Wow, so it’s been weeks since I last ranted and raved to you, dear reader.  And what, you ask (though begrudgingly so) has TV and Film Guy done with his time?  Well, I’ll tell you, I watched television, and because everything in the world was a repeat I watched stuff that I’ve never watched before, and though I liked some of it, I will probably never watch it again.

An example, you ask (again begrudgingly so)?  Sure, no problem, on New Year’s Day I watched many, many hours of a Flip That House marathon on TLC.  Boy, is that show fun!  Or at the very least, it is when the story is compelling.  There was this one guy, an assistant for a talent agent, that was working with his friends on a house on the weekends and hadn’t a clue as to what he was doing.  He went over-budget, we went over-time, he practically went broke doing it, but the house, should it be sold at the appraisal price, will make him a pretty penny (technically, $88,000 worth of pretty pennies).  There was also an episode with a shrill woman that plays in a band.  That episode wasn’t as good, because the woman was shrill; she was too perky and too peppy and just not as much fun (sorry lady, it’s true).  At the end of every episode they go over the cost of the place, plus the cost of the improvements made and then show the new appraisal value.  Everyone seems to make money, it’s unbelievable.  Even the people that had to tear down the entire house and completely rebuild it made money.  Frankly, I think there’s something a little fishy there, but I’ll roll with it.  Seriously, if everyone can just get a bank loan, buy a $200,000 house, hire someone to fix it, put in $30,000 and then sell the whole thing for $380,000 two months later, I’m in the wrong business.  After watching hours of Flip That House I have to believe that there are things the audience just isn’t being told. 

Anything else, you ask (sure that you’ll regret it)?  Ignoring the hours I spent watching Indian soap operas on Zee TV (no, I can’t name which ones they were, but can tell you that the plot of soap operas seem universal), it was a lot of “news” and holiday coverage.  I put news in quotes, because there are only so many times that the same old recycled stories can be counted as news. 

Why, I want to know, can we not have original, good programming on during the holiday season.  Does everyone really turn off their TV for two weeks?  Surely, in the evenings, after spending days on end with our families and extended families and extended families’ friends and their friends’ friends we could all use two or three hours in front of the TV, right? 

Thank goodness some of the broadcast networks are starting airing new stuff tonight, I just don’t think I can deal anymore with repeat after repeat. 

So, in a nutshell, here’s how this TV and Film Guy sees it:  yes, branching out in one’s TV habits can be a good thing, but happy days are here again on network TV starting tonight.  And, in a few short weeks, Jack Bauer is going to be back on the case.  Wouldn’t it be great if every time he did some impossible thing he looked at the camera and said “Jack Bauer!”  I really think it would add to the show.  Think about it, “Jack Bauer!”

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