All Shows

It was a race to the finish to see who would cancel this show about two mentally unstable lawyers first: FOX or TWoP. And even though FOX technically won, I think we all come out winners here. The thing is, the show wasn’t bad. But it also wasn’t good. It was so totally, incredibly “meh” that the black hole of apathy its two aired episodes created has quite possibly rent a tear in the space-time continuum. Tip of the hat, however, to Chris O’Donnell, who really rocks the L’Oreal Man-Pouf, and to Adam Goldberg, who just plain rocks.

We were hoping for another Deadwood, but this Western on AMC was just half-cocked.

[Bleep] off.

For its first season, it was an example of how to do a mainstream geek show right. During its next three seasons, it became a textbook example of what not to do in serial television. Still, we’re grateful for every minute of HRG.

Promise of a new day, or a study of the chemistry between ennui and childish tantrums? Take one faded pop star-turned-personality, stir in a couple shots of no alcohol at all, down it with a handful of absolutely no prescription or recreational drugs, and a zero-tolerance policy toward cougar pedophilia. Add a bevy of cold-hearted entourage, a whole lot of rush rush rush, a refusal to shut up and dance, and you’re blowin’ kisses in the wind. She’s forever our girl, but straight up: this was zero steps forward and an infinity back, both for Abdul’s career and the reality genre at large. Let all the essentially nice, violently uninteresting pop divas of the ’90s take note: when it comes to crazy, you’re better off bringing the cartoon cat.

With a title that double-entendriffic, you would’ve expected this CW summer teen soap to have been a trashy, oversexed guilty pleasure. Instead, we got teen sobriety and Kevin Williamson’s irritating brand of pop psychology masquerading as courtship. Things got freaky-deaky near the end, not coincidentally around the time things got interesting, but by then nobody cared and the CW pulled the plug.

We here at the TWoP staff knew that one day people from our past would wind up on a reality show. In early 2003, seventeen classmates from Wendola’s high school reunited to appear on this Big Brother-meets-Temptation Island carnival of naked pixellated ass. Guess who had to recap.

Watching this was like taking ourselves hostage.

If only it was possible to sue a fictional doctor for dramatic malpractice. Still, we’ll always have Cuddy.