It may seem a strange thing for an entertainment blogger to confess…but I think you should all know as the hype cranks up again that I have never seen a single episode, not a minute, not even a preview, of Game of Thrones, ever. And I’m OK with that.
“But the characters! The politics! The sexy medieval sex!” is what you are all shouting at me, I know. I certainly understand the intrigue. But in the “Game of Remote” that already goes on at my house, combined with the “Game of Life” (actual life, not the adorable board game from when we were kids, which is now an annoying iPad app, which is way less fun than poking your sister with plastic peg “kids”) there was just no more room at the inn. The hubs and I rarely agree on the fantasy genre (I am a fair to Mid-World fan, he doesn’t even see elves when heavily medicated) and with so many other blood-soaked, mind-chewing political tales out there to choose from, it just didn’t make the cut.
Five fun things about those other kinds of fantasies
I blame television, and the makers of it, for all of the twisty, intriguing, storytelling going on in so many shows today that it’s actually ushering in all-new glory days of television, or whatever the thing that we come to watch one-hour stories on will be called, because traditional television formatting is going to become obsolete. Now, when I’m ready for TV, TV is ready for me — and boy is it ready for me. In the allotted 45 minutes (hour and a half if we had takeout) that we get to relax after the kids are in bed and before we’re doing mutual head-bobbing on the couch, the choices are so plentiful that I’m like a kid in a candied TV store.
The rest of the blame goes squarely on my squishy constitution. There is only so much mayhem, trauma, and tension-filled viewing that I can tolerate before I turn to an episode of The Mindy Project to cleanse my mind of the twisted viewing that came before. And I have already pledged allegiance to Rick & Co. dispensing with walkers left and right - my dance card has no room for Lannisters, Starks or what looks like a very uncomfortable chair.
What about you? What show did you start, quit, or just never bother with?
Image Source: HBO Canada
Duck! The Internets are exploding with news that Full House will be getting a reboot courtesy of Netflix, where apparently they are drunk with the power of their newfound ability to make television hits.
How else to explain this half-baked and silly plan? This time out, it’s DJ Tanner all grown up (and still going by “DJ”?). She’s a recently widowed veterinarian who will need Kimmy Gibbler to come live with her and sort her mess of kids out.
1. This poor family and their spouses meeting untimely deaths. Don’t they look both ways? Wear a seatbelt? Learn not to text and drive? Is this a Disney property? Oh; wait.
2. Kimmy Gibbler is NOT sorting anything out. (Aha: situation. Comedy.)
3. If Uncle Jesse is still chasing chicks 30 years on, despite the amazing good looks of the amazingly well-preserved John Stamos…YUCK. (Yes, I am well aware of his marital status to Aunt Becky as of the series finale.)
RELATED: Mary-Kate Olsen With Old Man Sarkozy in Creepy PDA
It’s great that Candace Cameron Bure suddenly wants to work again (just how big was that dump truck full of money?) and it’s wonderful that Andrea Barber and Jodie Sweetin will get, well, work, but does it have to be this? Netflix, you are supposed to be producing much, much smarter television than this. How about giving the ladies a whole new series to play with that has a little wink to where we got to know them?
I absolutely loved Full House, by the way, so much so that after my formative years ended and I finally saw what Bob Saget’s real stand-up was like, as compared to that tall, goofy dad-type from AFV, I was mildly traumatized. (Though his version of “The Aristocrats” is a triumph of absolute filth.)
I even understand the gamble: if even one of the planned dozen or so reboots of our favourite shows from “days gone by” (see what I did there?) turns out not to be utter garbage, it’s a win for production companies and fans alike. Case histories, however, suggest that, unscientifically, it’s about 0.5 shows out of a dozen that return in a watchable, enjoyable format and not some pale, ugly imitation that smacks of desperation for all concerned.
So to all the TV reboots? How rude! Cut. It. Out.
Image Source: abc.com
It's one of those passings that hits you particularly hard. Actor Jonathan Crombie, best known as the embodiment of Gilbert Blythe in the Anne of Green Gables miniseries from the 1980s, passed away April 15 at age 48 from a brain hemorrhage. As always, the saddest part of grief is realizing just how how much you loved someone who departed.
To those of us who are a certain age (and probably a generation forward and back of that) who grew up on Anne in the beloved Kevin Sullivan TV miniseries, this man was Gilbert Blythe.
Anne of Green Gables and its sequels are pieces of work that stand as classics, and are a world-class telling of a completely Canadian story (all that snow when Diana’s sister has croup!) and at the heart of the productions is the evolving relationship between Anne and Gilbert.
Oh, Gilbert. (Apologies to the Gilberts of the world, but has a “Gilbert” or even a “Gil” ever been handsome and mischievous in anything else? Ever?) Millions of Canadian tweens (and their mothers) giggled and sighed at how blind Anne was to your somewhat obvious affections, and would have very happily allowed Gilbert, in the form of Crombie, to tug our braids and call us “Carrots."
RELATED: Secret Story Behind Cabbage Patch Craze
Crombie lent his talents to other fare such as Comedy Now! and The Secret World of Benjamin Bear (voice of Benjamin Bear), and I would always watch for his name in the credits as I watched that bear with my children - a bit like watching for the name of an old friend.
Many a Canadian girl in 1985 went to sleep dreaming of that particular Gilbert Blythe. He was a first “boyfriend” for an entire country. By many accounts, Crombie embraced his iconic role and was still kind enough, well into his forties, to smile and wave when fans yelled “Gilbert!” to him on the street 30 years after that production wrapped. This is the type of fellow we will all surely miss. If he didn’t know it the day he put on the newsboy cap and stepped on set, he surely knew nearly every day after just how very much we loved him.
Image Source
Printer-friendly version