." But I think he's supposed to be a compelling, complex, human character, as evidenced by his touching (and vaguley creepy) interaction with his son.

Who are these people working for? I guess the government? The NIH? I think they must have said it, but everything was happening at ultra-action speed, so the reasons anybody was doing anything was too difficult to follow. The only thing we the audience knew, was that there were blue people turning up everywhere. And that was bad. Very bad. Bad enough to panic and yell at people and make a lot of cell phone calls and fly around in a helicopter and sick your sassy PR lady on the press to illegally block any investigation by locking a reporter in the hospital basement.

This show is going to bomb. Somebody somewhere combined all of the marketable features of shows like CSI and Cold Case - aka the fast decsion making, problem solving, fancy medical/criminal technology, and eerie reinactments with wavy ghost people, and forgot to add any compelling reason why anyone should care about any of the characters. I guess they figured that if they make the plot seem important enough, we won't notice the ridiculous and destracting side-plot, the fact that the main character is an evil robot, and their inability to even attempt to rationally explain the case at the end. Why were the people blue? Why were the people fucking blue, you morons? They threw out a lot of fancy medical talk that amounted to sheer babble because IT DIDN'T MAKE SENSE.

I hate that show.

The gorgeous movie Winged Migration will be screened Monday, January 12th at the Warm Glow Vibe Zone. This is a beautiful film. I have seen it multiple times, and it moved me in different ways every viewing. It will be screened three times: 5pm, 8pm, and 11pm. The film is about 90 minutes, and will be followed by the approx. 60 minute making of feature which is also amazing. There will (most likely) be cokes available for 50 cents and maybe popcorn as well. Come enjoy these images which are such a brilliant example of what film and video can be.

There will be a showing on the new series The Apprentice at the Warm Glow Vibe Zone on Sunday, January 11th at 6pm. The Apprentice is a business reality show starring Donald Trump. Contestants will be competing in various business related challenges and each week someone will be fired by Mr. Trump. The winner gets a job as something like an Executive VP of one of Trump's many companies. The reviews for the show have been positive.

Also, being shown with The Apprentice will be an episode of MTV Cribs touring the house of Russell and Kimora Simmons, which is very impressive. Come on over, should be fun.

The space at 5802 N. Kerby Ave in Portland, Oregon, also known as my home, will now be called The Warm Glow Vibe Zone and used for showings of television and other video images deemed interesting, thought provoking, or extremely entertaining. The space is still a home, which works in building comfort in the viewer, but the purpose of these showings will be to try to create a new way for television to be viewed. The ideal would be to use the programs or images to try to learn about ourselves, human nature, art, our surroundings, the world, or anything else really. We will try to create a space where TV isn't just a time filler where you feel assaulted by invasive commercials or predictable programming.

The programs and images will be shown via DVD or recorded programming using a Digital Video Recorder (Replay TV) to weed out commercials or certain special times we will have the opportunity to watch live events (Super Bowl, Presidential Elections, etc.). We hope to add vitality to, or just highlight the existence vitality of television and other images by creating a venue of open minded intelligence and small simple changes to format(no commercials, possibility of discussion).

Keep your eye on this space for announcements and check the right sidebar for the next showing. There will be a dry run through tonight with a showing of Mr. Show Season 3.