GRIMM NEWS

FOX has a pilot being developed which for now is being called 'Georgia And The Seven Associates'. It's a contemporary reworking of "Snow White And The Seven Dwarfs" in which a young lawyer named Georgia Barnett is driven out of a top law firm by her stepmother. Georgia ends up working in a storefront law office (into the 'hood?) with seven "quirky" co-workers - lawyers, a bike messenger, perhaps a secretary and some paralegals maybe.

It's being described as "The Devil Wears Prada" meets "Taxi" set in Los Angeles' legal circles. (Did they throw in the 'Taxi' reference in hopes of landing Danny DeVito?)

Those she works with will have the personalities of the Seven Dwarfs, like Doc the ambulance chaser and Sleepy who naps in the office. (Is Happy hopped up on goofballs?) And their cases take on the aspects of classic fairy tales - for instance, three people (perhaps all of them overweight?) will have their homes taken away by the Wolf Corporation.

Bleep! I would so love it if the company name was "Bad Wolf Corporation"!
Not that it matters. It'll probably never see the light of day.....

But here's an idea I'll toss out to them for free: what if Georgia gets 3 clients with medical issues? One needs brain surgery, another needs a heart transplant, and the third suffers from nerve damage. And Georgia helps them to battle the wicked HMO "Well-FABA". (It's a play on Elphaba, the name of the Wicked Witch in "Wicked".)

BCnU!
Toby O'B

SWEET SAVAGE BLIPVERT

According to a new commercial, Sebastian is a romance novel hero who lives in a fantasy world somewhere between desire and heartache. But now he's in the "real world" (but actually in Toobworld, of course) to spread the word about Airborne, a "unique blend of vitamins and nutrients to help support your immune system".

There must be some kind of fissure between the dimensions of Toobworld and the literary universe, because this marks the second incursion into Earth Prime-Time in about as many weeks from the literary universe. In 'Lost In Austen', which I posted about last week, we saw Elizabeth Bennett leave the world of "Pride & Prejudice" and exchange places with Amanda Price.
Adaptations of novels for Television don't count when it comes to these types of characters. They are distinct from their original versions in the books; they mirror each other for the most part. Sebastian and Elizabeth are the actual characters from the books given form in Toobworld, by crossing the dimensional barrier between the two worlds created by Mankind's imagination.

But what novel could Sebastian be from? I'm not so lost in my own madness that I don't know he was created out of whole loincloth for the blipvert. But who knows?

Anybody familiar enough with such bodice-rippers to know of any book that might have a character who looks like this, going by the name of Sebastian?

If you do, let me know!

See the Airborne commercial here.

BCnU!
Toby O'B

"EASTENDERS" ZONKERS

In episode four of 'Gavin & Stacey', Smithie coaxed Gavin and his parents into a game of "Marry, Cruise, or Shag" in which you're given the names of three people and you have to decide which one you would marry, which one you'd take on a cruise (but with no sex), and which one you'd just shag.

Smithie said Sonia of 'EastEnders' would be his choice to shag.

The prime-time soap from the UK is not something I haven't seen before as a Zonk, and I know I've brought it up here at "Inner Toob" in the past.

Here's just a partial list of all the TV shows that mentioned 'EastEnders' when they should be sharing the same TV dimension:

"Inspector Morse"

"Game-On"

"Asylum"

"Mystery Science Theater 3000: The Deadly Bees"

"Spaced: Beginnings"

"Little Britain"

"Only Human"

"Extras"

"Red Dwarf: The Tank"

"Gimme Gimme Gimme"

"Hot Metal"

"Doctor Who"

And I'm not just talking about that Children in Need story in which many of the former Doctors met charactes from 'EastEnders', either. In the story "The Impossible Planet", the Doctor said, "This'll be the best Christmas Walford has ever had".

I'm thinking the Toobworld TV show of 'EastEnders' is a docudrama about the real life residents of that neighborhood, since specific actors - like Ross Kemp in 'Extras' - are linked to particular roles. It's probably the only way to disable the Zonks.

BCnU!
Toby O'B

"The winners have all the brains of Albert Einstein,
And the losers have all the brains of Albert Square."
Angus Deayton
'Comic Relief Does University Challenge'

TRU-BLOOD & TOOBWORLD

HBO's new series, 'True Blood', added a new tick to the Toobworld timeline: in 2006, the human blood substitute drink "Tru-Blood" was introduced on the market. The intention was that it would eliminate the need for vampires to feast on humans for their sustenance.However, as we saw in the cliff-hanger ending for the second episode, some vampires still prefer the real thing.

I think this could be analogous to a chain smoker not getting enough of a fix from the nicotine patches and gum.

So this suggestion could help splain away a potential Zonk outside of the show and in the TV Universe at large. If "Tru-Blood" existed in Toobworld by 2006, then why didn't we see private eye/vampire Mick St. John drinking it in the CBS show 'Moonlight'?I think the answer is that Mick may have had the drink in his fridge, but we just never saw it. (Although when we did get to see inside his refrigerator, he must have been fresh out of Tru-Blood.) And he obviously preferred the real thing anyway, because we did see that he drank from the supply that he bought off an inside source at the blood bank.

BCnU!

Toby O'B

TODAY'S TWD: STANDING PAT

HAPPY BIRTHDAY, PATRICIA CROWLEY!

I'll admit to having a crush on Ms. Crowley back when I was ten years old, when she was starring in 'Please Don't Eat The Daisies'.

I should say that's when it started.....

All the best!

BCnU!

Toby O'B

MAKE ZONKS FOR DANNY

From Alan Sepinwall:

"Make Room for Daddy" was the sitcom that Bobby and Sally were watching when Jimmy's Utz ad came on the screen at the exact wrong moment for Betty. The sitcom was better (or at least longer) known as "The Danny Thomas Show," but "Make Room for Daddy" was its original title, and the one used when NBC was airing reruns from earlier seasons (which this almost certainly was, based on the age of Danny's son Rusty) in daily syndication from 1960-65.

Once again, 'Mad Men' presented a Zonk that probably can't be splained away. Betty Draper was watching an episode of 'Make Room For Daddy' and we got to see it too - a scene between Danny Williams and his son Rusty (who was our January inductee into the TV Crossover Hall of Fame, by the way). Unlike the scenes we saw earlier this season from an episode of 'The Defenders' in which we knew it was 'The Defenders', which episode was being shown, and who was in it, no one onscreen mentioned that this was 'Make Room For Daddy', nor that the characters were Danny and Rusty Williams, nor that they were played by Danny Thomas and Rusty Haber. So it could be argued that they were indeed Thomas and Haber, but that they were playing characters from some other TV show... one which could only be found in the Twi- er, in Toobworld.

The 'Mad Men' episode also had mention of 'As The World Turns', so that would need a splainin as well since the soap operas we watch have characters who exist in the same universe as the characters from 'Mad Men'.

I enjoy watching 'Mad Men', even if I do find myself checking the info readout to see how much longer the episode is going to run. I'm mostly in it because of the time period, of which I only have the vague memories of a child from that era and more focused on my own small-city home-life. (I was seven in 1962.)

Because very little about the world in which the show takes place is fictionalized - save for Jimmy Barrett and his TV show "Grin and Barrett" - there's not much chance to find very much in the series which I can then link to other programs. So as it continues to showclips from actual TV shows (which may only increase as Harry Crane's TV department taps further into the future of advertising), I'm wondering if it's even worth it to find ways to dismiss the discrepancies and contradictions caused by those clips. It might be better to just chuck the whole thing into some other TV dimension and be done with it.

As far as Toobworld analysis goes, that is. Like I said, I still enjoy watching it even if it does become a chore because I detest Don Draper so much. [Which can be taken as a testament to the writing and the acting skills of Jon Hamm.] But the dislike of the major character - that's always a detriment in my TV viewing pleasures.

BCnU!

Toby O'B

(Alan Sepinwall writes the blog "What's Alan Watching?" You'll find the link to the left.)

TODAY'S TWD: BORN IN 1835

In this past Sunday's episode of 'True Blood', we learned that the vampire - Bill Compton - was turned in 1865 when he was 30 years old.

This means he is currently 173 years of age and that he was born in 1835.

Bill Compton shares his birth year with two other TV characters from classic TV shows.

Caroline Quiner was born in the year of 1835. When she was older, she married Charles Ingalls. ('Little House On The Prairie')

A son named Daniel was born into the Caine family that year; he was the half-brother to Kwai Chaing Caine. (Kwai Chaing's mother was Kwai Lin, while Danny's mother was named Elizabeth Chambers.)
BCnU!
Toby O'B

HATCHING A ZONK

"I love drama.
Remember when Locke blew open the hatch finally?"
Cappie
'GREEK'

Sometimes I wonder if a hit show is mentioned on another TV series just to help that show gain some cool cred. If so, then I'll be disabling Zonks about 'Lost' until I've gone on the Big Hiatus.

'Lost' Zonks are particularly difficult to deal with because of the show's content and structure. Even though it is now aligned with all the other shows in present day Toobworld on the timeline, the Oceanic Six created a cover story in which there is no mention of the Island. And without the Island, there's no Hatch. In fact, John Locke should have drowned when the plane crashed according to their story.

But with this quote by Cappie, there is no mention of 'Lost' itself. And Locke's first name is not mentioned either. Now, most folks would see the combination of "Locke" and "hatch" as a gimmee, that it definitely refers to 'Lost', I think we can work around that.

By the way, we may have heard the name as "Locke", because we're accustomed to that spelling due to 'Lost'. But what if it was spelled as "Lock"? Plenty of TV characters named Lock, mostly from the UK, spell their last name without the "E". So combined with other citizens of Toobworld named "Locke", we have quite a few options to avoid using John Locke from 'Lost'.

Now, as for the hatch being blown open......

What if Cappie was talking about a game show?

People have had to do a lot of things on game shows in order to win the competition - pick the right key to start a car's ignition, choose the right numbered briefcase, go for what's behind Door Number Three. Right now, people have to squeeze through odd shapes on 'Hole In The Wall'.

So what if a contestant had to complete the course in order to get the chance to "explode" a hatch, behind which would be, let's say, a million dollars. And if he didn't succeed the first time, he's back for the next installment of the game to play against new challengers. What if that contestant kept coming back again and again, to the point where he broke the record of appearances - in much the same way Ken Jennings did on 'Jeopardy'?

I'd say that would constitute as "drama" to the audience viewing at home. And the ratings would be so high that everybody could probably remember where they were when the contestant Lock(e) finally blew the hatch open.

I'm not sure this splainin could be used again the next time Locke and the hatch are mentioned, but at least for now that should disable the Zonk.

Like I said, it doesn't have to be totally plausible; it just has to provide an alternative to the obvious reference.

BCnU!
Toby O'B

DAWSON'S ZONK

When I try to find a splainin which can disable a Zonk - you know, those references to other TV shows when both shows should be sharing the same TV dimension - I'm not going to worry if it's 100% believable. My peeps, we're dealing with a universe in which your Mom could be reincarnated as a car!

I just need that splainin to satisfy the basic requirements in neutralizing the Zonk.

Having said that, here's the first of two Zonks for today:

Tony: I say this world extends way beyond this little field of dreams we're dancing in, and I wanna see that world.

Chris: What the feck's he on about?

Jal: He's quoting, Chris. It's a literary reference.

Chris: What do you mean, like Shakespeare and shit?

Jal: 'Dawson's Creek'.

Chris: Never heard of it. Don't watch telly - it's shit.

(I didn't bother to bleep the word "shit" as it goes out regularly now from BBC shows as well as from our own FX. As for the F-bomb, I substituted Father Jack's favorite expression from 'Father Ted'. I saw no need to over-use the 'Battlestar Galactica' substitute.)

The key to splainin away this reference to 'Dawson's Creek' is right there in the dialogue. Jal referred to 'Dawson's Creek' as a "literary reference".

Therefore, in Toobworld 'Dawson's Creek' is a book; a novel which is apparently so popular that Tony can quote from it. (Then again, Tony is a well-read fellow. In the same episode, he was seen reading "La Nausée" by Jean-Paul Sartre in the bathroom.) However, it looks like Chris doesn't read as much as the others, and he just figured it to be a TV show. And since he has such a low opinion of my favorite medium, who cares what he thinks?

What's great about this splainin is that we can now call upon it for any future reference to 'Dawson's Creek'!

BCnU!
Toby O'B

TODAY'S TWD: COCO CHANEL

It's been a banner year for Toobworld when it comes to historical presentations and biographical portrayals. The mini-series 'John Adams' serves as the high water mark, but we've also seen 'Mad Men', 'New Amsterdam', 'Generation Kill' (albeit recent history), even 'Primeval', and an interstitial recreation of "the shot heard round the world" on ESPN.

This weekend brought the televersion of Coco Chanel in a new TV production starring Shirley MacLaine as the French designer. I won't lie - I didn't see it. But I've seen plenty of reviews around the web and she seems to have received a lot of positive reviews for her acting, even if she didn't attempt a French accent.

Here's a bit of info about Coco Chanel from the old standby, Wikipedia:

Gabrielle Bonheur "Coco" Chanel (August 19, 1883 – January 10, 1971) was a pioneering French fashion designer whose modernist philosophy, menswear-inspired fashions, and pursuit of expensive simplicity made her arguably the most important figure in the history of 20th-century fashion. Her influence on haute couture was such that she was the only person in the field to be named on TIME Magazine's 100 most influential people of the 20th century.

Coco Chanel's stylish, elegant designs revolutionized fashion during the 1910s, freeing women from the uncomfortable and stiff apparel worn at the end of the 19th century. Chanel furthered her own image: the woman of the 20th century, embodying independence, success, personality, style, and confidence.

The influential Chanel suit, launched in 1924, was an elegant outfit composed of a knee-length skirt paired with a trim, boxy jacket, traditionally made of woven wool with black trim and gold buttons and worn with large costume-pearl necklaces.Chanel also popularized the little black dress which had a blank-slate versatility that allowed it to be worn for both day and night. The black Chanel dress was strapless, backless and more than a little risqué. It shocked the general public at large but quickly became a fashion sensation. The Chanel dress premiered in the third-ever edition of Playboy. This added to the controversy surrounding the Chanel name.

Much imitated over the years, Chanel's designs were manufactured across more price categories than any other in the high-fashion world. It was Chanel who also introduced costume jewelry to the fashion world, using a variety of accessories such as necklaces, chains or pearls of several strands. A bag with golden handles, an elegant pearl necklace, a tailored dress in black are the symbols of elegance and status that marked forever the history of fashion.

But it was Chanel No. 5 - considered the number-one selling perfume in the world - which helped her become a millionaire. The perfume was created in 1921 by Ernest Beaux at the request of Chanel, who said that it was "a woman's perfume with the scent of woman." Its Art Deco bottle was incorporated into the permanent collection at the Museum of Modern Art in New York, New York, in 1959. Chanel No. 5 was the first synthetic perfume to take the name of a designer. One of her most famous quotes is, "This perfume is not just beautiful and fragrant. It contains my blood and sweat and a million broken dreams."

BCnU!
Toby O'B

I almost named this post "Coco by A Cuckoo Poof", but that wouldn't have been quite right......

I'm not that crazy.