AP - Sam Haskell's publisher wanted to adorn the cover of his new book with celebrity photos, a logical move. During his days as a top Hollywood agent and executive, Haskell worked with George Clooney, Bill Cosby, Dolly Parton and more. Source: Yahoo! News: Entertainment News | 8 May 2009 | 11:35 am
MEMPHIS, Tenn. - The soulful singer Janiva Magness won entertainer of the year at the 2009 Blues Music Awards in Memphis. The Michigan native also won best contemporary female artist at Source: RSS feed - channel BNewsEnter | 8 May 2009 | 11:09 am
The T-800 killer cyborg famously originated by Arnold Schwarzenegger in the "Terminator" film franchise makes an appearance in the latest film, "Terminator Salvation." A screening... Source: RSS feed - channel BNewsEnter | 8 May 2009 | 11:08 am
We take a look back at the producer's hip-hop reign, in Mixtape Daily.By Shaheem Reid Irv Gotti Photo: MTV News It's official, people. Mixtape Daily is here. That's right, daily. Mixtape Monday... Source: RSS feed - channel BNewsEnter | 8 May 2009 | 10:51 am
1. NBA Playoffs: Chicago at Boston (Saturday, 8:04 p.m.), TNT, 5.01 million homes, 6.98 million viewers. 2. NBA Playoffs: Boston at Chicago (Thursday, 7:08 p.m.), TNT, 4.04 million... Source: RSS feed - channel BNewsEnter | 8 May 2009 | 10:40 am
SHANGHAI, May 8 /PRNewswire-Asia-FirstCall/ -- Acorn International, Inc. (NYSE: ATV) ("Acorn" or the "Company"), a leading integrated multi-platform ... Source: RSS feed - channel BNewsEnter | 8 May 2009 | 10:26 am
AP - "Store Front: the Disappearing Face of New York" (Gingko Press, 336 pages, $65), by James T. and Karla L. Murray: Overly affectionate accounts of days gone by make up an entire genre in America these days, part of the general shift in the past generation from future-focused optimism to nostalgia-laced longing.
AP - In the old days of "Star Trek," Kirk and Spock's supporting players often got stuck repeating things like, "Hailing frequencies open" and "Course laid in, captain."
AP - In the old days of "Star Trek," Kirk and Spock's supporting players often got stuck repeating things like, "Hailing frequencies open" and "Course laid in, captain."
YOUNG STARS BRING AWARENESS TO MUSIC IN SCHOOLS AND HELP BRIDGE THE GAP BETWEEN ENTERTAINMENT AND EDUCATION LOS ANGELES, May 8 /PRNewswire/ -- To celebrate the... Source: RSS feed - channel BNewsEnter | 8 May 2009 | 10:17 am
Bassist Donald "Ean" Evans of the Southern rock band Lynyrd Skynyrd has died after a battle with cancer. Lowndes County Coroner Greg Merchant said Evans died Wednesday at his home in eastern Mississippi. He was 48.
AP - The soulful singer Janiva Magness won entertainer of the year at the 2009 Blues Music Awards in Memphis. Source: Yahoo! News: Entertainment News | 8 May 2009 | 6:55 am
Oakland rap legend Del the Funky Homosapien, like all musicians, is coming to grips with a rapidly changing music industry. Unlike most, though, he's looking to himself for the solution, personally bankrolling his new album "Funk Man (The Stimulus Package)" and releasing it as a free download.
Mannequins on display wearing different fashions during a exhibit at the Metropolitan Museum of Art titled "The Model as Muse: Embodying Fashion" in New York. The exhibition, organized by historical period... Source: RSS feed - channel BNImagesEnter | 8 May 2009 | 6:15 am
Activision Blizzard is releasing three new music-based games this year: "DJ Hero," "Guitar Hero 5" and "Band Hero," and also confirmed the existence of "Guitar Hero: Van Halen."
Jack Bauer's alter ego arrived this afternoon at a New York...
Aw. Taj rendezvoused with her hubby in exile. Stephen and his brother shared one of their warmest hugs ever. Coach had his back cracked by his assistant coach.
The happy tears...
Reuters - So much portentous meaning has been read into Samuel Beckett's play "Waiting for Godot" that it's a pleasure to be reminded by Ian McKellen and Patrick Stewart what an entertaining show it is. Source: Yahoo! News: Entertainment News | 8 May 2009 | 3:28 am
Reuters - So much portentous meaning has been read into Samuel Beckett's play "Waiting for Godot" that it's a pleasure to be reminded by Ian McKellen and Patrick Stewart what an entertaining show it is. Source: Yahoo! News: Entertainment Reviews | 8 May 2009 | 3:28 am
Shanna Moakler is doing it again.
Just a week after posing for a pro-gay marriage PSA, Moakler spent part of today shooting print and television spots for a new campaign, which she says...
Front Page: John Singleton to direct videogame adaptation -- Paramount Pictures is accelerating its efforts to put "Fast and Furious" star Vin Diesel back behind the wheel of a fast car.
Front Page: Docu takes on media influence on kids -- Producer Mike Tollin, director Bill Couturie and Stacey Snider are teaming on the documentary "Clueless," which looks at the all-consuming media world inhabited by kids today.
Front Page: Chul-soo Park to direct '10A/10B' -- Marisa Tomei and Liv Tyler will topline indie psychological thriller "10A/10B," produced and financed through Christopher Mallick's Oxymoron Entertainment.
Reuters - A cache of drugs ends up in the wrong place, placing the unwitting recipients in jeopardy. Haven't we seen this story about 100 times since a blind Audrey Hepburn fought off a diabolical Alan Arkin in 1967's "Wait Until Dark"? Source: Yahoo! News: Entertainment Reviews | 8 May 2009 | 1:57 am
AFP - Actor Kiefer Sutherland, best known for his television role as a special agent, was arrested on charges that he head-butted a fashion designer at a Manhattan party.
Isaac Mizrahi is no Tim Gunn.
Tonight we got a taste of Bravo's Project Runway replacement, The Fashion Show, and it was clear that the lovable Isaac was not trying to copy Gunn,...
Spanish tenor Jose Carreras, who with Luciano Pavarotti and Placido Domingo formed the "Three Tenors", the most famous trio in opera history, said in an interview here Friday he was retiring from opera... Source: RSS feed - channel BNImagesEnter | 8 May 2009 | 12:54 am
Daisy De La Hoya isn't down for the count.
The Daisy of Love temptress was not rushed to the hospital for a drug overdose, as some outlets reported earlier today, her rep assures E!...
UPDATE: Added Abdul in a statement today: "I want to make it perfectly clear to everyone that I have never been addicted to or abused drugs in my life," Abdul said. "I have never been...
A bunch of new Eminem tracks leaked today, and, well, wow. There’s more to be said than can fit in this space, but quickly: The cover and title aren’t just for show, as apparently Relapse will partially deal with the causes and consequences of Eminem’s addiction to the sleep medication Zolpidem (something we’re not sure many of his fans were even aware of). “Dr. West,” the intro, features Em being released from a rehab facility by a doctor with questionable ethics (maybe played by McNulty!) and immediately being seduced by the pills, and it's the most sane new track: “My Mom” concerns how his mother put Valium in everything he ate when he was a kid, “Bagpipes From Baghdad” is a nutso screed against former paramour Mariah Carey and her new dude Nick Cannon, and “Insane” (below) is an presumably fictional account of being sexually abused by his stepfather, complete with references to hangings and felching. Have fun!
It's indicative of the year we've had that a $75 billion deficit is a cause for celebration. That's the amount the administration said ten of the nineteen largest U.S. financial institutions need to raise in the "stress test" report released today, which contained few surprises: Bank of America is the biggest loser, requiring $33.9 billion. The leaked figure had been $34 billion, so maybe all the alleged haggling that the banks were doing with the Treasury Department over the last week netted them $100 million off the top. Martini time on K Street!
So far, everyone's acting pretty "upbeat," as the Times puts it, about the results, which Ben Bernanke said today "should provide considerable comfort to investors and the public." Still, some of the details are quite shocking — like the fact that the test projected the nineteen institutions could lose $500 billion over the next two years, or 9 percent of their loan portfolios, a percentage higher than during the Great Depression. That losses of this magnitude won't cause a depression again is evidently something for which we have our government to thank.
Here's what to look for in the immediate aftermath:
• An eminently reasonable editorial in the Times that points out flaws in the process and decries the leaks but overall praises Treasury secretary Tim Geithner for coming through in the clutch.
• A cranky Paul Krugman.
• A sunny David Brooks.
• The CNBC cheerleaders doing handstands and cartwheels and generally keeping up their battle cry that the worst is over, bring on the glorious recovery!
• Nouriel Roubini muttering that the test is nothing but marketing pablum.
• Nassim Taleb thundering that if we don't listen to him, the unexpected is sure to bite us in the ass all over again.
In other words, nothing's really changed. But that doesn't mean we can't all let ourselves be a little bit happy, for once. Here's something to get you started:
After a day's worth of anticipation, actor Kiefer Sutherland has turned himself in to police at the First Precinct over the matter of his alleged head-butting of fashion designer Jack McCollough. He will not be arrested, but rather has been issued a desk-appearance ticket and charged with misdemeanor assault. As you can see from this image, many photographers were made to wait all day for blood a good shot. The 24 star, for his part, seems to be trying to say something. Do you think it's, "Hey! His nose hurt my forehead, too"? That's what we think.
While we wait patiently for one of the characters on Lost to explain to us what the numbers 4, 8, 15, 16, 23, and 42 actually mean, the explanation that Damon Lindelof gave at an event called Comics on Comics in Los Angeles is going to have to suffice for the time being: "The Hanso Foundation that started the Dharma Initiative hired this guy Valenzetti to basically work on this equation to determine what was the probability of the world ending in the wake of the Cuban Missile Crisis. Valenzetti basically deduced that it was 100 percent within the next 27 years, so the Hanso Foundation started the Dharma Initiative in an effort to try to change the variables in the equation so that mankind wouldn't wipe it itself out." If anyone else out there is still confused, you're not alone. [Show Tracker/LAT]
Part performance-art project, part exuberant dance-pop duo, Fischerspooner broke out of New York City’s electroclash scene, worked with songwriter to the stars Linda Perry on a major-label album, and have finally arrived at Entertainment, the irresistible, whip-smart disc they released independently this week. Tonight they bring an elaborate stage show inspired by sixties space-travel and developed with the Wooster Group to the Music Hall of Williamsburg; tomorrow they appear at Webster Hall. Casey Spooner talked to us about a skeptical Susan Sontag examining his journals, how he’d welcome death, and his insane new hat.
Tell me about that hat on the album cover.
Last spring I had been doing this production of Hamlet with the Wooster Group, and felt I needed help getting started on the next [Fischerspooner] performance. Kate Volk brought in these dances, and one of them was this Kabuki dance called “The Wisteria Maiden.” The Wisteria Maiden wears this crazy hat thing that’s transformed into all these different props — it becomes an umbrella, or a shield, or a pallet. So we were rehearsing, and I was using a trash-can lid. Then we went to Brussels and did an installation in a museum, where I ended up making this weird prototype — a hat-box lid glued on top of a straw boater and attached by a bungee. I had this guy named Nasir recreate my hat for me in London, and then we went to this neon company that we work with and had them install neon in the hat.
What techniques did you adopt from the Wooster Group?
It takes basically two years to get remotely trained in one of the Wooster techniques, and then it’s still very elusive. And we only worked with them for two weeks, so it’s very rudimentary what we’re doing — I don’t want to tarnish their reputation by my pale imitation of an homage to them. But we’re using the in-ears and the actor monitors, so you’re cued by monitors onstage. Having an in-ear, where you’re given an audio source and you duplicate what you hear, there’s this technique of, “You aren’t acting, you’re reacting,” and it creates a different kind of naturalism.
Is that related to the title of the new live show, Between Worlds?
It was kind of two things. Warren had wanted to work with this documentary about the space program in the sixties. [Wooster theater director] Liz LeCompte was into the idea of claustrophobia and restriction and isolation and more psychological things, and Warren was kind of drawn to how rudimentary and raw and dangerous and risky the whole endeavor was.
On Entertainment, there’s a certain theme, lyrically …
Uh-oh.
“Infidels of the World Unite” and other songs have a sort of standoffish thing going.
Standoffish — really?
There’s a word I’m trying not to use — political.
That’s always been there. Maybe it’s just not so veiled [on] this album. The first obvious example is “We Need a War” [from 2005’s Odyssey]. Literally, Susan [Sontag] challenged me to use that writing. I was just starting to write the album, and I was like, I want to be a better writer, so I’m gonna go to somebody who can show me how they do it. I had overwritten for that record, so I just had page after page after page of gibberish. I thought we would sit down and she would read through my tome of bullshit, and she’d be like, “Oh, Casey, this section right here we can sculpt into this amazing thing about image and virtuosity, and the idea of authenticity … ” That did not happen. Instead Susan closed my book, and we ended up talking about the news. And then she went into her study, came back, and handed me this piece of writing. And I looked at it, and I was like, “Susan, I thought we could do something that could walk the line between, uh, stupid and smart. This is just straight-up political.”
“Infidels” is the continuation of what I started with the Susan song. Eric Bentley got a lifetime achievement award at the Obies, and I saw him give his speech, which was this incredible, awesome, amazing speech, and the last line was, “Infidels of the world unite.” For this record, instead of making a telephone book full of bullshit, I kept a list of titles. And that was one of the titles that was written down.
Early on, you were associated with the electroclash scene—
I don’t know what you’re talking about.
Is there a cohesive group of musicians that you feel you belong with now?
I don’t know. I just look at that period as such a moment. Everyone was so terrified of Y2K. If I’m gonna die at the strike of midnight, and the whole infrastructure of the entire Western Hemisphere is going to implode, I’m going to be dancing in a motherfucking jockstrap to bad dance music, covered in sweat and glitter.
"I am tremendously proud of our accomplishments making the M.T.A. a leaner, more efficient and effective organization," wrote MTA chief executive Elliot Sander today in his announcement that he would step down as of May 22. "Each of the M.T.A.’s agencies is performing at peak levels." Dale Hemmerdinger, the Authority's chairman, has 30 days left in his own term, according to the latest legislation regarding the MTA. From then on, the position of chairman and CEO will be combined. Elliot said he left to allow Governor Paterson to take the leadership in "a different direction." [City Room/NYT]
We're told an e-mail was sent out to the staff at WNYC (which is currently going through union negotiations) announcing that eleven approved but unfilled positions (nine non-union and two union) and seven and a half filled positions (two and a half non-union and five union) were to be eliminated. A spokesman for the beloved New York public radio station had no comment on the changes or how long they will take to come into effect, if they do at all.
We don't know if Donald Trump will forgive Miss California USA Carrie Prejean her trespasses, but her minister seems to think another certain big guy is on her side.
"We all have...
You might think that Lady Gaga would've taken exception to "I Poke Her Face," the dirty yet catchy reinterpretation of her hit song "Poker Face" that Kanye West, Common, and Kid Cudi released back in early April. After all, her record company seems quite content with the fact that the naïve majority of her fan base believes it's a song about gambling. However, during a recent interview with MTV News, Lady Gaga not only proved that she's a good sport by effusively complimenting Kanye and crew's take on her song, but she also demonstrated that she's nobody's shill when she confessed what the song is really about: "The record is about how I used to fantasize about women when I was with my boyfriend." (Duh!) Keep it up, Gaga, and one day you just might win us over.
More anticipated than the next Twilight novel, more feared than Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, the Supervisory Capital Assessment Program: Overview of Results is FINALLY OUT. If you want to check it out yourself, the full report is available in all of its glory here. Don't everyone flood treasury.gov all at once, now. [WSJ; Treasury.gov]
Fall's fur touches — and they are just touches — are all about subtlety. Lanvin's doughnut is face framing and offers softer beauty. Miu Miu's fur coats, made with deconstructed gabardine wool, have a distinct forties feel. It's the kind of discreet luxury you'd expect to see in a recession.
The news in jackets this fall? Size is everything. The masculine, oversize boyfriend blazer has returned from the eighties. Yves Saint Laurent's was very sleek, paired over a miniskirt. Ralph Lauren grounded a floaty chiffon evening dress by topping it off with a tweed jacket, adding just enough guts and grits. Chalayan paired his with nothing but boots. Just be sure your boyfriend doesn't raid your closet for these boxy blazers.
If there's one thing shoe designers want you to buy this fall, it's a sexy thigh-high boot. Every designer has a pair, and demure they are not. Prada makes country waders a bit more chic, while Rodarte goes for an otherworldly look in wrapped taupe leather. Isabel Marant's boots are simple and cool, in black suede — the perfect pair to wear with anything.
We saw glimpses of scarlet in New York, and by the time Prada showed in Milan, we knew for sure: A deep, bricky red is fall's "It" color. Miuccia's came in a heavy, country wool. Donna Karan revisited some of her best years with her eighties, Working Girl–style wool blazer. Nina Ricci's cascading ruffled dress in red was, in a word, showstopping.
Cue your inner biker. From blazers to dresses to leggings, an array of leather is coming this fall. Louis Vuitton's blazer is short and nipped at the waist. Chanel gave us a sexy plunge-neck dress. And the master of leather, Rick Owens, sent out fluid shapes — soft, goth, and layered. One thing won't change: As always, leather is best in black.
The waist is in for fall. Belts will come large, thin, and corseted — a little something for everyone. Balenciaga's waist is sashed, feminine, defined, and girlie. Lanvin showed a skinny belt that was a nice color contrast with the dresses. Ann Demeulemeester's corseted version has a twinge of S&M: slightly naughty and dangerous. If you needed any confirmation, Michelle Obama's already wearing buckled belts frequently.
All that glitters ... is a disco dress. The eighties revival isn't complete without these shiny, sparkly minidresses. Balmain's over-the-top version came in electric blue, while Nina Ricci kept it on the delicate side. Versace went back to its roots: bright mermaids. Cue "Gloria" on your iPods and relive a dancing decade.
Velvet is growing up this fall. It's no longer a little-girl fabric, nor prissy and prim. Instead, you'll wear sophisticated looks that are classic, soft, and feminine with a hint of toughness. The evening fabric showed up in bright colors at Marc Jacobs, looking burnt-out at Proenza, and etched at Prada.
While you pull your frocks out of storage for — eventually — summer weather, retailers will soon be restocking their floors with the fall collections. Ever since Paris fashion week ended back in March, the Cut has been sifting through runway looks from fashion's four major cities in search of the big trends that will define the season. The eighties are back, not just in Marc Jacobs's New York show, but in disco-dolly dresses and boyfriend jackets. Lady Gaga won't be the only one going pantsless, as thigh-high boots arrive — maybe you'll pair them with the deep, brick red that is this season's predominant color. More subtly, leather is worked into anything and everything; fur retreats discreetly for the recession; and velvet, once the material of dark and brooding youth, gets a serious shot of eveningwear sophistication.
One of the plotlines in Jennifer Aniston's new movie Management involves a crazy road trip. So when we caught up with her at a screening for the flick this week, we wondered if she had ever embarked on a wacky road adventure herself. "I stayed in a tepee one night," she told us. "That's not very crazy." View more reflections on spontaneity in our Party Lines slideshow.
Front Page: Theatergoers to sit seven feet apart -- Theaters may have reopened in Mexico, but cautious government health officials are requiring movie patrons to sit seven feet apart, crippling the exhibition business there just as Hollywood summer tentpoles begin to roll out.
Actor Kiefer Sutherland has been charged with misdemeanor assault after he was accused of head-butting fashion designer Jack McCollough at a New York nightclub early Tuesday, police said.
"At a White House briefing on Thursday, the press secretary, Robert Gibbs, said the president 'does not intend to make any political endorsement in the New York City mayor’s race.'" He will, however, make recommendations for the Mazomanie, Wisconsin, City Council primaries and the City Commission of Truth & Consequences, New Mexico, and is considering an intervention on behalf of the pie-makers of St. Cecilia's in Rochester, Pennsylvania. [City Room/NYT]
During today's much-anticipated episode of Oprah, the talk-show host asked a lot of painful questions to Elizabeth Edwards regarding her former-presidential-candidate husband's affair with filmmaker Rielle Hunter. But Edwards said that she was trying not to let the fling take over her life. "I don't want it to define our marriage, 30 years before this and I don't know how many after," she said, casually referencing her terminal cancer (which she says does not give her too much discomfort). "My life was going to be less long and I didn't want to spend it fighting." As to whether Rielle Hunter's baby, whom John has visited, was his child, Elizabeth said she didn't know, and it didn't matter. "I can't come up with a reason [why it would], except that I care about something completely extraneous to my life," she said. "If they discovered one day that it was, that would be part of John's life, not mine." Edwards also said that she blames John for the infidelity, but that "there's no excuse for women to do this." "You have to have enough respect for human beings to leave their lives alone," she said of Hunter, who she only met once, in passing. "Don't just come in and try to take somebody else's life." To that effect, she asked Oprah not to mention the woman's name. "If somebody wants to stand in the light that shines on John, that's one thing," she said. "If they want to destroy my family in order to stand in that light, that's another." Then, Oprah wandered through the giant family mansion and found the former senator himself, and it got really awkward.
Quite literally, we're afraid. The star of The Girlfriend Experience is appearing in Hustler's production of This Ain't Star Trek XXX, which just so happens to be the least-punny porn title we've ever come across. [/Film]
Dodgers superstar Manny Ramirez has been suspended for 50 games by Major League Baseball for failing a drug test; he apparently tested positive for a women's fertility drug that's banned under Baseball's substance policy because it's often used to mask steroids during testing.
Granted, Manny isn't a New York celebrity and may not get tomorrow's back cover because of the timing of the news, but will that stop the Post from unleashing their angriest, punniest worst upon the ex-Red Sox? Let's hope not.
Leave your "Manny Suspended For Steroids" judgmental pun headlines in the comments -- and as always, a few to get the ball rolling:
MANNY BEING BANNED-Y
WANTED MANN
BANNY SHAM-IREZ
BANNY SCAM-IREZ
BANNY ROID-MIREZ
DREADS-ED NEWS
GIANT-HEAD SOX
DODGER OF NOT DOING DRUGS
HISPANIC BARRY BONDS (would you put it past them?) Source: Best Week Ever | 7 May 2009 | 9:45 pm
As we reported yesterday, the cow that escaped from a slaughterhouse in Jamaica, Queens, was successful in avoiding her grisly fate. The police that caught her took her to an animal shelter, which named her Molly and hooked her up with a spot at the Farrm, an organic farm and rescue shelter in Suffolk County owned by a couple named Rex and Connie Farr.
“She can eat some good organic hay and hang around with a lot of her friends,” Mr. Farr said. “She can eat and sleep for the rest of her life. She is not going anywhere. The bottom line is she will have a very good home.”
Holy crap does that sound good. Do you think that if we run out of the office right now and start galloping down the middle of the street, these people will take us in? We're doing it! WE'RE GOING RIGHT NOW!
This ad for a Major Network Reality TV Show About Life in Williamsburg spotted by Curbed broke our minds a little:
Did you wake up today around 1:30 EST in your industrial loft, pull on your favorite (and only) pair of cutoff jean shorts, and take a leisurely stroll down Bedford Avenue in search of organic green juice and the new DFA on vinyl? Do you tap the family trust fund every time you need to make rent? (or do you have to fix bikes for a living?) Does your tattoo have a story to tell? Do you jam with a hardcore band on the weekends and DJ on the weeknights? Are you cooking tofu right now for you and your seven roommates? Do you barely make it into Manhattan three days a week for "college"? Is that handlebar mustache merely for comedic effect?
AHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH. Ok no, we're all right. Really we're fine.
Do you consider 25 "old age"? Do you idolize Dan Deacon? Do you fold clothes at American Apparel? Are you SO not worried about getting swine flu 'cause that shit only happens to poor people? Were you recently the victim of the Hipster Grifter? Or even better, are you THE Hipster Grifter? And most importantly, what are you going to do this summer now that the McCarren Pool Parties are over???!!! If you live in Williamsburg, are between the ages of 18-25, and are cool with opening your doors to a camera crew (your seven roommates will have to be cool with it too), please send us the following:
• Photo of yourself
• Five things that make you a hipster.
• A short description of yourself and why you want to be on the show.
This is not a competition or game show, and you will not be required to live on an island or eat worms. There is, however, a cash guarantee involved for the chosen ones.
On the one hand, it could be fake. Which would mean it was a, like, ironic kind of joke, we think? But clearly, this was written by people who know this lifestyle intimately, or enough to make fun of it in detail (people who are not hipsters probably don't know what DFA or Dan Deacon is, or at least we don't, can't Google, sorry), which indicates that they are hipsters at least by association, which would mean this ad was written by hipsters to make fun of hipsters, which is essentially like looking into a mirror and laughing at yourself. Which a hipster type would actually probably do because it's like irony cubed, in fact that sort of thing is all the rage right now in those circles, as we understand it. But then again, how could a hipster make a joke making fun of hipsters when there actually aren't any hipsters, not only because, as Curbed pointed out, they all moved away from Williamsburg in like 2006, but because no one actually admits to being a hipster, ever? If they do, we are pretty sure that means they are not a hipster. Unless they're saying it ironically, in which case, they are. Anyway, this whole thing is out of hand. We feel like we're in the Matrix every time we get on the L. That said, we'd totally watch this show.
When the Beyoncé–Ali Larter catfight fantasy that is Obsessed opened two weekends ago, most (including us) just figured it was a glorified Lifetime movie that would come and go without much notice. But boy, oh boy, we were ever wrong; not only did the film manage to pull in $28 million during its opening weekend, but it will likely cross the $50 million threshold sometime in the next day or two. Not too shabby, considering the film was made on a budget of just $20 million. While many so-called box-office gurus are still struggling to figure out what led the public to embrace this decidedly B-grade movie, Bruce Willis let everyone watching The Late Show With David Letterman last night in on a tightly guarded secret: Namely, he has a secret cameo in the film as Derek, Beyoncé's nosy neighbor. And now, thanks to the miracle of Internet video, you can watch his scene without having to pay $11.75 or wasting a few hours downloading it off of BitTorrent!
Actress Nancy Cartwright (voice of Bart Simpson) poses close to the stamps of the Simpsons characters at the Fox Studios in Los Angeles, California. America's most famous dysfunctional cartoon family --... Source: RSS feed - channel BNImagesEnter | 7 May 2009 | 9:00 pm
This week, in a shocking elimination, Allison Iraheta was booted from the American Idol stage, leaving Adam Lambert, Danny Gokey and Kris Allen to battle it out for the top prize. But just how did the uber-talented Allison get voted off when less talented contestants were left standing? Well just take a look at some of the people who didn't vote for her this week:
10. Vincent Van Gogh. More like Vincent Van Gokey. Ironically, not a big Taylor Hicks fan though.
9. Frank Drebbin. We blame Frank for most things, but specifically for getting Allison voted off.
8. Marlee Matlin Soon to be starring in a movie entitled "Children of a Lesser Lambert".
7. Lou Ferrigno. Bet you didn't know Lou Ferrigno was deaf... and you definitely didn't know that the only thing Hulk don't smash are his Gokey cassettes. (Hulk no own MP3 player.)
6. David Lynch on Twin Peaks. Guess who else reminds Gordon Cole of a small Mexican Chiwowow? Allison Iraheta, obvs.
5. James "Deaf" Burke. We're feeling this clever nickname given to 19th Century boxer James Burke. Not quite as much as "Deaf" was feeling Kris' "Come Together" cover this week, apparently.
4. Marlee Matlin on "Seinfeld". Unlike real life Marlee Matlin, Seinfeld's Marlee Matlin -- the ball girl -- is actually a Gokey fan. Here's to hoping they sweep together in the coming future.
3. Ludwig van Beethoven. Possibly the only musician more adorable than Kris Allen himself...
2. This Guy. Who is actually adorable, and very possibly Adam Lambert wearing a "Men in Black" style people costume.
1. Luke on The Amazing Race. The only thing he doesn't need his Mom for is daydreaming about Adam.
First, pageant peeps paid for Carrie Prejean's boob job. Then there's news that they'd have covered up her topless photos—if they'd known. What else do pageant officials do...
Whoever he is, Locke's gonna get him! If you haven't watched last night's episode of Lost, well then, you probably should stop reading now. But if you have, and if you've been wondering about the identity of the man who lives in the Island's magical-mystery cabin, then follow along for a few theories as to who the CEO of the Others might be.
• Is he Jack Shepherd? "Of course Jack is Jacob ... He was such an adamant non-believer that you knew he was gonna switch, and he does to the max. He becomes Jacob. Everyone else is gonna figure out a way off the island or whatever, but he is gonna be so insane (i.e the new Locke) that he decides to stay and lead the others. plus Jacob is in the shack with Jack's father and sister ... That's my theory and I'm sticking to it." —Jesse, a commenter on Videogum. Further (possible) evidence: Jack and Jacob both share the same eye color, brown.
• Is he Christian Shepherd? Probably not. Although, as evidenced in the "Cabin Fever" episode back in season four, Christian claimed that he could speak for Jacob. Was he lying?
• Is he Jack's grandfather? "Think about it: He could have been a Dharma employee, the guy who took the experiment — intentionally or not. As someone who constantly travels through time, he is the person around whom fate centers. He brings practically his entire line (his son, Jack, Claire, Aaron) to the island, intentionally or not, it's just because the universe is course correcting and trying to avoid further anomalies. Jack's dad cannot really "die", because his dad is the cause for the anomalies, so perhaps it's part of the course correction to bring those in his line back to him." —Lost-forum.com
• Is he the captain of the Black Rock?Lostpedia gathers some of the evidence that could support this theory, such as the fact that his clothing and hairstyle resemble something from the time period of the Black Rock's crash, as well as the fact that Charles Widmore purchased the diary of the ship's first mate at an auction.
• Does he even exist at all? "My theory is that Jacob doesn't exist. Like the magician in The Wizard of Oz, Ben has created the illusion of a great and powerful being. Even the Others don't know that Jacob is simply Ben performing tricks. This is how he gets the Others to do what he wants them to do." —Bonnie Covel, About.com
Michael Jackson's publicist and manager is suing him for $44 million, the amount she claims she's owed for brokering the release a 25th-anniversary version of Thriller, refinancing the loan allowing him to keep the Beatles catalogue, and negotiating the deal for his upcoming series of comeback concerts. We can only hope that this in no way affects his ability to keep his warehouse full of hilarious Michael Jackson memorabilia. [AP]
With the addition of a new judge, fantastic guest appearances like Quentin Tarantino and unexpected new rules like the "Judge's Save," this season of American Idol has kept us on our pop-culture toes. None of these surprises could prepare us for what occurred on last night's results show when the judges added a new contestant! She could twirl, flip and dance, she could lip-synch with confidence and she could walk down a flight of stairs with the help of 8 strapping young men!
To see more of this Paula-rific performance tune into Best Week Ever with Paul F. Tompkins Friday at 11pm. Source: Best Week Ever | 7 May 2009 | 8:00 pm
Are you ready for the gay-jokingest weekend of 2009? Coming the same day as Brüno (July 10) is Lynn Shelton's Humpday, which tells the story of two straight friends who agree to have sex with each other on camera, much to the consternation of one's wife. The trailer just dropped and it looks funny enough — plus advance word gives every indication that any gay panicking in the movie is done at the service of a script that's light years more intelligent than, say, the typical SNL digital short. So, what the heck, we're in.
Front Page: Profits hit by steep drop in ad sales -- CBS Corp. capped several weeks of mostly dour financial results at media companies, swinging to a loss of $55.3 million last quarter from a $244 million profit the year before.
I realize that eating pork is anti-Muslim, but Afghanistan honestly has just one pig in the entire country? How can they even be sure? There aren't any stray pigs just sorta roaming around the border of Turkmenistan, occasionally stepping over the boundary and throwing the country's pig population statistics way out of whack? The fact that they decided to quarantine the one pig even though it's already in a zoo is just additional "wacky internet newz story" gravy.
The Reuters article about the Kabul Zoo then takes a turn for the crazy:
Shabby and rundown, Kabul Zoo is a far cry from zoos in the developed world, but has nevertheless come a long way since it suffered on the front line of Afghanistan's 1992-4 civil war.
Mujahideen fighters then ate the deer and rabbits and shot dead the zoo's sole elephant. Shells shattered the aquarium.
One fighter climbed into the lion enclosure but was immediately killed by Marjan, the zoo's most famous inhabitant. The man's brother returned the next day and lobbed a hand grenade at the lion leaving him toothless and blind.
Yyyyeah, I guess if I were a pig, I'd rather take my chances in a country that may eat me for food instead of the country where warring soldiers shoot elephants and throw grenades at lions.
This guy knows what I'm talkin' about!! (The pig, not the guy):
British food critic and Top Chef New York guest judge Toby Young was karmically hit by a car while riding his bike last week:
Toby's fine, but obviously, we're not going to let the master of lame, obviously-prepared movie references off the hook without comparing his car accident to some lame movie references.
Toby Young getting hit by a car is like...
- Rocky getting punched by Ivan Drago.
- A Daniel LaRusso crane kick to the face.
- Forrest Gump's box of chocolates.
- A liger.
- The car crash in the movie Crash.
- The car crash in the movie Crash (the David Cronenberg one).
- Show me the money!
- Office Space.
- Elvis.Leave your own lame Toby Young-esque movie references in the comments! Source: Best Week Ever | 7 May 2009 | 6:45 pm
If you are seeing Star Trek this weekend and some crazy woman keeps booing and throwing popcorn at the screen every time Zachary Quinto's Spock comes on screen, there is a good chance it's Today Show host Ann Curry. While Leonard Nimoy (best known for once guest-voicing an episode of The Simpsons) was being interviewed by Al Roker, Ann lost all control of her journalistic integrity and gushed about her girlhood crush on Mr. Nimoy. This is not some silly morning show host antics. You can practically see a seventeen year old Ann Curry staying home from prom to practice kissing on her Spock poster. She even grabbed his ears, which he NEVER lets people do. This was no time for an exception, Leonard. Everyone knows aliens from planet Curry mate through the ear canal.
Dancing with the Stars contestant and nipple pasty connoisseur Lil' Kim made an appearance on Live with Regis & Kelly, after Regis admitted to having a crush on the formerly incarcerated rapper. (But what of Joy, Reeg? What of her?)
But looking at photos of the two getting down and dirty in Miami, his crush begins to make sense... as Lil' Kim is the only person Regis Philbin positively towers over.
But where was Kelly during all of this? Don't you worry none about that...
Just gettin' dirrrty with some Marlins Fans. Figures. Source: Best Week Ever | 7 May 2009 | 6:26 pm
Allison Iraheta knows that winning isn’t everything. Though the 17-year-old singer was eliminated from “American Idol” Wednesday night (May 6) after a record-breaking 64 million votes were tallied, she’s looking to another fourth-place ‘Idol’ finisher, Chris Daughtry, for reassurance that all is not lost.
I'm pretty sure this movie Come What May is about abortion, but I can't really tell -- they don't really spell out the issue or speak about it directly at all, everything's really really vague. I mean, I think it's about abortion? I'm guessing the judges discussing the issue of abortion are actually a metaphor for a fetus, and the guy standing up to argue about the Bible's position on the issue of abortion and citing the history of Roe V. Wade represents a clinic, but I don't know.
The message is just so subtle and unpreachy, I wish they'd spell it out a little more:
The following is a recap of Lost Season 5 Episode 15 entitled “Follow The Leader”, originally airing May 6, 2009. This post is so full of spoilers, if you keep reading, it will curdle any milk within an atomic-bomb blast zone radius.LOCKE IS AN ANNOYING BOSSLocke set a record for most sh*t-eating grins in one hour of television, exuding a creepy satisfaction throughout this entire episode that actually made me feel bad for Ben and Richard. Locke sure seems like he has a point, though; he taunts Ben with the knowledge that Ben's never actually seen Jacob, and reveals this information to a collection of extras and Sun in the form of an infomercial spiel, with Sun even stepping forward and asking the scripted question "But can Jacob really bring my husband Jin back? Wow, I'd be a sucker NOT to give you my money!"
Ben and Richard then share a brief aside, in which they shadily discuss dealing with the John Locke "problem":
Have Ben and Richard been co-opting the existence of Jacob to control the Others this whole time, even though they've never actually seen him? I doubt they've just been thinking they're talking to Jacob and are wrong, there's gotta be some level of Ben-conniving behind it, but Richard too? It's just like the movie Zardoz!!! Anyone? This thing on? Alright, it's a lot more like Locke is Jesus, but that analogy doesn't involve a shirtless Sean Connery and a floating stone head (or maybe it does, I never read the thing cover to cover).
Ultimately, Locke reveals that he's going to "kill" Jacob, making for the finest "WTF/awesome" cryptic ending line of the season. Are Jacob and "the island" at odds, and John is killing whatever they believe Jacob is to unleash the island's true wishes? Wowee, that sentence sounds retarded. As for Richard's equally-cryptic opening-titler line, "I remember them...I watched them all die," does this mean that Jack's bomb plan is going to blow up in his face (PUNPUNPUNPUN!) or that he's witnessed a potential past that Jack and crew would only befall if they fail? Either way, awesome episode, for the second straight week, and it's setting up for one BOMB-bastic finale (not a pun, that's just how I believe that word is written.)
SAWYER IS GETTIN' TOO OLD FOR THIS SH[EXPLOSION]Sawyer got the crap beat out of him by a typically annoying Radzinsky last night -- when the director called over the blood-makeup dude, he instinctively went over to Michael Emerson and they had to be like 'no no, actually Sawyer this time' -- but refused to reveal the location of the Others or explain where Kate and Jack had gone and his relationship with them (also knowing that they'd never believe him). Phil then gets the brilliant and correct idea to make him talk by punching Juliet, which draws an immediate Sawyer "SON OF A BITCH," though Sawyer is in a "boy cried wolf" situation with his "son of a bitch"es, where he says it so often and for such a range of reasons, that when he really means it, as in 'stop punching my girlfriend you son of a bitch,' it just doesn't carry the same impact -- it'd be like Rodney Dangerfield saying "I really and truly feel disrespected by that!"
Meanwhile, Radzinsky -- who's taking that gunshot rather well, I might add -- decided he's the leader of the Dharmas after they all ran onto the submarine and underwent a dramatic Crimson Tide mutiny-type situation that got cut for time, and strikes a deal to allow allow Sawyer and Juliet to board the sub in exchange for drawing a map of the hostiles. Sawyer and Juliet agree, and after several tense minutes of all of us viewers expecting Sawyer to take a valiant turn on his captors and escape and rush to help his friends, he merely turns and says "good riddance" to the island and boards the ship.
Buuuuut just when everything appeared like it wasn't going to be an awkward love triangle of subtle glances, the Dharmas bring Kate on board the sub and seat her right next to Juliet, facing Sawyer. They then bring Sawyer's parents, high school crush, childhood pastor, and friend who watched him masturbate during a party when he was eighteen, and an actual, literal white elephant onto the ship and seat them all one foot from Sawyer's face, with no explanation. In the "next week on Lost" clip, however, we see that Sawyer is already off the boat and interacting with Jack, meaning that the boat has turned around for some reason, or that the clip of the ship submerging was just unrelated CGI'd stock footage and the real sub hasn't left the island yet. Probably the second thing.
WE'RE GOING BACK...TO THE FUTU....LATER TIME, I MEAN. BACK TO THE LATER TIME! NO COPYRIGHT INFRINGEMENT HERE.
Jack: Think about it, Kate -- All this misery will be over.
Kate: It wasn't all misery.
[Exchange of glances]
Kate: Ok, so the middle of Season Two was pretty miserable, that I won't argue. But erase the whole show?
Surely enough, Kate decided she didn't want to aid Jack in carrying out Faraday's atomic bomb plan, partly because she couldn't bear the thought of erasing her entire history and future with Jack and Sawyer, and partly because she didn't want to detonate an atomic bomb on an island and kill herself and a bunch of other people. Nevertheless, Jack finds a partner for his bomb quest in Not-too-old, Not-too-young, but Juuuuust Right Eloise, who's beginning to piece together her Daniel experiences and believes that Jack has indeed traveled in time. The group is also joined by Sayid, who arrives by shooting an aggressive Other surprisingly, because he definitely couldn't have just appeared and been like "Sup, Jack. How's things?"
The bomb is located in the Jolly Roger Bay level from Mario 64, and Jack, Eloise, and Sayid manage to swim underwater into the secret bombcave to the find the bomb, leading to this awkward product shot:
People did notice that Lost showed a bunch of PC ads and Sawyer just so happened to mention to Juliet "we'll buy Microsoft," right? Coincidence: unlikely. If they throw completely random zoomed-in shots of the GE logo into next week's episode...
LOSTDS AND ENDS-- In the opening sequence, when Eloise said "These people aren't from Dharma" and Widmore responded "Then where the hell are they from," I was expecting her to say yet again, "You mean...WHEN are they from..." and a bell to start ringing and a bunch of confetti to start falling from the sky and Damon Lindelof to come out to present a giant novelty check to Eloise for uttering the one millionth instance of "WHEN are we." I'm very glad this didn't happen.
-- Locke's line, "I'm not afraid of anything you can do anymore, Ben" was the most emasculating thing anyone on the show has ever spoken. I hope Ben has something up his sleeve for the finale and hasn't actually been broken by Locke.
-- "Who's Hugo Reyes?" "The fat guy." Immediate cut to Hurley grabbing armfuls of canned food. Pretty funny comic-relief moment that for once didn't self-awarely poke fun at how ridiculous all the time travel stuff is, for the first time in about fifteen weeks.
-- Despite the amazing opening and closing "cut to LOST titler" lines, Locke's reveal to Ben "Who is that man, Locke" "...ME" was the single least surprising twist of the season. Not that it was a bad moment, but we had literally seen that entire seen occur before already, so why did the show feel the need to treat Locke's "ME" line with dramatic music and a "dun dun!!!" cut to commercial? Just have it happen.
Episode thoughts, theories observations, finale predictions, Rose/Bernard lamentations, and unfounded "I'm done with this show" declarations -- leave 'em all in the comments! Source: Best Week Ever | 7 May 2009 | 5:05 pm
Here's a question for ya: The Octomom... she knows they're real babies, right? Like, not dollar store dolls with fake lashes whose eyes close when you lay them down? Because the following "trip to the park" -- or, as my family used to refer to them, "press junket" -- shows Octomom basically juggling her kids alongside flaming swords and bowling pins. She could not be more careless with them:
At the park, she spent much of her time chatting on her cell phone, fixing her hair and juggling her babies in a rather precarious and careless fashion. Suleman divided her time so she could bottle-feed, change diapers and show some love to each member of her expansive baby army before handing the kids off to her nannies, but there was a suspicious air of detachment and disinterest behind Suleman’s actions. With the camera rolling, it was hard to believe that her affection toward her little ones was genuine or just a great staged photo op. Is Suleman a misunderstood struggling mother under a media microscope or is she an exploitative fame seeker who only sees dollar signs and opportunity when she looks at her children?
Well, our minds our made up: These babies should be vacuum sealed together and sold at Costco to a family that will actually take care of them. Agree or disagree?
And in other news, please check out the following photo, found while Google Image searching "baby juggler":
Sharon Stone managed to turn quite a few heads when she stepped out to L.A Gay & Lesbian Center's 'Evening With Women' soiree in Beverly Hills over the weekend, looking suddenly super-skinny. Source: FOXNews.com | 7 May 2009 | 2:53 pm
American radio talk-show host Michael Savage said he wants an apology from Britain's home secretary and his name removed from a list of people banned from entering the United Kingdom.
US actor Tom Hanks (R) and movie director Ron Howard of the US attend a press conference to promote their new film 'Angels and Demons' in Tokyo. Hanks said Thursday he wants to act in more movies based... Source: RSS feed - channel BNImagesEnter | 7 May 2009 | 2:04 pm
A second lingerie-modeling photo of Miss California USA Carrie Prejean has appeared after she assured pageant officials this week that the earlier shot was the only one she had appeared in.
A second album from The-Dream this year is apparently a reality. The "Umbrella" songwriter and solo artist tells Billboard.com he's "seven records in on a new album," tentatively titled "Love King" and targeted for a December release.
AFP - Star French couturier Pierre Cardin, 86, was on Thursday released from a hospital in the Mediterranean city of Marseille after a 48-hour stay caused by high blood pressure, his press service said.
Harry Shearer -- who crafted Tap with partners Christopher Guest and Michael McKean and director Rob Reiner -- tells Billboard.com the 25th anniversary of the hit parody "This is Spinal Tap" meant "we should probably do it again. There were still a lot of Spinal Tap songs that had never been recorded."
America knows a thing or two about turning on the sexy, so we invited her to analyze the summer's hottest swimsuit trend - the monokini Source: FOXNews.com | 7 May 2009 | 1:13 pm
Kiefer Sutherland was charged with assault Thursday for an alleged late-night altercation at Manhattan nightclub. Source: FOXNews.com | 7 May 2009 | 10:29 am
Dr Gunther von Hagens speaks to the media at the opening of the new exhibition "Body Worlds: The Mirror of Time" at the O2 bubble in London, 2008. A new exhibition featuring preserved dead bodies having... Source: RSS feed - channel BNImagesEnter | 7 May 2009 | 10:01 am
Aw. Taj rendezvoused with her hubby in exile. Stephen and his brother shared one of their warmest hugs ever. Coach had his back cracked by his assistant coach.
The happy tears...
Shanna Moakler is doing it again.
Just a week after posing for a pro-gay marriage PSA, Moakler spent part of today shooting print and television spots for a new campaign, which she says...
Isaac Mizrahi is no Tim Gunn.
Tonight we got a taste of Bravo's Project Runway replacement, The Fashion Show, and it was clear that the lovable Isaac was not trying to copy Gunn,...
Daisy De La Hoya isn't down for the count.
The Daisy of Love temptress was not rushed to the hospital for a drug overdose, as some outlets reported earlier today, her rep assures E!...
UPDATE: Added Abdul in a statement today: "I want to make it perfectly clear to everyone that I have never been addicted to or abused drugs in my life," Abdul said. "I have never been...
We don't know if Donald Trump will forgive Miss California USA Carrie Prejean her trespasses, but her minister seems to think another certain big guy is on her side.
"We all have...
Velvet for Adults
Get Ready for Red
You'll Still Be Wearing Leggings
Disco Dollies Will Dance
Defining the Waist
More Leather Than Ever
Fur Hibernates
The Boyfriend Jacket Is Back
Pants Are So Last Year
Dodgers superstar Manny Ramirez has been 
• Kendra doesn't hold back the personal revelations, including how Hank first said "I love you." Hint: It involves Cabo, parasailing and !!!!!!!.
•...
First, pageant peeps paid for Carrie Prejean's boob job. Then there's news that they'd have covered up her topless photos—if they'd known. What else do pageant officials do...
LOCKE IS AN ANNOYING BOSS
Locke set a record for most sh*t-eating grins in one hour of television, exuding a creepy satisfaction throughout this entire episode that actually made me feel bad for Ben and Richard. Locke sure seems like he has a point, though; he taunts Ben with the knowledge that Ben's never actually seen Jacob, and reveals this information to a collection of extras and Sun in the form of an infomercial spiel, with Sun even stepping forward and asking the scripted question "But can Jacob really bring my husband Jin back? Wow, I'd be a sucker NOT to give you my money!"
Ben and Richard then share a brief aside, in which they shadily discuss dealing with the John Locke "problem":
Have Ben and Richard been co-opting the existence of Jacob to control the Others this whole time, even though they've never actually seen him? I doubt they've just been thinking they're talking to Jacob and are wrong, there's gotta be some level of Ben-conniving behind it, but Richard too? It's just like the movie 
Sawyer got the crap beat out of him by a typically annoying Radzinsky last night -- when the director called over the blood-makeup dude, he instinctively went over to Michael Emerson and they had to be like 'no no, actually Sawyer this time' -- but refused to reveal the location of the Others or explain where Kate and Jack had gone and his relationship with them (also knowing that they'd never believe him). Phil then gets the brilliant and correct idea to make him talk by punching Juliet, which draws an immediate Sawyer "SON OF A BITCH," though Sawyer is in a "boy cried wolf" situation with his "son of a bitch"es, where he says it so often and for such a range of reasons, that when he really means it, as in 'stop punching my girlfriend you son of a bitch,' it just doesn't carry the same impact -- it'd be like Rodney Dangerfield saying "I really and truly feel disrespected by that!"
Meanwhile, Radzinsky -- who's taking that gunshot rather well, I might add -- decided he's the leader of the Dharmas after they all ran onto the submarine and underwent a dramatic Crimson Tide mutiny-type situation that got cut for time, and strikes a deal to allow allow Sawyer and Juliet to board the sub in exchange for drawing a map of the hostiles. Sawyer and Juliet agree, and after several tense minutes of all of us viewers expecting Sawyer to take a valiant turn on his captors and escape and rush to help his friends, he merely turns and says "good riddance" to the island and boards the ship.
Buuuuut just when everything appeared like it wasn't going to be an awkward love triangle of subtle glances, the Dharmas bring Kate on board the sub and seat her right next to Juliet, facing Sawyer. They then bring Sawyer's parents, high school crush, childhood pastor, and friend who watched him masturbate during a party when he was eighteen, and an actual, literal white elephant onto the ship and seat them all one foot from Sawyer's face, with no explanation. In the "next week on Lost" clip, however, we see that Sawyer is already off the boat and interacting with Jack, meaning that the boat has turned around for some reason, or that the clip of the ship submerging was just unrelated CGI'd stock footage and the real sub hasn't left the island yet. Probably the second thing.
WE'RE GOING BACK...TO THE FUTU....LATER TIME, I MEAN. BACK TO THE LATER TIME! NO COPYRIGHT INFRINGEMENT HERE.
Jack: Think about it, Kate -- All this misery will be over.
Kate: It wasn't all misery.
[Exchange of glances]
Kate: Ok, so the middle of Season Two was pretty miserable, that I won't argue. But erase the whole show?
Surely enough, Kate decided she didn't want to aid Jack in carrying out Faraday's atomic bomb plan, partly because she couldn't bear the thought of erasing her entire history and future with Jack and Sawyer, and partly because she didn't want to detonate an atomic bomb on an island and kill herself and a bunch of other people. Nevertheless, Jack finds a partner for his bomb quest in Not-too-old, Not-too-young, but Juuuuust Right Eloise, who's beginning to piece together her Daniel experiences and believes that Jack has indeed traveled in time. The group is also joined by Sayid, who arrives by shooting an aggressive Other surprisingly, because he definitely couldn't have just appeared and been like "Sup, Jack. How's things?"
The bomb is located in the Jolly Roger Bay level from Mario 64, and Jack, Eloise, and Sayid manage to swim underwater into the secret bombcave to the find the bomb, leading to this awkward product shot:
-- In the opening sequence, when Eloise said "These people aren't from Dharma" and Widmore responded "Then where the hell are they from," I was expecting her to say yet again, "You mean...WHEN are they from..." and a bell to start ringing and a bunch of confetti to start falling from the sky and Damon Lindelof to come out to present a giant novelty check to Eloise for uttering the one millionth instance of "WHEN are we." I'm very glad this didn't happen.
-- Locke's line, "I'm not afraid of anything you can do anymore, Ben" was the most emasculating thing anyone on the show has ever spoken. I hope Ben has something up his sleeve for the finale and hasn't actually been broken by Locke.
-- "Who's Hugo Reyes?" "The fat guy." Immediate cut to Hurley grabbing armfuls of canned food. Pretty funny comic-relief moment that for once didn't self-awarely poke fun at how ridiculous all the time travel stuff is, for the first time in about fifteen weeks.
-- Despite the amazing opening and closing "cut to LOST titler" lines, Locke's reveal to Ben "Who is that man, Locke" "...ME" was the single least surprising twist of the season. Not that it was a bad moment, but we had literally seen that entire seen occur before already, so why did the show feel the need to treat Locke's "ME" line with dramatic music and a "dun dun!!!" cut to commercial? Just have it happen.
Episode thoughts, theories observations, finale predictions, Rose/Bernard lamentations, and unfounded "I'm done with this show" declarations -- leave 'em all in the comments!
