THE FINAL TOOBITS AWARDS FOR 2012!

[TA-DA!]

The Odds 'n' Ents......

BEST "PET"

Tricey the Triceratops in 'Doctor Who' - "Dinosaurs On A Space Ship"

Triceratops are my favorites of the thunder lizards. So of course Tricey would meet a bad end.......

BEST LINE
"Those are brave men knocking at our door. Let's go kill them!"- Tyrion Lannister, 'Game Of Thrones'

BEST EXCHANGE OF DIALOGUE

[TIE]
Walter Sherman: Do you really want to kill me that badly?
Detective Colman: You're annoying! Hell, it might be worth it!
('The Finder')

Victor Dubenich: So, what have you been doing for three years? Playing Robin Hood? Know what I've been doing for three years? I've been preparing for this day.
Nate Ford: Well... you'll have to do better.
Victor Dubenich: Better than killing your father? Wow. Tough room.
('Leverage')

BEST SPEECH/MONOLOGUE
“Excuse me, I have something to say. None of you may realize it, but I was very much looking forward to this weekend. It was going to be like the old days, the four of us hanging out, playing video games, before you all got girlfriends. Do you have any idea what its like to the be the only one without a girlfriend? Even if I get one someday, I’ll still be the guy who got a girl after Sheldon Cooper!” – Raj, 'The Big Bang Theory'

BEST ZONK-FILLED DIALOGUE
Kenneth Parcell: If Tracy doesn't get 14 hours of sleep, he starts to go crazy!
Tracy Jordan: We're in a show within a show! I'm Tracy Morgan!
'30 Rock'

BEST THEME SONG
"Kelsey Grammar"
As seen in '30 Rock'

BEST MUSICAL MOMENT
'The Finder'
Fight scene was set to "Stuck In The Middle With You" by Stealer's Wheel

BEST DREAM SEQUENCE
'The Big Bang Theory'
Sheldon Cooper's Spock action figure "came to life" (within the limits of the doll's abilities) and was voiced by Leonard Nimoy.

BEST NEW TOOBWORLD LOCATION
Mercy, Nevada, 'Doctor Who'

BEST FIGHT SCENE
'The Finder'
Shoot-out in a Miami 80's-styled bar

BEST NEW FICTIONAL BOOK
"Needy Baby, Greedy Baby", 'The Big Bang Theory'

BEST NEW FICTIONAL MOVIE
"Leap Year Williams" - '30 Rock'

BEST NEW FICTIONAL TV SHOW
'The Undiscovered Country' - 'The River'

Skitlandia
"Real Housewives of Disney" - 'Saturday Night Live'

BETTER LATE THAN NEVER
DOMESTIC
'Spartacus: Blood And Sand'

IMPORTED
'State of Play'

BEST ADAPTATION FROM ANOTHER UNIVERSE (aka MEDIUM)
MOVIE TO TOONIVERSE
'Napoleon Dynamite'

TV TO MOVIE
'Dark Shadows'

BOOK to TV
'Restless'

WORST ADAPTATION FROM ANOTHER UNIVERSE (MEDIUM)
TV TO MOVIE
'21 Jump Street'

BEST MOVIE THAT SHOULD BE A TV SHOW
"John Carter"

Didn't see it? I think it got a bum rap......

WORST MOVIE THAT STILL COULD BE A TV SHOW
"One For The Money"
About a female bounty hunter. Sure, 'Karen Sisco' didn't work, but that starred a show-killer. And Katherine Heigl, who starred in the original movie, should be available soon to star in the TV version. (As of this writing, she was asking to come back to 'Grey's Anatomy'.)

BEST BOOK THAT SHOULD BE A TV SHOW
"Fearful Rock" by Manly Wade Wellman

BEST BEHIND THE SCENES
IN PRINT:
Article by Josh Schwartz in Entertainment Weekly, reflecting on the end of 'Chuck'
THEY SAY EVERY END IS A NEW BEGINNING. In the spring of 2007, I was on set for the last day of shooting The O.C. when I got the call. I need to immediately watch an audition for the lead of my new pilot Chuck. The actor who had just read? Zachary Levi.

And so began the most quixotic, satisfying, and, at times, surreal journey of my career. In the fall of 2007, I was lucky enough to have not only Chuck premiere but also another series I had co-created, Gossip Girl. What were the chances given that there are seven days in a week, that both shows would air against each other? They did, and my parents upgraded to a dual DVR.

As momentum for Chuck’s first season started to build, the writer’s strike hit. We didn’t know if we’d be back. We anxiously waited almost a year to return. As season 2 came to an end, we learned that NBC was going to air The Jay Leno Show five nights a week in prime time, eliminating five hours of time slots. Once again our future was in jeopardy. We may not have been a breakout hit, but we had a passionate fan base, and when NBC released its preliminary fall schedule in 2009 and Chuck wasn’t on it, those fans mobilized.

This wasn’t just a letter writing campaign but something that involved a new weapon in a fan’s crusade to save a show: mayonnaise. We had done some not so subtle product integrations promoting Subway sandwiches (which are delicious!). So our fans hit Subway shops around the world, ordering tens of thousands of foot-long turkeys. This garnered attention on a national level. NBC took note. With a mixture of pride and awe I can tell you: Chuck was saved by sandwiches. And by the the greatest, most passionate fans in the universe.

What kept Chuck from being a runaway hit was the same thing that made those who loved it so committed: a mash-up of genres–from spy to sci-fi to romantic comedy–with a heart devoted to its characters and a soul steeped in 1980s summer-movie geek culture. Well, ’80s everything.

Co-creator Chris Fedak and I used to marvel if the 13-year-old versions of us could see the show we were making, we’d lose our minds. It was our adolescent love of Quantum Leap that led us to pursue Scott Bakula for the role of Chuck’s dad. Knowing our precarious ratings situation, Scott advised: “Keep your head down, keep making the show. Next thing you know, it’s five years later. That’s how we did it on Quantum Leap.”

Casting actors we grew up loving didn’t end there. We were unabashed in our geekdom. Doc Brown’s Christopher Lloyd playing a member of the medical profession so Chuck could call the Back to the Future star “Doc”? Check. A huge influence on Chuck was Fletch, so it was an honor to have Chevy Chase play one of our best bad guys. Of course, there would be no Chuck without James Bond. The first Bond movie I was old enough to see in theaters? The Living Daylights. So imagine the pulse-pounding excitement we felt when Timothy Dalton signed on for a season. And who else could have played Chuck’s mom than the female icon of summer movies of yore, The Terminator’s Linda Hamilton? The list goes on, and we knew our fans would be as excited about all this as we were.

Now thanks to NBC Entertainment chairman Bob Greenblatt, we get to say a proper farewell to those fans with our Jan. 27 series finale. And with every end comes a new beginning. On the last day of shooting Chuck, my daughter was born. That gives you perspective. My hope is one day some kid who grew up watching our show will have a show of their own, and that kid will hire one of our talented actors to appear. Then that actor can advice that kid, “Keep your head down, keep making the show. Next thing you know, it’s five years later. That’s how we did on Chuck.”
WORST NEW SERIES TITLE
'The River'
This should have been 'The Magus' - much more interesting!

BEST EPISODE TITLE
"An Embarrassment Of Bitches" - 'Castle'

(It was an episode about show dogs.)

BEST ADVANCEMENT FOR TOOBWORLD
'Lost Girl'

A succubus as a lead, with many varieties of Faerie thrown in......

BEST SERIES MARATHON ON DVD
'Sherlock Holmes'

BEST ZONK OF THE YEAR
"Sweater Sequels" by Old Navy

BEST CLASH BETWEEN TOOBWORLD & THE REAL WORLD
'The New Normal' - the debate over Obama vs. Romney

BIGGEST DISAPPOINTMENT IN A NETWORK
ABC's failure in giving 'Cougar Town' proper support. But TBS has picked up that ball and it looks to be off to a great start at its new home.

BIGGEST DISAPPOINTMENT IN THE GENERAL AUDIENCE
There should have been more support for 'The Finder'

BIGGEST DISAPPOINTMENT IN MYSELF

Not keeping track better through the year so I could do a proper Toobits Awards presentation

WORST PRODUCT PLACEMENT
From the NY Times:
this example from “Pu’olo,” Monday’s episode of “Hawaii Five-0" on CBS, was particularly egregious — the most jarring, disruptive and insulting example I’ve seen. For nearly a minute, the unfortunate actors (Alex O’Loughlin, Grace Park and the former sumo wrestler Taylor Wily) stepped completely out of the story in order to plug Subway sandwiches, as the food-truck vendor Kamekona (Mr. Wily) is found eating five subs as part of his
new diet.

BEST CRITIQUE BY AN ONLINE COMMENTER
AMATEUR
Michelle Ortiz:
So I just finished watching Grey's Anatomy.... And quickly remembered why I stopped watching it in the first place. These doctors have wayyyyy too much drama going on! Omfg! I don't have any in my life thank God and God help me if I fall down a rabbit hole and end up in Grey'sLand with these mad doctors! They're insane. They have all dated each other and up and down and all around... $#!+ I am dizzy!! Just give me a bandaid for my maimed lower half before Dr. McDramaRama puts their hands on me.

PROFESSIONAL
I broke my vow and watched the inane season 3 opener of HAWAII FIVE O. The bad guy Delano breaks Wo-Fat out of prison by using a massive, CGI helicopter with a super-claw that lifts up the armored prison vehicle and drops it into the ocean...where a team of divers, straight out of SPECTRE swim up, use laser-sighted spearguns to kill the guards (WHY!? The guards were right in front of them....and DROWNING!!) and retrieve Wo Fat. Why does Delano do this? Because Delano doesn't have the resources to distribute stolen drugs...and Wo Fat does. WTF?! Delano has the resources to mount a prison break involving a specially-equipped helicopter, a super-claw, a team of divers with laser-sighted spear guns...and he can't find people to sell his drugs? But if that was the only totally lame-ass, inept, illogical plot point in the episode, I could probably live with it. But it's not. I could go on and on. The plotting on this series is perhaps the worst on dramatic television today...with stories, and I use that term lightly, that depend on the bad guys being outrageously stupid and sloppy...so the mopey, passive, totally reactive heroes can catch them by relying almost entirely on their exposition computer and lab results. Now that's drama. I really, truly, absolutely am done with this awful show.
- Lee Goldberg

BEST REVIEW OF A TV SERIES
'Danger 5' by Rob Buckley
So imagine a world where the Second World War is happening in the 1960s, Hitler is still alive and five secret agents from around the world have ganged up to try to stop the Nazis.

What do you mean, "Why?" Because I tell you to, that's why.

Actually, that's a very good question that maybe we should ask the creators of Australian show Danger 5, who seem to have taken some peyote while watching Thunderbirds, The Prisoner, The Champions, Inglourious Basterds, the Godzilla movies and huge amounts of those bizarre 1960s eurospy movies that Tanner writes about. They've come up with a very precise pastiche/homage that tries to walk the line between affectionate and mental, except the peyote is so strong the line actually looks like a blancmange being ridden by Anne of Cleves.

So we have Hitler sending out zeppelins to steal the Eiffel Tower in scenes that remind you of Derek Meddings' efforts on a bad day; someone with an eagle's head dressed like Patrick MacGoohan in The Prisoner; deliberately bad dubbing; seductive, smoking, talking robot dogs; bad accents; Champions-like telepathy; exploitation cinema bondage scenes; and more - but for no apparent reason other than it looks cool and people who love the 60s will go "Oh yes, that's from X". There's no plot coherence and no real jokes.

It looks fantastic. A lot of work has obviously gone into it. But it'll leaving you wondering what the whole thing is supposed to accomplish and why you should be watching it. Even more than Garth Marenghi's Darkplace, in fact.

BEST TELEVISIOLOGICAL ANALYSIS
Alan Sepinwall of HitFix
re: 'Sherlock'
When I reviewed the first season, I wondered what crime fiction was like in a world where Sherlock Holmes stories didn't exist around the dawn of the 20th century, given how many later detectives — including TV characters like Gil Grissom, Robert Goren and Greg House — were lovingly modeled on Holmes. We get a vague answer of sorts in this season's third episode, where Inspector Lestrade explains Holmes' value to the department by calling him "CSI: Baker Street." My guess? "CSI" existed in this world, but with a different lead character.

And there you have it - another year wrapped up in Toobworld.......