Late Night Programming

Yawn.  Stretch.  Man!  These weekend nights can be a grind, especially when there's nothing going on the great province of...

o/`  Our home and native land...  o/`

There's a TV back here at the dispatcher's desk and I flip through once in a while.  By and large the selection is crap.  Sometimes there's the odd movie on, but it's usually not very good - hence why I opt to write at night a bunch of the time.  However, there are a few gems out there and I'd like to share them with my fellow night owls.  Well, I'm only a part-time night owl, really.  I'm in bed by 10:30 during the week, and this is all kind of a moot point because I'm dialing up Humber's perfect game and listening to that tonight instead of the tube.  Nevertheless, here we go!


JUDGE JOE BROWN

SOLD!  *WHACK!*  ...  I mean, GUILTY!  *WHACK!*  ...  Can I unwhack something after it's been whacked?

I must confess: I never had the time to watch court TV.  It always seems so...  I dunno...  It seems like something that should be private.  You get a couple of slobs up there arguing their case and how they done been wronged and my conscience says that, hey, this is really something that's none of my business.  In fact, I wouldn't lose any sleep over it if all court cases were kept firmly behind closed doors.  But if they really feel compelled to be on camera and the courts are O.k. with it then go ahead and fill your boots.
Now before I start talking about the actual show, I'd like to start with the parody of the show, and a particularly biting parody if I must say.  The best parodies are the ones that seem the closest to the truth, and this one cuts pretty close to the bone.  I speak, of course, of Just or Unjust, the fictional, satirical courtroom (or rather "courtroom" as it apparently doubles as a...

See that guy on the left?  With the wolf helmet?  Ronald Kuby.

...where they battle to the death) on WKTT, a fictional radio station in the game Grand Theft Auto IV.  The judge, the star of the show, is misogynistic, inept, black, and just a little bit right of Papa Doc on the political spectrum.  Now where have I seen this before?

I'm a judge.  What exactly did you expect?  This isn't a courtroom!  It's a studio!

Well, it's not that bad.  I can see where the satire is coming from (especially perhaps the inept part - video editing can sure help anyone look smart), but really he doesn't seem all that bad.  In fact, I find the show somewhat entertaining.  He really doesn't screw around at all and seems rather open-minded, in spite of how he's lampooned.  And, generally, the more smug the defendant, the better the show.  So, good stuff.  I didn't anticipate this being as good as it is.  Way to go, Joe!


STORAGE WARS / PAWN STARS

I could do entries for both of these shows separately, but then I thought nah, we'll just lump them together.  Yeah, they both fit into the category of shows that I like to call...

Oh please, please tell me how much this piece of crap is worth!

It's getting to be a sickness, I think.  First there was Antiques Roadshow...

Not to be confused with the crooks at Artiques Roadshow.  I've actually (or rather, artctually) spoken with the bozo on the right.

And that was fine and quaint and British and whatever.  Invariably old people would take dusty old relics down to this meeting hall where some dusty old expert would let them know that they'd either discovered Oliver Cromwell's walnut chiffonier, which could fetch upwards of £750.00 at auction, or a collection of wood scraps (a "reproduction") that would find peak resale value as campfire fuel.  And that show was fine.  It had all of us thinking that if you dug through the basement hard enough you might uncover something that was at one time owned by Harthacnut.  But then there's this nonsense.

Ooo!  What could it be?  I think I see St. Cyril's long lost Loving Spoonful albums!

Gimme a break.  That might be interesting for a show or two, but it gets real old real quick.  Granted...

This guy's pretty cool and gives me fantasies of what Dustin Hoffman does in his spare time.

...and...

I do love a good villain, and this jerk's up there with Ebeneezer Scrooge on Christmas Eve.

...but...

Presenting Phillip Seymour Hoffman and woman-who-holds-clipboard.

...and the rest of the crew are just so...  Well, I think of it like this.  Do I really want to look over everyone's shoulder as they go to work?  Loggers, truckers, fishermen - those are all fine and well and may by exciting from time to time, but this is just getting silly now.  Who cares what the hell they find in an old storage container?  It's getting to the point where I'm concerned that one day I'll walk into work and cameras will start following me around for a new A&E series, "THE PROPERTY GUYS" chronicling our *yawn* trials and tribulations as we *yawn* attempt to manage parking lots in...  *snore*


MTV LIVE

I must confess, I...  I, uh...  I don't get it.  Well, O.k.  Let me see if I can put myself back into the right frame of mind.  I was a kid once, after all, and these guys are really quite popular...

read: poo-poo-lar

...amongst the kids.  But I don't get it.  Mind you, there are a few things that I don't get that I once got that I watch late at night on MuchMusic that now just mystify me how I ever thought they were cool in the first place.

I liked this crap?!  What was I thinking..?

So with this in mind I've stuck it out and watched a few episodes.  You really have to take the little dial deep inside of you labelled "maturity" and dial it down a ways, pretty much to the low end of the scale.  There are a lot of jokes, gags, and pop culture references that kinda go over my head, but by and large I can see what they're doing, but I don't fully get it.  The show's not really all that live, either.  Especially not at 5 a.m.  Now fortunately...

I just tune the other hosts out, really...

Sheena's really cute!  I get that part!  She's cute, but unfortunately AB-SO-LUTE-LY-FROOT-LOOPS.  So I guess you can't have everything in life.  Oh well.  Keep fishing.


THE DUDESONS

Mm.  I didn't know if I should include this one or not, but I thought ah, what the hell?  Why not?

A quartet of charming rogues ready, willing, and able to injure themselves for your enjoyment.

The Dudesons are this gang of kids (well, not really kids as they're all my age now) from this town in Finland and they do the whole snowboard, dirt bike, stupid stunt crap that the good ole boys at Jackass made their living off of.  Only the Dudesons, I believe, were doing it first in the 90's, whereas Jackass only went on the air first in 2000.  The really amazing thing here to figure is that they've been doing this more or less for twenty years now and they can still actually move.  Amazing!  Oh, and you have to find that little "maturity" dial again and dial it all the way down again for this.

Anyway, for my money, far and away their best work is the Mr. Hitler sketches, especially #2.

Yeah!  That guy!

So this guy, this poor unlucky guy, just so happens to be the Dudesons' neighbour.  For all of the nasty things that they allege "Mr. Hitler" is guilty of, if I was the Dudesons' neighbour I'd probably slam the door in their face if they wanted a cup of sugar, too.  I won't go into detail about sketch #1.  Suffice to say they take a shit in mailbox.  Yeah.  Classy.  You were warned.  Watch at your own peril with that one.  #2 though is way better!  They put on these furry costumes and call themselves...

If I didn't know any better, I'd guess that this was a Beastie Boys video.

Then they wait until Mr. Hitler leaves, dig out his driveway with a backhoe (in costume!) and wait for him to drive home.  Hilarity ensues.  As mean and stupid as this is, I have to admit that it's rather inspired.  Credit where credit is due I always say.


INFOMERCIALS

They're not all bad.  Actually, they're not all bad, but they do mostly follow the same format: the pitch guy...

This ain't no ordinary tea towel!

...and the stooge...

OHMYGODREGULARTEATOWELSAREDISGUSTING!!!

I often find that the pitchman and the stooge really have to work in conjunction to make a great team.

Liquified canaries you say Billy?

I do say, Janet.

Celebrity endorsements help.

Well...  To an extent, anyway.

Of course, you need a dynamite product, too.

Introducing: THE VESSEL!  Ideal for storing olive oil, shampoo, sodium pentathol, liquified canaries, and much, much more!

And a creative design will ensure that your product gets noticed.

Hm.  A vacuum.  How novel.  Sure can't get that at Zellers.

Follow these simple rules and you too will have a product that will be impossible to keep on the shelves.
And that's all the time we have for today.  I hope you enjoyed this guide to late night programming, but please don't stay up late on my account.  Good night!