The New Normal: Part 4

As the semester comes to a close, I wonder if anyone cared that I had this generic sentence at the beginning of the blog to try to show how clever I think I am?

NBC has ordered a full season of The New Normal and it really has me thinking what their entire strategy is. They obviously want to go back to a traditional sitcom base and move away from what gave them critical acclaim for almost a decade now. Their primetime strategy clearly shows as shows such as 30 Rock and The Office finish up their final seasons, yet these were the shows that partially saved them from their disaster of have Friends and Frasier leave in back to back seasons. NBC picked up a full season of Guys With Kids and are changing Up All Night to a multi-camera show, even though it has been on for two seasons already. Guys With Kids is one of the worst shows I have watched in the last few years. There is nothing good on that show. They are trying to move towards multi-camera sitcoms and have it more of an original base, yet they keep Go On and The New Normal. The New Normal is nothing but a rip off of Modern Family and they clearly do not care about it. NBC wants to be traditional, but they decided to pick up a show that is a carbon copy of a hit non-traditional sitcom from another network. They are trying to move away from shows that brought them critical acclaim, but are going to end up using these shows to help bridge the gap between good content and terrible generic primetime nonsense. Parks and Recreation and Community are praised for how good they are, yet it seems NBC wants nothing to do with them. Also, Whitney is a terrible show. Whitney Cummings is not funny. She is the creator of 2 Broke Girls and Whitney, both of which could disappear right now and I could completely care less. Neither show is even remotely funny.

Either way, congrats to all of the shows who got picked up for a full season and did not get cut. I'm very happy that Revolution is successful because NBC could use a good show like that to fill the gap they've been looking for in the sci-fi kind of genre. The New Normal is a lot better than what I was expecting coming into this semester. It has very good chemistry between the stars of the show and I hope it last for at least a couple seasons.

The New Normal is on Tuesdays at 9:30 Eastern on NBC

Around the World in 80 Plates: Part One

Is now the time to mention that you can only cook an ingredient so many different ways before I realized I've already tried this before?

As you can tell from this title, this blog is discussing the current reality competition Around the World in 80 Plates, which is on the Bravo network. The show follows 12 chefs competing in a culinary race across 10 different countries in 44 days. The show is hosted by chefs Curtis Stone and Cat Cora, two individuals who made their fame on the Food Network. The format of the show seems like a rip off of Celebrity Apprentice, which makes this show all the more reputable. Everytime a team wins the competition for the week, they get some sort of reward for their hard work and dedication. The whole idea is to not only recreate, but reinvent the menus for world-renowned restaurants. Each of the contestants have a cooking background of some sorts. Like all other television cooking shows, this does nothing for the cooking genre. No matter what the content of the show is, if it is reality programming, it all has the same kind of atmosphere. You can only have so many shows that consist of cooking something different to be "unique" only to win a competition after betraying your friend you have such a close bond with. If I never watch another reality television program for the rest of my life, I would die a happy man. If I type any more about this idiotic nonsense, this blog will turn even more into a rant then it might already appear to be.

I would tell you when to turn in, but the first season is currently over.
http://www.bravotv.com/around-the-world-in-80-plates

The New Normal: Part 3

You know it is a network television comedy when there is a pop culture reference in almost every single scene. I'm not sure if I am smart enough to get all of these cool and important references to such scholarly articles like People Magazine.

As The New Normal goes into its eighth episode, one can only question what other controversial topics it will tackle next. This show seems to make it a point to turn any sort of topic questioning homosexuality and make it a focal point for the entire episode. The last two episodes aired touched on the topics of homosexual marriage and Christianity, God and Spirituality. Having every episode touch on topics that should last for multiple episodes, or at least stay in the minds of the characters past the episode, makes the topics they touch on very trivial. The episodes start to feel like a teenage sitcom where the viewer knows they are watching the "very special episode," yet try to cover it up with a bunch of jokes and pop culture references. I'm guessing they figure every viewer of the show watches E! News religiously. Every episode that features Goldie's mother, the crazy right wing racist, is absolutely annoying and could easily disappear. The character lays on her views extremely thick and yet she apparently has the best intentions for everyone, not to mention every time someone argues with her, it is like the writers copied an Aaron Sorkin script. The show could easily replace her with Bryan's Assistant, Rocky, which is what they sort of did in this most recent episode. The newest episode that will air will have Jane, Goldie's mother, in the episode. Let's hope for the best. There is some good to this show, as everything usually involving Shania and Bryan is great. Also, Goldie is somewhat growing on me.

The New Normal airs this Tuesday with their Halloween themed episode at 9:30 pm Eastern/8:30 pm Central.

Here are some links to The New Normal
http://www.nbc.com/the-new-normal/
http://www.imdb.com/TheNewNormal

The New Normal: Part 2

While I'm perfectly fine with looking past NBC's plan of making sure there is a minority in every single scene, I do wonder how much this show is making for having the main couple own a MacBook Pro.

It took the fourth episode to put a terrible signature into the start of the show, but The New Normal is off an running with a solid idea. The plot did move rather quick in the first episode, with Goldie deciding to be a surrogate without any real explanation to why, but the performances by the entire cast are very solid to cover up the incompleteness, especially from Andrew Rannells. The promos for the show were questionable because they refused to show the more obvious homosexual man, but he is hard to miss in the show with his banter between him and Goldie's daughter on the show, played by BeBe Woods. I don't understand the excessiveness of Ellen Barkin's bigotry on the show. They lay it on pretty thick with no real forgiveness or resolution in the end. The first few episodes tackle and feature some topics that weren't really necessary for a show just debuting, such as the Presidential Election and how society views homosexuality and family values, but some of the performances make me look past its pushiness. It's a pretty typical show where no one ever uses the bathroom or pays attention to money, so that's always a plus. I've looked past how quick every bonds on the show so quick and have become an alternative family to decide that this show is definitely worth a watch. I'm not going to compare it to the ABC show Modern Family.

Random Notes
Andrew Rannells always wears green
Goldie doesn't look 24
Goldie's daughter is going for an Abigail Breslin look

The New Normal airs at 9:30 pm Eastern/8:30 pm Central on Tuesdays after the new show Go On.

Here are some more links to The New Normal
http://www.nbc.com/the-new-normal/
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt2087571/

The New Normal: Part 1

As I write this blog and wonder why I need all of these Microsoft Words settings at the top of this page, I wonder if someone would film me writing this like they would film Carrie Bradshaw writing her weekly column. If only YSU were as glamourous as NYC...

As you can tell by the title of the blog, I am writing about the new NBC comedy The New Normal, set to debut September 11th, 2012. It is a show about two men, Bryan and David, who live in Los Angeles and are looking to become parents. They find Goldie, a single mother who just moved out to LA to change her life. She agrees to become the surrogate for Bryan and David they all become friend, or something. The show stars Justin Bartha as David, from The Hangover, and Andrew Rannells as Bryan, from the hit broadway musical The Book of Mormon and most recently the HBO show Girls. Those two somewhat recognizable actors will have to carry the load, star wise, since the part of Goldie is played by Georgia King, who is an absolute nobody. There is also the grandmother and daughter of Goldie on the show, but those parts don't matter to me right now.

I guess it is safe to say that NBC is trying to capitalize on the success ABC has had with Modern Family, but they already had a successful show featuring two homosexual men with Will & Grace. So they're not doing anything different, with the exception of this showing being in single camera format. This show seems like a safe choice in NBC's transition to regular television sitcoms and their attempt to distant themselves from their critically acclaimed, but not financially successful alternative comedy shows, such as The Office, Parks and Rec, and Community. Unfortunately for everyone in Salt Lake City, they will not be able to watch it at the regularly scheduled time. The NBC affiliate in Salt Lake City, KSL-TV, claims that that the show's "dialogue might be excessively rude and crude. The scenes may be too explicit or the characterizations might seem offensive.. For our brand, this program feels inappropriate on several dimensions, especially during family viewing time." I never realized how offensive homosexuals are...

So tune in Tuesday Nights at 9:30/8:30c and take a look at how surrogacy and single parenting can be a ton of fun!

Here are links that relate to The New Normal
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_New_Normal_(TV_series)
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt2087571/
http://www.nbc.com/the-new-normal/