MISCELLANEOUS MISCELLANY: RANDOM HUMP DAY MUSINGS

Just a few random thoughts before I have to be away from a computer for the rest of the day. (The Horror! The Horror!)

• I didn’t see this anywhere else, although maybe I just missed it, but while watching like 10 minutes of Monday Night Football on, well, Monday, during one of the bumpers either going to or coming from commercial, the music playing under the clips was “Little Dawn” by the great Ted Leo (from his latest album Shake the Sheets). I’ve become a huge Ted Leo fan this year, and am extremely excited for his show Saturday night at Bowery, but I sure as hell never expected to hear any of his songs on ABC football. Is this a signal of a potential breakout to the mainstream? One can hope.

• I’m totally going to get into this later (or maybe I’m just making false promises) but the only reason The Real Gilligan’s Island isn’t the worst reality show in history is because Fox once produced Forever Eden and ABC recently gave us The Benefactor. The Real Gilligan’s Island (it’s not even good enough to deserve a cute little abbreviation or acronym) isn’t even bad so much as pointless and utterly boring. Not that I expected much from it, but this is simply ridiculous. It’s one of the few TV shows that I actually felt ashamed watching, and because of it’s annoying format (and my stupid-ass desire to be thorough), I’ve actually watched it … more than once.

• Could this be a sign that Pixar might have it’s first not-the-greatest-animated-film-since-the-last-Pixar-film on its hands? Pixar Delays Its Next Film ‘Cars’ to 2006 . Cars is the last film in Pixar’s deal with Disney, and they claim that it’s just an attempt to move their films to a summer rather than holiday release schedule. Since they are releasing it in Summer 2006 the answer is probably, No, this movie will be just as good as the rest. However, if you saw The Incredibles (and if you haven’t what the hell is wrong with you? It’s fucking brilliant!), you probably also caught the teaser for Cars, and I don’t know, personally, I was underwhelmed. I mean, sure it looked kind of cool, but unlike all the trailers and teasers for previous Pixar films that I remember, Cars didn’t seem to have too much personality. Obviously, I’ll withhold judgment until, well, summer 2006 I suppose, and Pixar has earned the benefit of the doubt. AND switching to summer isn’t like taking the easy road or anything. Still, makes me pause and say, Hmmmm.

• Craig Ferguson as new host of the Late, Late Show on CBS? I say meh. He’s fine. Like Gawker, I would have preferred Michael Ian Black, but it’s not like I would have watched the show anyway, and I wasn’t crazy about any of the finalists. It will be interesting to see how much (if at all) they change the format and setting to better fit Ferguson and whether or not he really can compete with Conan.

• And speaking of late night, I just happened to flip on Last Call with Carson Daly the other night, and what the hell? Who’s brilliant (read: asinine, stupid, moronic) idea was it to suddenly put Carson behind a desk? And a cheesy, too-small, looks-like-it-was-bought-at-IKEA desk. One of the worst things about the old Later was when it stopped being a late-night, two people in two easy chairs chatfest and they added a desk. While Daly’s show has, since the beginning, been devoted to a more traditional late-night talk show format with multiple guests plus a musical act, why make it even more imitative. I know this seems like it may be a small thing, but it really isn’t. Maybe they’re just trying to prep his comfort level behind a desk in the hope that he will inherit 12:35 when Conan takes over The Tonight Show in a couple years, but this late-late night slot is really much better when it’s even more casual and it doesn’t look like every other late-night show. I thought Daly & Co. had done a reasonably good job creating a decent show for the time slot (again, not that I ever watched with any regularity), but seriously folks … get rid of the desk. Unless it’s there because guests don’t want to be in the same room with Carson if there’s not a physical barrier between them, in which case, you have an entirely different problem.

That will most likely do it for me today as I know have to go play tour guide for several hours and then will be off to see the latest big action movie starring Ryan Reynolds and Jessica Biel. Oh yeah … I guess that guy Wesley is in it too.