The Saturday Report – A Heavy Dose of Reality

Archive

Back from the honeymoon, got a wedding band, a tan and chance to ramble a bit about it (and other things). Yep, it’s my first real random thoughts column.

Non-TV related stuff
You may want to skip this if you don’t care about weddings
– Club DJs suck at weddings. They’re great at mixing songs together, but aren’t any good at gauging the feel of the crowd (i.e. if noone’s on the dance floor, maybe you should consider changing the music). Luckily, this happened at a friend’s wedding last week, not mine – we got a DJ specializing in functions, and it kept everyone reasonably happy.

– Kauai is beautiful. It’s also a lot less busy than Maui, Oahu or Hawaii. If you don’t like just kicking back and taking your time, this might not be the best place for you to go. There’s still enough to do to fill 5 days, even if you want to take a couple of days to relax at the beach.

– The Hana Highway on Maui is no fun if you’re the one driving.

Other Notes
– A quick word about fantasy football magazines. They were all written up about 1 month after the college draft, so remember that before you draft Koren Robinson or a Grammatica – they’re unemployed and even the CFL doesn’t want them.

– The NHL is back, and Bob Goodenow is gone. Gary Bettman is still around, but eventually the owners will realize that the ill will Bettman caused by canceling the 04-05 season will outweigh his David Stern-lite tactics in the long run.

– Unfortunately, this means Don Cherry is back as well. At least there’s a good chance that Tie Domi won’t be on the Leafs anymore.

– What? You’re American and can’t remember what hockey was like? Have no fear, The Sports Guy has written an article to get you reacquainted with the Coolest Game on Earth (when there isn’t a lockout). Even if you still don’t care, you’ll probably get a good chuckle out of it.

This is TV-related, I swear
Network Fall Premieres
We’ve got NBC and ABC for you to look at in addition to UPN and Fox (motto: you create it, we’ll copy it).

For me, notable dates are:

Mon, Sept 19 8pm – Arrested Development
Tue, Sept 20 9pm – My Name Is Earl
9:30pm – The Office
10pm – Law & Order: Special Victims Unit
Wed, Sept 21 8pm – The Apprentice: Martha Stewart
9pm – Lost
Thu, Sept 22 8pm – Joey
9pm – The Apprentice 4

Canadian Idol
– Colour me surprised that Ashley Leitao was booted off of Canadian Idol this week. From my last column, you know that I’d pegged her to win the whole thing, but obviously I was a wee bit off on that.

– Still, I have to say that the voters aren’t wrong in voting her off. I give them credit, as (most of the time) they’ll give you a strong final two (the major Idol exception being Diana DeGarmo being there in AI3).

– According to eTalk Daily, Rex Goudie (at 7-to-4) is apparently the oddsmaker’s favourite to win. But if you listen carefully to the judges, he’s not on the list for their desired final three, which look to be Josh Palmer, Amber Fleury and Suzi Rawn.

– Next Tuesday is 80’s week. Darryl Brunt should sing Rockwell – he wouldn’t even need to do a falsetto.

The Brendan Report
I’m now three columns behind IPTV’s favourite movie guy. So I just wanted to say a belated “no, I didn’t get a VHS copy of that and it’s not illegal for TV shows… yet”. Also, this column should be up on a Saturday. I hope. Anyways, click the link to get the most recent Weekly Pulse.

More Reality Shows
– Watched Rock Star: INXS for the first time this week, and I was surprised to see Off The Record favourite Tara Sloan on it. Mostly because I thought she still had a Canadian recording contract.

– Also, Dave Navarro seems to be trying to prove that Carmen Electra is his beard. Cut down on the eye shadow a bit, will ya?

The Law Firm debuted on Thursday. I was going to write a whole column about it, but the problem was, in terms of the look, the personalities, the feel and even the music, this ripped off of The Apprentice in almost every way. Let’s review:
– You’ve got a bunch of pretty faces, all of whom give the same standard confessionals that we’re used to seeing on Trump’s show.
– You’ve got Roy Black, a top lawyer who is kissed up to by all the attorneys.
– A “Conference Room” where Black meets the attorneys, hands out their cases, and “dismisses” attorneys from the firm.
– The usual bickering and slamming we’ve come to expect from Reality TV.

David E. Kelley, I thought you were more original than this. (Looks at his resume filled with law shows) OK, maybe not. Well, at least you had the brilliant idea that any attorney could be “dismissed” based on their performance, not by losing a case. That being said, pity that Kelly, the Kelly Hu lookalike, had to go.

Reality fights stemming from a reality show
At 9pm on August 6 SpikeTV is showing a LIVE UFC event with Ultimate Fight Night. It’s possible that the IP Wrestling crew will do a recap of it, but maybe Murtz has something up his sleeve. I’ll be taping this for sure. The Ultimate Fighter is well represented on the card (TUF contestants in yellow):

Nathan Marquardt vs. Ivan Salaverry
Pete Spratt vs. Josh Koscheck
Pete Sell vs. Nate Quarry
Sam “Sticky Fingers” Hoger vs. Stephan Bonnar
Patrick Cote vs. Chris “Fratboy” Leben

Undercard Fights
Mike Swick vs Keith Rockel
Kenny Florian vs Alex Karalexis
Drew Fickett vs Josh Neer

Also be on the lookout for UFC: Unleashed, which this coming week will be showing some of the undercard bouts from the TUF finale. Be warned, though – these fights promise to give us a lot of Joe Rogan commentary. I don’t think that that’s a good thing…

That’s it for me. See you next week.

Kevin has been an Insider since 2003, writing on a variety of topics ranging from The Amazing Race to Mixed Martial Arts. His current hobbies include Fantasy Football, Sporcle, travelling, making liberal use of his DVR and wondering what the heck he's gonna do when his two daughters are old enough to date. You can follow Kevin on Twitter (@starvenger).