Rejected TV Sitcoms
If you’ve watched enough television then you’ve probably come to the conclusion that there is no such thing as a rejected television sitcom. With programmes as truly, cringingly, stereotypically awful as The War At Home and genuinely, cry-inside, unfunny as The I.T. Crowd you could be forgiven for thinking that TV producers look only for the words "situation" and "comedy" and greenlight a series without checking for those all-important warning signs such as "written by a racist", "based on a Chekov play", or "starring Tom Arnold". However, in the annals of TV history there actually have been some sitcoms rejected by networks across the world. For the first time, a selection: Pope Jack Synopsis: Father Jack, formerly of Father Ted, becomes Pope. With hilarious consequences. Reason For Rejection: There is no latin word for "feck". Chachi Loves Richie Synopsis: A modern take on the Happy Days spin-off penned by Russell T. Davies. With hilarious consequences. Reason For Rejection: ABC’s testing indicated that viewers and Ron Howard were uncomfortable with every scene featuring penetrative anal sex. Schindler’s Lisp Synopsis: The everyday tale of a Sudeten-German Catholic businessman in the days of The Final Solution and his struggle to invent a list-processing computer language for the Nazis. With hilarious consequences. Reason For Rejection: There was a rival sitcom based on Goebbels and his love affair with Babbage’s Difference Engine already in production. Married … With AIDS Synopsis: Sal, Penny, Burt, and Kerry Grundy battle one another and HIV positive humour at the same time. With hilarious consequences. Reason For Rejection: Threats from shoe salesmen – worried that their business would be affected by storylines such as "Sal’s Shoehorn Infects A Fat Woman" – forced the network to pull out. That’s My Janitor! Synopsis: A middle-aged, long-term unemployed man is finally employed as janitor at an all-girls school. With hilarious consequences. Reason For Rejection: FOX imposed a limit of fourteen onanism references per episode but the writer would not negotiate down from three hundred and seventy two. How I Raped Your Mother Synopsis: A rape story in reverse, the story follows Todd telling his numerous offspring about the events that led to him serving life with no chance of parole. With hilarious consequences. Reason For Rejection: Focus groups indicated they were not keen on the phrase "Your Mother". Mind Your Language A.D. 2100 Synopsis: Updated version of the classic racist comedy set in a language school teaching English to damn foreigners. Now on the moon. With hilarious consequences. Reason For Rejection: Nobody was sure what horribly offensive stereotype could be applied to Esperanto-speakers. That ’40s Show Synopsis: Erich von Feuermann and his...
Top 5 One-Take Music Videos
A list of – in my opinion because it’s the only one that counts around here – the best music videos filmed in one take. Think of it as the Brian de Palma Music Video awards but try to hide the memory of Mission To Mars that surfaces if you do so. 5. DJ Format (ft. Abdominal) – Vicious Battle Raps This Ruben Fleischer-directed video shows Abdominal walking through downtown Los Angeles rapping to camera while the chaotic world behind him pretends it can’t see the strange man talking to himself. Technically there are some good things happening too; the different speed rates of the video sequences and the scale of the video shoot are pretty impressive. Of particular note in this video is the impressive pimp-walking by Abdominal; a lesson for any would-be pimp-walkers out there. Also, schoolgirls and a nurse in stockings! Oh yeah. 4. Lucas – Lucas With The Lid Off Director Michel Gondry has a unique approach to video-making; he usually utilises seven dimensions of space and three of time to visualise them. Sometimes the result is beautiful and uplifting. Those ones are ditched; nobody must see a beautiful and uplifting Gondry video! The keepers are the videos that hurt your mind in a good and a bad way at the same time. Lucas With The Lid Off is one of those videos that make you think both "Ooh, impressive set-ups and choreography" and "Only a madman could come up with this! A madman I tells ya!" 3. Die Krupps – To The Hilt Compared to the other videos listed, this particular one – by one of the earlier industrial bands I ever listened to, Die Krupps – is by far the simplest in terms of production. Its high rating, though, comes mainly from two elements: firstly, the video takes place in a toilet. A toilet! Would you ever see, say, George Michael perform in a toilet? Okay, bad example. Secondly, one of the cubicles includes a couple of old men in suits dancing with one another. You’d pay top dollar to see a show like that anywhere in the world and here it is in this video for free! Wowsers! 2. Smashing Pumpkins – Ava Adore One of my favourite videos of all time thanks to the feel and production of it features Billy Corgan in the midst of his Nosferatu period along with the other members of Smashing Pumpkins moving from set to set along both sides of a tracking camera. Great use of speed-changes, filled with just the right amount of pretentious shit to remind you it’s the Smashing Pumpkins, and it’s...
Dog Planet Movie News
New Release! Borzoiz N The Hood (12) Dog-on-dog crime is at an all-time high. The spread of rabies in the ghettos is so extensive that the government turns a blind eye to it now. It’s against this bleak backdrop that we first meet the main group of characters in the film – Litter Tre, BowWowBoy, Chrissy, Ricky, Doggie, and Monster – as pups. In a tough neighbourhood only Litter Tre escapes the inherent violence and late-night barking at shadows for no reason. The bulk of the movie takes place many years later and tackles many social talking points such as poverty, education, and licking one’s testicles in public. Fans of action won’t be disappointed though as gangs feature heavily. Even Litter Tre chooses to run with the pack in order to seek vengeance on a murder and you won’t be able to help yourself wonder if the cycle of hate can ever be broken. Former Mutts With Attitude rapper Rice Rube puts in a compelling and believable performance as BowWowBoy and Angela Bassett Hound shines in her role as Litter Tre’s mum. Coming Soon! Where Beagles Dare Classic wartime novel "Where Beagles Dare" looks set to be turned into a film later this year after all. Regular readers will remember that studio executives have been locked in negotiations with author Goodboy Maclean for several years now over his insistence on creative control for the movie. Thankfully some backroom butt-sniffing finally seems to have put a seal on the deal and cinemagoers should be able to look forward to the big screen version of the wartime epic late in 2008. The story is that a team of Beagle commandos must parachute into catzi Germany near the end of World War 2, infiltrate the headquarters of the Siamese Service, and either rescue or kill a captured American Foxhound with full knowledge of the upcoming D-Day invasion. But things aren’t quite what they seem. Veteran actors Richard Bullmastiff and Clint East Siberian Laika are rumoured to have already signed on. Movie Of The Week! Weekend At St Bernard’s (PG) The drop-dead comedy makes its way to DVD this week and earns our coveted "Movie Of The Week" award. The basic premise of the film is that Larry (Spaniel McCarthy) and Richard (Rottweiler Silverdog) are a couple of young executives trying to make it big in their dog-eat-dog corporate world through a combination of hard work and slobbering charm. After taking details of a financial irregularity to their boss Bernie they are invited to his beachfront doghouse. Bernie wants them killed but ends up getting whacked by a hitmutt instead. To avoid being...
Pretentious Book Reviews: Mr Tickle
In Mr Tickle the author Roger Hargreaves first introduces us to his fictional world living under the ethereal real world we inhabit, a place where names make the person. This is a tip of the hat towards our own past and the surnames that were in use in medieval times – a writing technique designed to anchor us in the mythos of the book immediately -, but ultimately Hargreaves is striding towards something far more sinister and encourages the readers to consider the corrupting and binding power of words on a complacent society when they correlate Mr Tickle’s name and his actions. Mr Tickle himself is a rather joyful person on the surface as you would surmise from his name. Yet Hargreaves is deliberately lulling the reader into a false sense of security. The Tickle character is a hedonist who derives pleasure from inflicting pleasure. Again, our first instinct is to find this a noble act but we soon learn through the victims of Tickle that too much of a good thing is ultimately bad. When the story starts we find out that Mr Tickle is also slothful. Hargreaves considers pleasure and indolence to go hand-in-hand. The author is trying to warn generations of readers by describing the wastefulness of living in blind bliss without simply using the words themselves; this is a return to the author’s cautionary approach to their power and danger. This subversive, subliminal indoctrination technique is used throughout the entire Mr Men series and is indicative of Hargreaves’ genuine concern for society tempered with authoritarianism borne of the era in which he grew up. The disturbing issue of rape appears in the novel over and over again as a metaphor. We can clearly surmise that Hargreaves equates the spread of the corruption he fears so much with physical molestation. Mr Tickle’s rape scenes take the form of inappropriate handling of the people he meets and it is revealing to examine the sorts of people who Hargreaves sees as victims here. The teacher, policeman, and doctor all represent powerful, friendly figures in our lives and we see that they are no match for Tickle. The station guard and policemen are people we trust for protection, the teacher is a person we trust with our children, we trust the doctor with our lives, the greengrocer and butcher with feeding us, and yet all these people are powerless against the long reach of Tickle. A clearer message of how words have power and laziness penetrates all barriers. And yet in a final masterful twist we also discover the postman – the bearer of communications – is also susceptible....
Ultimate James Bond Trivia
Guaranteed not to have been previously seen on IMDB or your next article is free! Film: Dr No (1962). Trivia: Sean Connery heard the song Under The Mango Tree so many times during filming that he developed a phobia for the fruit. The name of the island Crab Key was chosen because it is an anagram of Car Key B, writer Ian Fleming’s favourite key for opening his car. Although Jack Lord ended up playing Felix Leiter in the movie he originally auditioned for the role of Conch Shell #2 in the beach scene with Ursula Andress. Film: From Russia With Love (1963). Trivia: It was impossible to get the rats to run correctly in the catacombs so cats in rat costumes and camera trickery were used instead. Sean Connery refused to buy any lucky heather while filming at the gypsy camp and was subsequently cursed with an inability to render any foreign accents convincingly. Film: Goldfinger (1964). Trivia: Ian Fleming became incandescent with rage after the censors insisted that Honor Blackman’s character be named ‘Pussy Galore’ rather than ‘Cuntflaps O’Houlihan’. Harold Sakata – who played Oddjob – became so attached to his bowler hat that he became a stockbroker on the London exchange. He lost everything in the global jambalaya downturn of 1979. Film: Thunderball (1965). Trivia: The apparatus that allows Bond to breathe underwater was made from two tampons but Sean still doesn’t know and you mustn’t tell him. The jetpack Bond uses in the escape from the chateau was real. However, the helmet was a hollowed-out watermelon. The frogmen fighting sequence is generally regarded as one of the longest and most tedious moments in cinematographic history. Film: You Only Live Twice (1967). Trivia: Literal translations for this movie’s title in other countries include: "Mr Bond In Outer Space" (Canada), "Ninjas, Ninjas, Ninjas" (Ethiopia), and "Worst. Japanese. Impression. Ever." (Japan) Connery’s obsession with tentacle rape anime started during production of this film. The cat stroked by Blofeld in earlier Bond movies could not reappear due to other commitments and a replacement was used. Film: On Her Majesty’s Secret Service (1969). Trivia: In the film Draco’s favourite drink is Corsican Brandy. However, in real life actor Gabriele Ferzetti claims he likes nothing better than bleach. George Lazenby and Diana Rigg’s rocky relationship on set is legendary but very few people realise this stems from them being born conjoined twins separated by a paper guillotine at age 7. Film: Diamonds Are Forever (1971). Trivia: Despite the looks, Mr Kidd was actually the "man" in his and Mr Wint’s relationship. Film: Live And Let Die (1973). Trivia: Jane Seymour became...
Darts
Is there a more manly sport than darts? I don’t think there is. You see more manly flesh when a bout of fisticuffs commences in the ring but exposed manly flesh is not a measure of the overall manliness of a sport or David Beckham would have joined a men’s synchronised swimming team in his youth. And he didn’t. He joined a netball team. A girls netball team. For girls. Nakedness or partial nudity does not a manly sport make. Aggression is something that is often considered manly while hoovering and painting toenails, often together, are those traits we all associate with women of the feminine persuasion. Darts is not an aggressive sport, unlike cock fighting. Seriously, nothing pisses me off more than touching another man’s bell end with my own. Rage. Building. Still, if pure anger made a sport manly then there’d be a whole new channel just for men called Sky Sports Leaving The Toilet Seat Up featuring housewives and girlfriends storming into rooms berating their partners and then throwing their remote controls at the window. Disclaimer: that’s never happened to me. Is sheer size something we can measure sporting manliness against? No. The men may be larger in sumo but darts players don’t wear nappies and hug one another. They are, however, armed with slivers of metal! That’s like ninja-sumo and I think we can all agree that nothing could possibly beat ninja-sumo on the manly scale of sports. So, with the position of Most Manly Sport attained, just who are some of the stars of the manly sport of darts these days? What do you mean by "I don’t care"? Phil Taylor "The Power" Stoke Stoke has given the world many wonderful things: pottery, for instance, and, of course, potters. And pottery shops. There are probably courses in learning to pot available in Stoke and don’t forget to take a guided tour of the amazing Stoke Pottery Experience. But Stoke also has people, some of whom have become famous for some ghastly reason or another; people like Anthea Turner and Neil Morrissey and, of course, Phil "The Power" Taylor. Phil’s record in darts is quite phenomenal. Nobody – and I mean nobody – in the world of darts has annoyed the living shit out of me more than Phil and that’s some record indeed! I’ve sent him some of those trophies you can buy in trophy shops engraved with "World’s Most Ungracious Winner" and "You’re No. 1 In My Book. My Book Of Arrogant Dart Players That Is!" (that last one cost a fortune to have done) but I suspect he hasn’t room for them...
Recent From Retro
-
The Women Of Kilobaud Computing Sep 26, 2016 -
-
-
-
-
Recent From Entertainment
-
Dance Music Triple Nov 19, 2016 -
-
-
-
-
Recent Comments