Was TV writer/producer Bruno Heller listening in on my family's Thanksgiving road trip or something? Just four days ago, the assembled Vozick-Levinsons were drivin' down the highway, lamentin' last year's early demise of HBO's Rome. Sure, we understood that it must have been prohibitively expensive to keep constructing those awesomely realistic sets. But come on. Just two short seasons, with so much more ancient history left to explore? Couldn't they make a movie or something?
Turns out they can! Heller, who co-created Rome, just confirmed the rumors that he's been thinking about continuing the series on the big screen. Even better (SPOILER ALERT!), he's hinting that Kevin McKidd's character might not be quite as deceased as he seemed at the end of season 2 — which is great news for anyone who thinks McKidd is destined for bigger places than the sidelines of Seattle Grace. Anyway, nothing's for sure yet: "It's not there until it is there," Heller cautions in that Hollywood Reporter story. "I would love to round that show off." He can consider this official notice that I (and my parents and sister) would totally love for him to round that show off, too. Anyone else ready to follow Rome to the multiplex?
Why you should gobble up 14 hours of yet more gobbling: It's the Sunday after Thanksgiving now, and what's left of the turkey is dry and tasteless and it really is time to say adios to the rest of that hardened pumpkin pie. A perfect opportunity to turn our attentions to the wonderment of other, non-seasonal foods — hello, donuts! hi, sandwiches! hey there, BBQ! — and take ourselves on a 14-hour journey to the splendor of the world’s great Food Paradises.
Must-see episode: “Pizza Paradise” (3 p.m.): Notice that the categories above are “100% Pure Cheese, Happy Holidays, Television.” Sounds like this show described to a tee...
How about you, PopWatchers? Planning on some post-Turkey Day couch surfing courtesy of the Travel Channel? Which Food Paradise is your favorite? And come on back after you gorge yourself on a few hours and share any thoughts/dreams/new observations you may have stumbled upon during your TV gluttony.
Why you should gobble up seven hours of viral video lunacy: By now, you've had so much damn turkey, the weird, cringe-inducing, Jackass-style viral video madness of Whacked Out Videos can help snap you back to consciousness and remind you that it's back to work again tomorrow.
Must-see episode: Where to begin...The old lady in a wheelchair firing an assault rifle is pretty good. Oh, or demonstrators getting barreled over by a water canon. Plus blonde girls. In bikinis. And monster trucks. Enjoy!
How about you, PopWatchers? Planning on a Turkey Day ass plant courtesy of Whacked Out Videos? Anyone willing to admit they actually watch? And come on back after you wolf down a few hours and share any thoughts/dreams/new observations you may may have stumbled upon during your TV gluttony.
Why you should gobble up eight hours of the makeover show: You'll want to eat an extra serving of Grandma's yams in thanks for never having those insecure teen years broadcast on national television.
Must-see episode: "Hip Hop Dancer": Uncoordinated brainiac Marie wants to bust a move as a hip hop dancer. Yeah, it's as cringe-worthy as it sounds.
How about you, PopWatchers? Planning on a post-Thanksgiving ass
plant courtesy of Made? Which episode is your favorite? And come on
back after you wolf down a few hours and share any thoughts/dreams/new
observations you may have stumbled upon during your TV gluttony.
Why you should gobble up 9 hours of jailbirds: There is no more inappropriate marathon for the holiday season than Lockup, MSNBC's paean to prison life, which is precisely what makes it so awesome: counter-programming for Thanksgiving-weekend schmaltz! Let's be honest: People love prison tourism. We love learning about the arts and crafts prisoners make to keep from losing it. We love learning about the intricate customs and rituals that make us feel like we're delving into a fascinating — if preternaturally violent — foreign culture. We especially love the love (turns out, prison "intimacy" is a lot like online dating, only with only one gender and a lot less choice). Also: It is, perhaps, instructive to see where one might end up should holiday meals with loved ones go horribly wrong.
Must-see episodes: Three episodes of Lockup: Raw comprise the final troika (from 7-10 p.m.) of MSNBC's version of the Scared Straight program -- following episodes of Lockup: Inside Pendleton Juvenile and Lockup Holman: Extended Stay -- and damn straight, we're scared!
Why you should gobble up eight hours of gobbling: After you spent the entire day laboring over that damn turkey, it seems only fitting you should spend the better part of the next luxuriating with a man who looks like a darn chicken. A chicken who knows how to eat. Join Guy Fieri from your couch as he cruises between (and clucks among) America’s finest Diners, Drive-ins and Dives, gorging himself on the best burgers, BBQ, dogs, and fries.
Must-see episode: “The Best of...” (9 p.m.): Leftovers schmeftovers — we want a Homewrecker hot dog!
How about you, PopWatchers? Planning on a post-Turkey Day ass plant courtesy of Diners, Drive-ins and Dives? Which episode is your favorite? And come on back after you wolf down a few hours and share any thoughts/dreams/new observations you may have stumbled upon during your TV gluttony.
Why you should gobble up 12 hours of the SoCal, so-cool crew: Thanksgiving may be all about family, but let's be honest: You're gonna want to escape crazy Aunt Sally and her lace-up leather skinnies at some point. So why not take a trip to one of the most escapist places on earth — the ridiculous, teen-tastic (and then 20-something-tastic) world created in Beverly Hills, 90210. And even better: The marathon is so aptly, Thanksgivingly themed as "Kelly's Leftovers," so it's a veritable buffet of the men — Dylan, Brandon, Steve, and Matt are featured — that Jennie Garth's character loved (and left) over the years. Mmmm, now that's some tasty meat.
Must-see episode: "Back in the High Life Again" (1 p.m.), an early season 3 staple, is where all the delicious Brenda/Kelly drama truly began. During a brisk walk in the park, new couple Dylan and Kelly finally reveal to a brooding, kicked-to-the-curb Brenda (who's wearing a bad-ass black leather vest and black leather jacket combo) that they're a couple. And they hooked up when she was in Paris over the summer. (You can catch that penultimate episode, "Shooting Star/American in Paris," at 12 p.m.!) "Look, I hate you both!" screamed Brenda after they dropped the bombshell on her. "Never talk to me again!" Cue the sad, sad music. Check out the dramatic scene here:
How about you, PopWatchers? Planning on a Turkey Day ass plant courtesy of Beverly Hills, 90210? Which Kelly Taylor-centric episode is your favorite? And come on back after you wolf down a few hours and share any thoughts/dreams/new observations you may may have stumbled upon during your TV gluttony.
Participants in the annual Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade are supposed to look insanely cheery no matter what, but with temperatures in the low 40s and plenty of sun this year, they didn't have to fake it. I was up at 9 a.m. to catch every corny second of this holiday mainstay, and after three hours of overdosing on scarves, brass sections, and lip-synching, here are some of the moments that stood out.
HIGHLIGHTS The parade gets Rick-rolled: While the monsters of the Cartoon Network were in the middle of a song, the one and only RICK ASTLEY burst out of their float out and broke into "Never Gonna Give You Up." My life is complete! All Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parades will pale in comparison now that Astley has put his footprint on this one. Did anyone else burst out laughing at the end of the song when the monster/puppet shrieked “ILIKERICKROLLING”?
The Radio City Rockettes have a fashion moment: The Rockettes
broke tradition from their red and white outfits and donned
champagne-colored mini-dresses. Finally, a fashion choice as sexy as
their chorus-line kicks!
In The Heights makes Broadway look good: The cast of the 2008 Tony winner for Best Musical (including a clearly psyched composer and star Lin-Manuel Miranda) looked pretty awesome as they performed the title song from the show, managing to pull off the only Broadway performance that wasn’t cheese-tastic this year.
The Nutmobile remains totally awesome: Mr. Peanut, head honcho of Planters, drove his hot ride through Herald Square, and it was worth it just to hear Matt Lauer announce the arrival of the Nutmobile (and also to hear my mom call out from the kitchen that she knows a few people she’d like to put in it).
LOWLIGHTS Al Roker shamelessly plugs NBC shows: Listening to Roker talk up the struggling network's non-hits as if they were American Idol-level successes proved absolutely painful. Next to a grinning Justin Bruening, the star of Knight Rider, Roker said, “Some kid growing up will have a Justin Bruening lunch box.” Umm, I don’t think so.
Harajuku Girl balloon heads sully the festivities: Donning enormous balloon heads on
normal human-sized bodies, performers bounced around on a float as
Harajuku girls. Did we really need to cross this line? On Thanksgiving?
White Christmas makes Broadway look bad: Are these people for real? The performance from this holiday-themed Broadway show was stickier than the pecan pie I broke into last night. And not in a good way.
A tradition of bad writing continues: It wouldn’t be the same old parade if it wasn’t filled with terribly written zingers. Here are some of the greatest hits: “A bear-hug is understood in any language.” “There they are, the unofficial marshals of the parade -- pilgrim man and pilgrim woman.” “We await the arrival of superstar Miley Cyrus.”
All right PopWatchers, I'm gonna go seek out the mashed potatoes that have been haunting me the past couple weeks. What did you think about this year's parade? Did it still hold the magic it did when you were a kid? And what were the best and worst moments for you?
Why you should gobble up eight hours of Lucy and Ricky and Fred and Ethel: It has been more 50 years since I Love Lucy aired on CBS, but the
black-and-white sitcom (and its endless loop of quips about our
heroine's henna'ed hair) will never grow tiresome. True, not everything about
the Lucille Ball comedy would fly today if someone tried to reboot the series: Imagine if a contemporary comedy featured a wife who ridiculed her husband's
Cuban accent. But classic moments -- like when Lucy inadvertently cements a costume beard to her face -- remain irresistible.
Must-see episode: Nothing says Thanksgiving more than that unforgettable scene from "Job Switching" (a.k.a. "The Candy Factory") in which Lucy and Ethel shove gobs of bon-bons down their pie holes. It still makes us
bust a gut.
How about you, PopWatchers? Planning on a Turkey Day ass plant courtesy of I Love Lucy? Does watching that clip give you a stomach ache or make you hungrier? And come on back after you
wolf down a few hours and share any thoughts/dreams/new observations
you may may have stumbled upon during your TV gluttony.
Fred Claushits DVD Nov. 25, and in case you find yourself in the holiday spirit, thinking it's gotta be funny if it stars Vince Vaughn, Paul Giamatti, and Elizabeth Banks, I felt the moral obligation to remind you that IT'S NOT.
Is there a holiday film that you strongly believe deserves the treatment Rudolph received (pre-fog)? Issue your own turkey alert below.
Is there a holiday song for which you harbor an irrational hatred? Here's why I'm asking. I received Faith Hill's Christmas album, Joy to the World, in the mail a few weeks ago but held off listening to it until yesterday. (I blame the snowflakes I saw in Happy Valley, PA last weekend with weakening my resolve to wait until after Thanksgiving.) It turns out, I kinda hate "Joy to the World." Nothing against Faith (who does particularly lovely versions of "Away in a Manger," "Silent Night, Holy Night!" and "O Holy Night!," by the way), but I just can't get it up for a song that is neither as sweet and/or stirring as those previously mentioned, nor as naughty as Elvis' "Santa Claus is Back in Town" (which I still maintain is the sexiest holiday song ever). The only people I actually want to hear sing "Joy to the World" are Clark W. Griswold, in Christmas Vacation, and my sister, who sings those four words sarcastically whenever the Bierly family Christmas takes a turn for the worst.
So, which holiday song can't you stand? My mother refuses to listen to "The Christmas Song," even when Nat King Cole is singing it. That's just wrong.
I'm going to have to issue a respectful but firm "Hell no!" to my man Dave Greenwald's recent call for a "Moratorium on Hip-Hop Christmas Songs." Sure, the Gap ad that inspired his post is pretty wack on the merits. I don't think anyone needed to hear Flo Rida, Trey Songz, and least of all Rainn Wilson yammering about jingle bells. But does that mean happy-holidays rap is "always a bad idea," as Dave argues? Surely not. Sometimes it can be an idea so wrong, it's right — so incongruous, so unnecessary, that it's a miracle of sorts unto itself.
Just look at the contributions Harlem hustler Jim Jones has made to the form. He dropped the wonderfully WTF-worthy A Dipset Xmasin '06. And this season he's following it up with a project titled Jim Jones & Skull Gang Present A Tribute to Bad Santa Starring Mike Epps. Now, Bad Santa, while an excellent film on all counts, came out five years ago. And Mike Epps wasn't even in that movie! Meanwhile, are the song samples Jones is streaming online actually "good"? Absolutely not. (Sample lyric: "How can I be without money on Christmas Eve?/Cause I'm thinkin' of robbin' you…") All of which makes this a kitsch masterwork in the making. Someone actually went to the trouble of following through on this strange, strange concept. Just let that sink in for a minute. It's like the Star Wars Holiday Special of rap mixtapes! Seriously, Jim Jones might have just stumbled upon the ideal Chanukah present for someone like me.
In closing: Dude, "Christmas in Hollis"! Any genre that includes that stone-cold classic (after the jump) can't be all bad. Can it?
Greetings PopWatchers -- it’s time for the Halloween
edition of Enter the Fray. While my own week was dominated by watching the
Fightin’ Phils win the World Series and trying to plan my Halloweencostume
(I’m going as the Industrial Revolution. It’s conceptual.), there were plenty of
pop culture treats (and tricks) for you to consume.
10. On the trick front, British comedian and MTV Video Music
Awards host Russell Brand played a phone prank that got him suspended from his
BBC radio show.
9. Amy Wilkinson and other PopWatch staffers shared what
irrationally scares them. (Seriously you guys, outer space is terrifying.)
7. Christina, Mariah, and Hilary threw down in a battle of
the video divas.
6. I shared my love of Chuck with the world (or just this
blog, either way).
5. A new Harry Potter trailer premiered, and we couldn’t
figure out who Ron was snogging (Turns out it’s Lavender Brown. Too bad we still have to wait so long for the film!)
3. Aubry D’Arminio mourned the not-really-premature-but-still-sad loss of sexy Scotsman David
Tenant as Dr. Who.
2. David Archuleta wrote a novel in the liner notes for his
new album.
1. Finally, you had a lot to say about Elisabeth Hasselbeck’s
stumping for Sarah Palin (pictured). The election is now only four days away -- and in the name of civic duty, PopWatch encourages everyone to go into work late on Tuesday. After voting, that is. Not, like, sleeping in.
My pal Kristen Baldwin sent me a frantic IM this morning: "Turn on The View. NOW!" Really, her message should have come with a warning -- "What you are about to see may result in trembling, emotional scarring, and possible collapse." But since I got blindsided by the sight of the show's hosting panel in frightening Halloween drag, why should you be spared, PopWatchers? After the jump, check out closeup screengrabs of Barbara Walters as George Washington, Elisabeth Hasselbeck as Ronald Reagan, Sherri Shepherd as a penny, er, I mean Abraham Lincoln, Whoopi Goldberg as FDR, and Joy Behar as Teddy Roosevelt. And do vote in our exclusive PopWatch poll to tell us which costume freaks you out the most.
Earlier this week, Nick DiFonzo, author of Seriously Bad Album Covers, compiled 28 Creepy Album Covers for the Houston Press. The Louvin Brothers' Satan Is Real is my favorite of his choices, mostly because the guys seem to have no idea Satan shares the stage with them. (Or is real.) I honestly didn't recognize most of his covers, so I've taken a complete inventory of my own iTunes library, and share some of my creepiest album covers after the jump. Feel free to add your own!
Bobby "Boris" Pickett's 1962 novelty song "Monster Mash" may have lost some of the humor since it first became a graveyard smash decades ago. Yet, everyone knows the song and can at least recite the chorus by memory (even if they won't admit it). To celebrate Halloween -- the one day when it's only kind of corny to play the tune -- we went out and collected some of the many "Monster Mash" covers recorded over the years. In addition to Vincent Price's version (in the clip below, following a scene from the movie Monster Club), after the jump we've included a version by the Misfits (sadly, latter-day, sans-Danzig), a little mashing en espanol, courtesy of Lost Acapulco, the art-school freakishly cool Dog Doo-Da Band, and (our favorite) Bobby Brown and Mike Tyson's duet version on Jimmy Kimmel. Any good ones we missed (please don't say the lame "Monster Hash" covers, originally done by the Toyees)? Which is your favorite version? Any other good Halloween carols? BOO-yah?
Not everyone needs to party Halloween night -- some of us geniuses keep tacky clothes and bags of fun-size candy bars in the house embedded in our sofas all year long. If you'd rather spend the weekend freaking out in private, EW's Dalton Ross picked his five favorite scary-movie DVDs for an appearance on CBS' The Early Show this week. Go ahead, press play below. The eerie chords at the beginning should render you just unsettled enough to keep watching.
Any titles to add? I might just phone it in and watch rerurns of Spongebob. Those can be pretty terrifying.
Help! It's Attack of the P-Dubs! A few weeks ago, PopWatch asked for pictorial proof of your favorite pop-culture-inspired Halloween getups, and you CrazySexyCool people did not disappoint. Here you all are! I'm so personally offended that Christopher didn't win an office prize for his Guy from the Operation Game costume (pictured, far left) that I'm awarding him a few hours of PopWatch pseudo-fame -- you know, until this post disappears into the vast wasteland of faraway "Page 2" forever. Among others, we had Dwight and Angela (taken from day to evening!), Robot Chicken, Facebook, a Golden Snitch, and even Kevin Spacey's skanky cheerleader fantasy from American Beauty. (The way Jessicah's red-eye matches the rose petals = unintentional genius. Or, she's Satan.)
Thanks to Amy, Brian, Rachel, another Amy, Katie, Hilary, Sara, Hannah, Jessicah, Mackenzie, Michael, Jamie, Robert, Greg, Melissa, and Jill for this exclusive glimpse into your twisted lives!
“There are three things I have learned never to discuss with people: religion, politics, and the Great Pumpkin.” —Linus van Pelt (Christopher Shea), It’s the Great Pumpkin, Charlie Brown (Relive the uber-cuteness at the 5:35 mark of the clip that's embedded after the jump.)
I'll admit, I was watching the VP debate and thinking to myself, I have wire-rim half glasses, I could rock the partial updo, now all I need is a sharp red suit....But after perfecting my Sarah Palin accent, I came to terms with the fact that I would be one of a thousand VP hopefully nots
trick-or-treating for moose pelts and off-shore drilling. There's
always a crop of annual costumes that are over-played long before
Oct. 31 rolls around, and with this year's heated election on everyone's mind, that Obama and/or McCain mask you
bought for Halloween should be used instead as decoration at your Election Day party, five days later.
Another one we're already sick of seeing is the Joker, as played by
the late and better-than-great Heath Ledger. Everyone saw The Dark Knight
(once or thrice), and we were all wowed by his performance, but donning
the duds, makeup, and accent is not only a little morbid, it's
superfluous. No one could be a better Batman villain than Ledger
himself, and didn't you use up all of your face paint when you dressed
up for the movie premiere anyway?
So who or what are you guys not dressing up as for Halloween this year?
Ever fall victim to the "great idea!" costume only to find out that
everyone else had the same thought? Joe the Plumber and Joe Six Pack
will be popular picks, but what about a sexy Joanne the Plumber or Jane
Boxed Wine -- equally overdone or just plain clever?
Last week, we made a plea for you to send us pictures of your best-ever pop-culture-inspired Halloween costumes. We've gotten some good entries so far, but we still need more. Soooo, as a way to prove that no photo is too embarrassing for public consumption, I now offer up a snapshot of my Teen Beat magazine cover frock (starring Hanson) -- designed by mom and worn by yours truly back in 1997.
Here are the rules again for those of you who are getting those costumes together last minute, or who simply forgot to email us last time around: Send us photos of what you're planning to wear for Halloween 2008, and
you might be featured on the Feedback page of the Entertainment Weekly
issue that hits newsstands October 31, or a related photo gallery on
EW.com. And if you have photos of a fabulous "vintage" costume from
years past, you can send those, too. E-mail your picture(s) (a jpeg,
with a minimum of 600 pixels at the longest edge and a maximum file
size of 1 Mb) to popwatch@ew.com.
In your e-mail, please include your name and a short description of
your costume. Submit your costume photos from 12:01 p.m. on October 15,
2008 to 11:59 p.m. on October 22, 2008. U.S. entries only. All photo
entries will be judged by EW editors equally on creativity and quality.
By sending your picture, you are representing and warranting that you
took this photograph and giving us permission to print it in the
magazine or post it on our web site(s) without compensation.
Now that we've cleared those legal hurdles (whew!), it's time for you to start scanning and sending. Can't wait to see what you come up with!
For the average Halloween lover, October 31 is the perfect opportunity to channel an inner witch, vampire, or lingerie-wearing animal. But for me, Halloween is all about getting in touch with my inner Britney Spears. Yep, I've gone as the many stages of the troubled-yet-fascinating pop tart over the years, but my 2007 costume (pictured) was by far my crowning achievement. I knew people would go as bald, umbrella-wielding Brit or lethargic VMAs Brit, so I went a different direction, funneling all of 2007's tabloid fodder into my best costume ever: Britney as Perez Hilton post! How will I beat it this year? Especially with Spears' quiet recent history? Only my local art-supply shop knows for sure.
Now, it's your turn to wow us with your pop-culture-inspired Halloween costumes. Send us photos of what you're planning to wear for Halloween 2008, and you might be featured on the Feedback page of the Entertainment Weekly issue that hits newsstands October 31, or a related photo gallery on EW.com. And if you have photos of a fabulous "vintage" costume from years past, you can send those, too. E-mail your picture(s) (a jpeg, with a minimum of 600 pixels at the longest edge and a maximum file size of 1 Mb) to popwatch@ew.com. In your e-mail, please include your name and a short description of your costume. Submit your costume photos from 12:01 p.m. on October 15, 2008 to 11:59 p.m. on October 22, 2008. U.S. entries only. All photo entries will be judged by EW editors equally on creativity and quality. By sending your picture, you are representing and warranting that you took this photograph and giving us permission to print it in the magazine or post it on our web site(s) without compensation.
Whew! And now that we've got those rules out of the way, get your photos scanned or downloaded and start sending! Looking forward to seeing what you guys cook up.
It's Oct. 15, which means it's National Grouch Day! Naturally, the first thing that comes to mind is the trash-loving Muppet Oscar (who you may or may not know is just one of many members of the grouch species hailing from Grouchland; see the clip below). But let's think outside the trash can for a moment and name a few other famous grumps who deserve homage on this day. I'll go first: Sean Penn, Simon Cowell, and Dick Cheney. Okay, your turn.
Stephen Colbert's hour-long ***musical!*** special, A Colbert Christmas: The Greatest Gift of All, will air November 23rd, almost a month before the holiday. So we don't think it's too out of line to start pregaming for its impending Yuletidiness today. Witness a pre-WristStrong Colbert deliver a heartwarming fireside Christmas story on The Daily Show in ye olde 2000. The only things missing are that self-portrait painting and better production values!
John Legend, Elvis Costello,
Toby Keith, and Feist will perform in the special, but we're somehow most psyched about Colbert's duets with Jon Stewart ("Hannukah") and Willie Nelson ("Little Dealer Boy.") Also, I'd like Doritos to create a chip just for the occasion. Thanks!
Loyal PopWatchers might recall that it was after seeing Vince Vaughn in the horribly unfunny holiday movie Fred Claus that we coined the term 'nut guard': "The credit on an actor's résumé that is so beloved it stops fans from wanting to actually kick him where it hurts after sitting through his latest stinker." (We were unable to physically harm Vaughn because he has a nut guard for Swingers. For a gallery of other actors' protective wear, click here.)
So you can understand why we were a little nervous to see the trailer for Four Christmases (below), a festive comedy starring Vaughn and Reese Witherspoon as a couple forced to spend the holiday with each of their divorced parents.
Though the trailer doesn't 100 percent sell us on the Witherspoon-Vaughn pairing, Vince did make us laugh. Particularly with that "I'm gonna do it, too!" line.*
Finally, a legitimate reason for me to celebrate Duran Duran on PopWatch. In preparation for Sunday's holiday, I suggest you take a few moments to enjoy the videos embedded below — visual proof that myself and their Red Carpet Massacre collaborators Justin Timberlake and Timberland are not the only ones prepared to fete them.
Last May, the Killers joined them onstage for "Planet Earth" in Vegas...
while Billy Corgan helped them out on "The Chauffeur" in Chicago:
August 5 is National Underwear Day. It's true, y'all. I already unknowingly celebrated this morning by fast-forwarding through last night's Queer as Folk Logo repeat to see Brian (Gale Harold) attend an Underwear Party. Yay me.
You can celebrate by naming the TV or movie scene you think of first. Just keep it PG. (Notice the restraint that I showed by not linking to the QAF scene. From episode 302. Wink.) Because I know where some of you are headed, I've embedded David Cook's Guitar Hero commercial below.
BREAKING: Forget Zac Efron, ubiquitous Chace Crawford, and that Shia LaBeouf kid...Hunter Parrish is Summer 2008's crystal goblet of frozen lemonade positioned high above a somewhat interchangeable cluster of melting Slurpees. As if I needed any more reasons to keep watching Weeds, last night's episode (get Shirley Halperin's full recap here) featured shirtless Hunter sexing up Julie Bowen in a cheese shop. That's four reasons right there -- especially the words 'cheese' and 'shop'. The less racy of the two scenes (and there promise to be many more) is embedded below.
Damn! It cut off before the best part -- where he says "Hold on to ME" instead of her suggestion, the kitchen sink in the back room. I'm not sure we can even publish that sentence. I guess that's why it's not in the clip, huh?
So now that I've followed my own instructions from the headline above, it's your turn to share your favorite TV sex scene(s). Yeah, sure you can name more than one! (Ahem, Kate and Sawyer!)
Happy National Gorgeous Grandma Day, P-Dubbers! Yes, we're totally serious. Aren't we always? Don't answer that.
Whoa, look! EW.com has the perfect photo gallery -- unabashedly entitled 33 GILFy Pleasures -- to help you celebrate. That's so awesome. And honestly, so is this random holiday. GGD's mission statement? "Let's celebrate this day, and every day, by making it vibrant and lovely!" My favorite Gorgeous Grandma, Lucille Bluth, is gamely pretending to be on board. Who's your favorite GG, whether in pop culture or bleak reality? ("Helen Mirren in a bikini" won't technically count, but let's go ahead and make her an honorary.)
Don't forget to head on over to my favorite restaurant, 7-Eleven, for a free Slurpee today. Christian Slater's practically begging you to:
Are you one of those people brave enough to mix every Slurpee flavor available, in tiny layers? I envy you a bit. The only combo I think tastes great is Mountain Dew and Coke. It's so weird, because I'm so disgusting about food otherwise...
Was TV writer/producer Bruno Heller listening in on my family's Thanksgiving road trip or something? Just four days ago, the assembled Vozick-Levinsons were drivin' down the highway, lamentin' last year's early demise of HBO's Rome. Sure, we understood that it must have been prohibitively expensive to keep constructing those awesomely realistic sets. But come on. Just two short seasons, with so much more ancient history left to explore? Couldn't they make a movie or something?
Participants in the annual Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade are supposed to look insanely cheery no matter what, but with temperatures in the low 40s and plenty of sun this year, they didn't have to fake it. I was up at 9 a.m. to catch every corny second of this holiday mainstay, and after three hours of overdosing on scarves, brass sections, and lip-synching, here are some of the moments that stood out. 
I'm going to have to issue a respectful but firm "Hell no!" to my man Dave Greenwald's recent 
Greetings PopWatchers -- it’s time for the 
My pal Kristen Baldwin sent me a frantic IM this morning: "Turn on The View. NOW!" Really, her message should have come with a warning -- "What you are about to see may result in trembling, emotional scarring, and possible collapse." But since I got blindsided by the sight of the show's hosting panel in frightening Halloween drag, why should you be spared, PopWatchers? After the jump, check out closeup screengrabs of Barbara Walters as George Washington, Elisabeth Hasselbeck as Ronald Reagan, Sherri Shepherd as a penny, er, I mean Abraham Lincoln, Whoopi Goldberg as FDR, and Joy Behar as Teddy Roosevelt. And do vote in our exclusive PopWatch poll to tell us which costume freaks you out the most.
Earlier this week, Nick DiFonzo, author of Seriously Bad Album Covers, compiled 
Help! It's Attack of the P-Dubs! A few weeks ago, 
“There are three things I have learned never to discuss with people: religion, politics, and the Great Pumpkin.” —Linus van Pelt (Christopher Shea), It’s the Great Pumpkin, Charlie Brown (Relive the uber-cuteness at the 5:35 mark of the clip that's embedded after the jump.) 
I'll admit, I was watching the 
Last week, we made a plea for you to send us pictures of your best-ever pop-culture-inspired Halloween costumes. We've gotten some good entries so far, but we still need more. Soooo, as a way to prove that no photo is too embarrassing for public consumption, I now offer up a snapshot of my Teen Beat magazine cover frock (starring Hanson) -- designed by mom and worn by yours truly back in 1997.
For the average Halloween lover, October 31 is the perfect opportunity to channel an inner witch, vampire, or 
Happy National Gorgeous Grandma Day, P-Dubbers! 
