HBO's "Friends"
I admit it. I watched "Friends" on NBC when it first started, when it came on after the beloved "Seinfeld." I watched it for a few more seasons for the simple reason that Jennifer Aniston had hard nipples in every show, and Courtney Cox was coming off of looking hot in "Ace Ventura: Pet Detective." Every show though, Jennifer Aniston, poking out, I shit you not. I knew the show was bad, predictable, unfunny, formulaic, etc. Now comes the 21st century version of "Friends,"
"Entourage" on HBO. "HBO presents Entourage, the hit comedy series executive produced by Mark Wahlberg that takes a look at the day-to-day life of Vincent (Vince) Chase, a hot young actor in modern-day Hollywood, and his entourage."
First red flag, "executive produced by Mark Wahlberg." I still can't wrap my brain around the fact that Marky Mark turned "Good Vibrations" into a career. Granted, he's great in "Boogie Nights," "I Heart Huckabees," and "The Departed," yet he epitomizes the puppet-puppeteer relationship between actor and creator. This guy would walk into a wall if you asked him to. So how the fuck does he get to the position of executive producer? Are the executives at HBO so queer that they agreed to whatever came out of this guy's mouth because they were too busy fantasizing about him cumming into theirs?
This is the Maxim magazine of tv shows. Low brow content, feeding off the male desire to drive fast cars and bang hot chicks. Hey, I'm not complaining about the ladies in the show, but I can't accept the characters of the show, let alone the actors who play these underdeveloped zombies getting these girls. Vince, ha! (Adrian Grenier--of Britney video-fame, pre-world realizing she's Louisiana trash) The Ross of the show, getting girls way out of his league, permanent five o'clock shadow, uninteresting, no charisma, obviously no talent as an actor--it was like a bad Jim Henson make-up job watching him as Pablo Escobar. Turtle is the least annoying character--except for his ridiculous Yankee-inspired outfits. Turtle epitomizes the bastardization of athletic gear: hot shoes, jerseys and hats-being produced for fat fucks who couldn't play a lick of anything and taking the fun and excitement away from those who could actually do something on a diamond, court or field. But he smokes weed, thus the least annoying character. Next we have Johnny Drama-- the Joey character, obnoxious and always putting his foot in his mouth, a "never was" dependent on name-dropping 80's to 90's references for those late 20-30 somethings to connect with. A perennial B-lister, Matt Dillon's brother.
And then there's Eric, or "E." He deserves his own paragraph. What a worthless fuck of a crap dispenser. How could anyone take this fucking guy seriously? Was it his contagious banter with BobCat Goldthwait as a stuffed animal on the "Married With Children" ripoff "Unhappily Ever After" (Scott Baio directed-mind you) that led these HBO producers to land on this gem of a ginger? Am I the only person who remembers how fucking retarded that show was? And how marginal Kevin Connelly was in it? Collateral damage from a great pair of tits on television (i.e. Nikki Cox). How many actors ride on the coat tails of tits? For those interested in answering this question, please comment. This Napoleonic prick is the lead? And they've been forcing these relationship scenarios down our throat since day 1. We didn't care about the first whore--if anything we wanted gratuitous orgies. Who knows who came next. But Sloan--WAY out of this fuckin' guy's league. Yeah, she's short, he's short, maybe they have a connection THERE, but where else. Emmanuelle Chriqui: sounds like the real life person all those skinflicks on Cinemax were based off of. Except that on SKINEMAX, you could count on breasts being bared. HBO's "Friends," you get plenty of side boob and nipple coverage. Is this why we pay $15 extra a month, to be deprived of the very same thing that basic cable deprives us of? Yeah they may throw a stripper or two in there just to get our areola fix for the evening, but like Maxim, the caliber of female is there (granted the airbrushing in both arenas is ridiculous) but the execution falls short and right on line with Michael Bay's swear em up shoot em up keep em covered mentality. Tangential yes, but consistent with my point.
And then there's Jeremy Piven, who's exploded as an asshole playing an asshole being an asshole. Wow, what a niche. Can we please not forget Jeremy Piven playing the Costanza character in the Seinfeld in-show pilot. He was great as a neurotic, nervous balding New Yorker, and more believable than the fast-talking-never-take-no-for-an-answer agent officianado he plays here. And "PCU," the asshole was there but so was George Clinton, and PFUNK trumps all. Not to mention his wife is unbelievably hot, maybe not the face (for those Hebrew speakers we'd call her a Coosit), but goddamn! that body is bangin'--and we'll never see her w/o clothing. And even for television, I'm just not buying it. Debbie Mazar, best known as the coked-out mistress to Henry Hill in "Goodfellas" as Vince's publicist? I think precedence matters in this case.
And those are just the characters. The stories are more or less nonexistent, drawn out into 25 minute vignettes that always lead back to point A. There is no real conflict or change in mood or function of these people. They give what they expect us to want, not taking us out of our comfort zone. And I probably wouldn't be so outraged by the mediocrity of this show were it not for corpulent co-headliners such as "Big Love" or even "John From Cincinnati"--I can't get enough of those now-famous David Milch soliloquies. Those shows are so character and content heavy that it's difficult to absorb all that's happened in fity minute episodes. With "Entourage" you can sum up a story in one sentence. And I might rewatch an episode because of a gorgeous girl, but usually don't because I become so frustrated by recycled story lines and joke-free airtime, I usually just watch an "Arrested Development" episode for the 50th time. And yet this monstrosity of a show falls under my list of shows for which I watch for one reason: gorgeous women: O.C. and Mischa, Dawson's Creek and Katie, even Grey'S Anatomy and Katherine--bringing me back to the original horrible show with hot lady, "Saved By The Bell" and young Tiffani Amber Thiessen. And so I upend my own point when I say, it doesn't matter what the show is, I just want to see a beautiful girl, with a beautiful face, and minimal male talking. Is that really that difficult?
Even "30 Rock" the best all around television show on air since "Arrested" ended knows the formula, and Seinfeld brought in slews of women on a weekly basis.
But why those shows worked would take a much longer post, and for now, I'm pooped off the poop.
"Entourage" on HBO. "HBO presents Entourage, the hit comedy series executive produced by Mark Wahlberg that takes a look at the day-to-day life of Vincent (Vince) Chase, a hot young actor in modern-day Hollywood, and his entourage."
First red flag, "executive produced by Mark Wahlberg." I still can't wrap my brain around the fact that Marky Mark turned "Good Vibrations" into a career. Granted, he's great in "Boogie Nights," "I Heart Huckabees," and "The Departed," yet he epitomizes the puppet-puppeteer relationship between actor and creator. This guy would walk into a wall if you asked him to. So how the fuck does he get to the position of executive producer? Are the executives at HBO so queer that they agreed to whatever came out of this guy's mouth because they were too busy fantasizing about him cumming into theirs?
This is the Maxim magazine of tv shows. Low brow content, feeding off the male desire to drive fast cars and bang hot chicks. Hey, I'm not complaining about the ladies in the show, but I can't accept the characters of the show, let alone the actors who play these underdeveloped zombies getting these girls. Vince, ha! (Adrian Grenier--of Britney video-fame, pre-world realizing she's Louisiana trash) The Ross of the show, getting girls way out of his league, permanent five o'clock shadow, uninteresting, no charisma, obviously no talent as an actor--it was like a bad Jim Henson make-up job watching him as Pablo Escobar. Turtle is the least annoying character--except for his ridiculous Yankee-inspired outfits. Turtle epitomizes the bastardization of athletic gear: hot shoes, jerseys and hats-being produced for fat fucks who couldn't play a lick of anything and taking the fun and excitement away from those who could actually do something on a diamond, court or field. But he smokes weed, thus the least annoying character. Next we have Johnny Drama-- the Joey character, obnoxious and always putting his foot in his mouth, a "never was" dependent on name-dropping 80's to 90's references for those late 20-30 somethings to connect with. A perennial B-lister, Matt Dillon's brother.
And then there's Eric, or "E." He deserves his own paragraph. What a worthless fuck of a crap dispenser. How could anyone take this fucking guy seriously? Was it his contagious banter with BobCat Goldthwait as a stuffed animal on the "Married With Children" ripoff "Unhappily Ever After" (Scott Baio directed-mind you) that led these HBO producers to land on this gem of a ginger? Am I the only person who remembers how fucking retarded that show was? And how marginal Kevin Connelly was in it? Collateral damage from a great pair of tits on television (i.e. Nikki Cox). How many actors ride on the coat tails of tits? For those interested in answering this question, please comment. This Napoleonic prick is the lead? And they've been forcing these relationship scenarios down our throat since day 1. We didn't care about the first whore--if anything we wanted gratuitous orgies. Who knows who came next. But Sloan--WAY out of this fuckin' guy's league. Yeah, she's short, he's short, maybe they have a connection THERE, but where else. Emmanuelle Chriqui: sounds like the real life person all those skinflicks on Cinemax were based off of. Except that on SKINEMAX, you could count on breasts being bared. HBO's "Friends," you get plenty of side boob and nipple coverage. Is this why we pay $15 extra a month, to be deprived of the very same thing that basic cable deprives us of? Yeah they may throw a stripper or two in there just to get our areola fix for the evening, but like Maxim, the caliber of female is there (granted the airbrushing in both arenas is ridiculous) but the execution falls short and right on line with Michael Bay's swear em up shoot em up keep em covered mentality. Tangential yes, but consistent with my point.
And then there's Jeremy Piven, who's exploded as an asshole playing an asshole being an asshole. Wow, what a niche. Can we please not forget Jeremy Piven playing the Costanza character in the Seinfeld in-show pilot. He was great as a neurotic, nervous balding New Yorker, and more believable than the fast-talking-never-take-no-for-an-answer agent officianado he plays here. And "PCU," the asshole was there but so was George Clinton, and PFUNK trumps all. Not to mention his wife is unbelievably hot, maybe not the face (for those Hebrew speakers we'd call her a Coosit), but goddamn! that body is bangin'--and we'll never see her w/o clothing. And even for television, I'm just not buying it. Debbie Mazar, best known as the coked-out mistress to Henry Hill in "Goodfellas" as Vince's publicist? I think precedence matters in this case.
And those are just the characters. The stories are more or less nonexistent, drawn out into 25 minute vignettes that always lead back to point A. There is no real conflict or change in mood or function of these people. They give what they expect us to want, not taking us out of our comfort zone. And I probably wouldn't be so outraged by the mediocrity of this show were it not for corpulent co-headliners such as "Big Love" or even "John From Cincinnati"--I can't get enough of those now-famous David Milch soliloquies. Those shows are so character and content heavy that it's difficult to absorb all that's happened in fity minute episodes. With "Entourage" you can sum up a story in one sentence. And I might rewatch an episode because of a gorgeous girl, but usually don't because I become so frustrated by recycled story lines and joke-free airtime, I usually just watch an "Arrested Development" episode for the 50th time. And yet this monstrosity of a show falls under my list of shows for which I watch for one reason: gorgeous women: O.C. and Mischa, Dawson's Creek and Katie, even Grey'S Anatomy and Katherine--bringing me back to the original horrible show with hot lady, "Saved By The Bell" and young Tiffani Amber Thiessen. And so I upend my own point when I say, it doesn't matter what the show is, I just want to see a beautiful girl, with a beautiful face, and minimal male talking. Is that really that difficult?
Even "30 Rock" the best all around television show on air since "Arrested" ended knows the formula, and Seinfeld brought in slews of women on a weekly basis.
But why those shows worked would take a much longer post, and for now, I'm pooped off the poop.
posted by Zachariakis at
6:38 AM
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