TV From The Female Angle

When I moved in with the Duchess about 2 years ago, I figured my life would change a little. I kinda figured that I would no longer being drinking until 3 AM, watching old Buffy episodes, and wondering things like “Can I back flip off the coffee table without spilling my beer?” I also figured my TV viewing habits would change. For all her attributes, she’s not that big into sci-fi stuff. However, that’s not to say that I haven’t tried to make her watch “Battlestar Galactica” and “Smallville”, its just she’s not interested. However, good relationships are built on compromise, so she watches some of my stuff and I watch some of her stuff. While I don’t quite understand her fascination with the Disney Channel, she has introduced me to some stuff that is totally kick-ass. I will share with you the top 5 TV related things she’s shared with me; to help spread the world that good TV doesn’t have to involve space.

Two author’s notes before I begin. One, I watched the “Life on Mars” series finale the other day. I was completely blown away, yet need time to digest it all. I’ll probably be writing a review of it sometime soon. Two, if this list was a top 6, I would have included “Zoey 101”, just for all the Jamie Lynn Spears pregnancy jokes you can make in half hour. Anyway, on with the list:

5) “Ned’s Declassified School Survival Guide” (Nickelodeon) – Growing up with such great shows as “Saved by the Bell”, “Running the Halls”, and “Chris Cross”, I like school shows that involve very few parents and complete comedy. While this is a middle school show, it pretty much fits the bill. Basically, you have middle school moppet Ned Bigby who, along with friends Moze and Cookie, creates a survival guide for middle school. Now, before you start thinking that it’s uncool, how bad can something be that gives Savage Steve Holland and Fred Savage paychecks for directing episodes. Plus, it gives acting credits to Meshach Taylor (who is without a dummy). The show is 30 minutes long, but you get two stories for the price of one. Also, you have cool character names like Coconut Head and Suzie Crabgrass. I’ve given you sufficient reason to check it out, so go.

4) “House Hunters International” (HGTV) – Personally, I could care less about people finding there dream home, but this has the twist of being international. Basically, people are looking to upgrade their digs and they get shown three houses and they decide which is best for them. Now, while I don’t care what $200 grand will get you in Grand Rapids, MI, I do care what it will get you on some Caribbean island. Why? Because living in paradise would be cool, where all you do all day is lay in a hammock and booze. Basically, do you want to live in cold as hell New England or in sunny Aruba? Yeah, that’s what I thought.

3) “Survivorman” (Discovery Channel) – Les Stroud is one badass. Basically, this man gets dropped in the most inhospitable places on earth and is forced to survive for seven days. Now, this isn’t some lame show where the cameraman slips him a sandwich off camera, mostly because he is the cameraman. He carries 50 pounds of equipment with him. That might not sound bad if you’re trekking in your backyard, but he’s carrying this crap around the Mojave Desert and above the Artic Circle. He’s building igloos and drinking his own evaporated urine and eating scorpions. The man is freaking crazy. But unlike most crazy people, he’s filming this for our enjoyment. Now, I’m not going to be sledding up in the Yukon Territory anytime soon, but it’s nice to know how I can get by with a Swiss Army Knife, some pliers, and an old hockey ticket. This guy is like MacGyver.

2) “Cash in the Attic” (BBC America) – Before we start, I have to say you need to watch the British version, not the crappy American version. I watched that once and almost went into shock. Instead of raising money for something cool like throwing Mum a 90th birthday party, two fat parents and their fat teenage daughter in New Jersey wanted a hot tub. Now that we have that squared away, let’s get to the show. Basically, you either have one chick and a couple of gay guys or just a couple of gay guys pawing through some family’s old junk to try and find stuff they can hock at auction to raise money for some expenditure the family wants to make. This is cool on a couple of levels. One, it makes you think that all the old crap you have might be worth something. Two, seeing the tools who go to an auction in England is a long way off from what I saw watching “Lovejoy”. The best part is that there is always a happy ending since the family always gets the money they are shooting for. So, unless you are cold sadistic bastard (you know, your typical Colts fan), you should be happy at the end.

1) “Iron Chef America” (Food Network) – First off, I would like to admit I’ve never seen the Japanese version, so don’t give me poo for liking this. The premise is pretty simple. You have some hot shot chef out there who thinks he’s the balls, so he shows up on the show and challenges one of the Iron Chef’s to a cook-off. Basically, there are two rules. One, you only have an hour to create a couple of dishes and two, you need to use a special ingredient in each dish. The special ingredient is announced right before the cooking begins. You then serve your food to three judges and they tally up points using a completely arbitrary points system. The one with the most points wins. The only thing you get for a win is the satisfaction of a job well done, which kind of sucks. There are a couple of cool things here. One, the iron chefs all rock. Bobby Flay is a big dick, so its fun to root against him. Mario Batali has a huge gut and sweats so much, you think he might have a heart attack at any time. I have nothing against any of the other chefs. Also, the commentator is Alton Brown, who is wicked awesome. Watch any of his shows on Food Network and you’ll be impressed with his knowledge. Plus, you can’t go wrong when you’re watching “Stargate Atlantis” and you realize that the dude trying to kill Ronan is the Chairman from “Iron Chef America”. Another reason its cool is the possibility of some hot shot chef completely lose it because he doesn’t know how to make a dessert with eggplant.

There’s the list. While the shows may not be great, it makes compromise much easier. So I get to say things like “oh, you want to watch “Ned’s Declassified”? That means you have to watch “Mega Snake” on Sci-Fi later.” See, that’s fun for the whole family.