Showing posts with label TV;. Show all posts
Showing posts with label TV;. Show all posts

Sunday, May 16, 2010

WTF TV
















If you're as unstimulated as myself, you'll find yourself flipping through the weekly TV guide the day it comes with the Sunday paper just to see if there's anything worth keeping your eyes out for on the box in the upcoming week.

Even if you're not as sadly sedate as all that, I'm sure you'll still not fail to notice just how many acronyms there are for TV shows. Hey, even TV itself is an acronym come to think of it.

MASH was one of the first ones to start it – wisely deciding that Mobile Army Surgical Hospital might not have drawn the 1970s telly viewer in such large numbers. Later on, ER producers also believed that 'Emergency Room' sounded more like a door sign than an engrossing drama.

If I flip through the guide whilst typing this, I notice that we have 'Law and Order: SVU'. No, that's not a Sports Vehicle Utility, but a 'Special Victims Unit'. In other words, it's one of those cop shows where the murder always involves a dead girl who lives a secret life; normally involving prostitution, pole dancing or a sleazy strip club. And yes, the detectives are always compelled to visit at least one of these sordid places in order to solve the crime.

To support my blather, here is the actual description for the next episode that screens on Thursday night: ‘Suspicions that the girlfriend of a lesbian artist could be responsible for her sexual assault and murder are overshadowed by an attack on an activist, who is part of a gay advocacy group following the investigation.’ Nice; especially when Mr and Mrs Channel Ten Breathy-Porno Voice-over couple promote the show during every single ad-break during the G-rated MasterChef Australia program.

NCIS is another one, presumably standing for 'Non-imaginative Crime Investigation Series', yet they’ve also created a second stream located in Los Angeles. *sigh*, I mean ‘LA’.


















The king of acronyms that breed remains the CSI franchise. We have the original CSI (Crime Scene Investigation) set in Las Vegas, and CSI: Miami and now CSI: New York. I'll start watching the day they release CSI: Wagga Wagga.

Current affairs, light-hearted game shows and aliens get in on the act as well: Q&A, QI, and V.

You've also got AFL footy, the NRL Show, Late night NBC news. At the insomniac's hour of 3:00am we have JLF, but I have no idea what it stands for - Juicy Lesbian Fairies perhaps, or Judge's Liver Failure. This is then followed by USA high, Airline USA, Wife Swap USA and various UKs.

OneChannel has embraced the capital with UFC Unleashed, MVP, NBA playoffs, TNA Xplosion, MLB, ANDRA pro-series drag racing, NASCAR nationwide, ATP World Tour Uncovered, ITU World Champions, ANZ netball, SK Telecom Open and MotoGP.

We even had the movie, DOA playing on Saturday night!

To digress a bit, let's now look at numbers, shall we? They too, are now considered important enough to be a show's name. We have - 20/20, Hi-5, 7PM Project, the 7:30 Report, Zontas 100%, 24, Autism Speaks 400.... Why the last one is on the sports channel ‘One’ is a mystery I’m not prepared to sit down and watch in order to solve.

I asked Love Chunks once (and only the once) what acronym he'd choose to describe himself and he immediately shot back with: "BBD. Bloody Big Donger."

Hmmm well he may be a physicist and mathetician all that, but there's still a fair share of Benny Hill lurking within.

As for me, it would definitely be WACA - Worrywart And Chocolate Addict.

Thursday, April 02, 2009

I'm ON


After nearly four weeks of sitting through stories that involved an unemployed young bogan who impregnated eleven different women, some Adelaide chick who looks like Princess Diana with a bad blow dry, the new miracle bra, why some students are stripping to earn money and how to avoid paying parking tickets, Love Chunks saw a promo.
No, this time Tracy Grimshaw wasn't talking about the woman who lost a tonne of blubber by walking around town pushing her pram or how you can buy bargain baby gear.... Yes, I've sadly sat through either live or videod versions of the show, wondering if the delightful Thomas Schnetzler and I would ever make it on.
....and if we did, would we fit in amongst the rip-off merchants, dodgy priests, anti-airport development battlers and Nick Darcy victims?

We'll see. Friday night, 3rd April, 6:30pm, channel nine. They do say that the camera adds on ten kilograms, so please be kind....