What’s Cooking?

The evil beast has finally been slain. For the last five months, evil has been disguised as a seventeen year old. He charmed so many with his innocent smile and “aww shucks” attitude. But behind all those charms was the downfall of Western civilization. He threatened to bring music down one more level, and while American Idol isn’t exactly noted for its high minded views on the art of music, I really believe that if David Archuleta had won, a small part of America’s soul would have died. OK I’m obviously way overstating AI and DA’s respective roles in America, but I’m just happy he didn’t win. And in some ways I do think that American Idol was saved by David Cook winning. It’s the first time the most talented contestant has won since Carrie Underwood in Season 3. I’ve been hoping that the voters would send Archuleta’s puppy dog style back to the Shire for many weeks, hearing the judges fawn over him when he couldn’t even really understand a lot of what he was singing, it made me sick, all the while they trashed Jason Castro and Brooke White. Anyway, Cook can now graduate to making mediocre pop-rock while his career is controlled by the leaches sucking the business dry, and Archuleta can try to compete with Miley Cyrus and The Jonas Brothers for the young peoples’ attention (and their parents’ money,) taking his rightful place as a latter day Tevin Campbell.

A couple other highlights from the show; first the George Michael medley which only lacked a great Wham tune, but did debut George’s unfortunate nose-job. Basically the one of the reasons I enjoy Idol is because when I’m singing along to songs by forgotten pop stars I don’t feel so alone. (I do still feel ridiculous, but that’s deserved.) Bryan Adams and Donna Summer were also given a little time to shine, and that’s fun. Where else but Idol? I just can’t understand why they never got to mentor the contestants, it would’ve been fun to see Bryan Adams telling the kids what’s what. I could’ve done without the final ridiculing of the lost souls from the open auditions, but I guess that’s part of the deal at this point.

That’s all I’ve got for now. I did want to put out a link. If you like Boston Sports and hot chicks, check out Barstool Sports.

-Bender Out

And I’m Baaack!!

So much has gone on these last couple weeks outside of politics, and it’s all in The Bender’s wheelhouse. The most important thing that went down of course was the final episode of the RW/RR Challenge on MTV. The Gauntlet wrapped up and while the Rookies won with their slim compact team, it may have been a career ending moment Big Easy. Eric aka “Big Easy” couldn’t finish the grueling final mission. I don’t know exactly how hard the final mission was, but I can’t believe how poorly he performed. I watched the reunion show this week to see if there’d be an explanation of what had gone wrong for him, but there was none, so I don’t want to be overly critical, it was obvious that he wasn’t exactly a pro athlete and not in ship shape, so he probably had some fear inside that his life could’ve been in jeopardy. All that said, I just don’t think he’ll be treated the same if he comes back for future Challenges. There was one interesting thing that caught my eye from the reunion show this time around. And no, it wasn’t that Coral came out guns blazing (not referring to her boobs.) It was that a few of the contestants seemed to go out of their way to state that they were successful in real life outside of their roles as MTV celebrities. I really enjoyed the idea that a lot of these people were making their livings as MTV personalities, perhaps that’s a thing of the past but hopefully there will be a book about the lives of reality TV celebs, sooner rather than later.

In other huge reality TV news, Chekezie Ezie was voted of American Idol. For me he was truly the most likeable contestant, especially more so than that little fraud David Archuleta. Chekezie was done in by two things this week. First, that damned Kristy Lee Cook singing one of the most patriotic songs ever written. I could just imagine hundreds of thousands of votes coming in from the red states on her behalf, and those votes may or may not have been preceded by conversations that anyone who doesn’t vote for her doesn’t love America. In fact I heard there was a situation in Texas where a fight broke out because someone wasn’t voting for Kristy and the result was that the “un-American” voter was banished to Massachusetts. So that person got what they deserved. The second big factor for Chekezie getting voted off was that he kept singing songs that no one had ever heard of. I remember his singing some Luther Vandross song at some point that had also been sung by Mariah I think, but aside from that I had no idea what he was singing. He even managed to find two Beatles songs that no one had ever heard of. But no use crying over it now, Chekezie is gone and all he got was some stupid video montage with Fat Ruben Studdard singing in the background. What we need is America to smarten up and vanquish that little devil spawn David Archuleta. Perhaps my words are too strong, but I can’t stand these little child star types, especially when they keep singing preachy songs like “Another Day in Paradise” and “Imagine.” He’s too young and inexperienced to understand those songs, at least “Imagine” anyway.

Have to at least weigh in on the NCAA tourney. I watched it all, the first day sucked. Duke survived a scary game but ultimately won, and there’s nothing more disappointing than that, and when they did lose it was to West Virginia, who is coached by the very hate-able “Huggy Bear” Bob Huggins. Other quick observations from the first weekend, I was quite under-whelmed by Michael Beasley. This guy is supposed to be the top pick, but he couldn’t even look good against Wisconsin. Wisconsin is a good defensive team, but if you’re a top star you have to be able shine on the big stage. Long story short, The Miami Heat are tanking for no reason. Stephen Curry was a revelation, the hype for him began last season and I poo poo’d it because I thought he was a product of his father’s fame. But he may be the best college player around before his career is over at Davidson. He’s an amazing shooter and undersized shooting guards are perfect for the college game. His shooting is so good that he may end up in the NBA someday, despite his diminutive size. Davidson really was the show-stealers of the first weekend, not only because they’re a double digit seed making it to the sweet sixteen, but also because they knocked off the only true title contender who has been eliminated so far. Georgetown really broke a lot of hearts because expectations were so high, they had probably the best Center in college basketball in Roy Hibbert, along with a top senior point man in Jonathan Wallace. They had a comfortable second half lead but it all fell apart, worst of all for many fans, CBS was showing other games for the bulk of their collapse so the comeback really seemed to come out of nowhere. Week two is set up well despite the eliminations of Duke and Georgetown, hardly any low seeds have stayed around, and one of them is Villanova who while a low seed had high expectations all season and has seemingly put it together for now. My last impression from week 1 is that Kevin Love is a really good college player, but I just don’t see him making it in the NBA. He had two clutch turnaround jumpers from the post to help win it against A&M and complete the comeback, but he’s too slow and not tall enough to ever be an NBA star. Perhaps a good conditioning program could change all that and he’ll be an all-star someday, I’ve been wrong before, but he just doesn’t seem to want it badly enough right now.

That’s way too much for now, so I’ll end it there. I double posted so don’t forget to scroll down and read about the Clintons if you’re bored enough.

-Bender Out

Vital Idol

My apologies to Billy on stealing his title. As is my tradition, I’ve been watching lots and lots of American Idol. I got hooked in season 2 and my love affair just grew, culminating in back to back seasons featuring Carrie Underwood and Kellie Pickler. After featuring those two southern belle sweethearts they have a lot of goodwill built up, although they really put that to the test after last season’s crapfest which featured only one mildly attractive and the best singer had me wondering if she had some mental deficiency given that she was the only person on earth who didn’t know she was by the best contestant. Only the magic that was young Sanjaya Malakar saved last season and has me coming back to watch every episode.

This season so far hasn’t really blown me away. They did a nice job of hyping the kid who lived in his car, but then they cut him and watched the waterworks fly. I felt bad for the kid, and really all the young contestants when they get voted off. Just tonight that poor young girl got voted off, and she was a mess, didn’t want to sing but they forced her, then tried to play it off as an uplifting moment. She didn’t deserve to get voted off, in fact the people at home always disappoint me with their voting. They’ve already voted off one of the hotter girls, Amy Davis, who cares if her singing was kinda crappy we need to keeps girls like her around, at least until after we’ve eliminated the annoying contestants. Right now I think the hottest girl they have left is that Danny Noriega chick.

Oh what’s that? No, you’re pulling my leg.

It has been brought to my attention that Danny Noriega is actually a guy, but still very pretty nonetheless. So, my deepest apologies go to young Danny.

Anyway, my early predictions are for Brook White, Carly Smithson, Asia’h Epperson, David Archuleta, Michael Johns and David Cook to be the final 6. I’m already tired of that Michael Johns character, but the judges seem to like him, and the fans, to me he just seems a bit smug and rather ordinary. The kid David Archuleta seems a bit overhyped as well, he reminds me of a singing version of Sam Levine from Freaks and Geeks fame. I just don’t trust people who smile that much. As for next weeks eliminations before we get to the final 12. I’m going to predict Cady Malloy is gone, even though she’s kinda hot, voters have shown a lack of respect for such things, anyway she seemed resigned to leaving tonight. Then Ramiele Sulabay will get voted off, she’s a good singer but in the past the Asian contestants have always been voted off too early, so I’m thinking she’ll continue that. For the men, Luke Menard is definitely going, he’s like a less talented James Vanderbeek out there, the bloom is definitely off his rose. And finally, David Hernandez will be voted, not because of his singing, but because I find him to be completely unlikeable.

That’s all I got for now, I’ll be back soon with some commentary about SNL’s triumphant return.

-Bender Out

Andre the Terribnle

Andre Tippett, NFL Hall of Famer. It just sounds so right. He was my favorite Patriot growing up, really there weren;t many other choices. I do have a soft spot in my heart for Irving Fryar, Stanley Morgan and later Bruce Armstrong, but most of the other players came and went, Tip was the only guy who was consistently good during my formative years. He was dominant, probably the second best linebacker of his era, but he just played on crappy teams so he often seemed overlooked. I’m real happy about the Tippett situation, kinda the exact opposite of the Jim Rice situation, it shouldn’t really matter to me whether or not people agree with me about how good my favorite players were, but I like the validation. I’m just giddy, using this as an excuse to reminisce about those 80s pats teams, for some reason I enjoy thinking about the players, even if they were awful for a few stretches. In a 10 year period they had the worst record in football three times, but also made it to a Super Bowl. In some ways I’ll always look back more fondly on Raymond Claiborne, Ronnie Lippett, Don Blackmon, Johnny Rembert, and Steve Nelson than I will on the current Patriots dynasty.

Something else I really enjoyed more in my youth, or at least in my 20s was reality TV. But this year I haven’t really enjoyed the American Idol judges making fun of the “bewildered.” I’ve been trying to get into the new season of The Real World/Road Rules Challenge, but all I can do is judge the participants for being fame-hungry and pathetic. I’ll give it time, maybe some of the chicks will start to look hotter and Danny will have some ‘roid rage. Also a new Survivor starts next week, featuring some returning favorite participants and I can’t even get into it. Maybe it’s because of the writer’s strike and over-saturation of reality TV, but I’m just not feeling it right now. I’ve probably just had enough of these particular shows, and I’m not really in the MTV demographic anymore.

Some shows I am enjoying include, Dr. Drew’s Celebrity Rehab show and that new lie detector show on Fox. Both are pretty good quality, last week Dr. Drew unleashed his huge guns on the world. For an old dude he’s really jacked. The lie detector show is interesting, but it takes about five minutes per question, still worth a watch. The one other show I want to recommend is The L Word. If you get Showtime, you should check it out. I don’t really know any of the characters names yet, but when I see it’s on, I can’t turn away. It’s the only scripted TV I’m watching these days aside from some wrestling here or there, and of course Lost.

That’s all for today, I’ll be back with Post Super Bowl thoughts after the game.

-Bender Out

Catching up again

Had to catch up on my entertainment news this time around. There's a ton going on this time of year with all the season finales on TV, but the most newsworthy thing is this ridiculous Paris Hilton situation. Paris is going to jail for 45 days, and she's crying to everyone who'll listen. Apparently she thinks she's being made an example of, and if that's true, so be it. She's become famous for being a wild child, a rich spoiled brat, and even though I'd still love to party with her (like I did out in Vegas a few years back, inside joke.) I can't imagine a more suitable fate for her than to go to jail because she didn't realize the rules applied to her. The part where this becomes so comical is now she's try to get a pardon from the Governator. She and her "people" still don;t seem to understand, they still can't believe that the rules apply to them. Paris' mom was lucky to not be arrested after her behavior in the court room. I just can't relate to these people, which is what makes this whole scenario so fascinating.

Onto my favorite TV shows. We'll start with Idol. Ever since Sanjaya was voted off, the show has become boring and predictable. We all miss him, heck I miss him, I miss the way laughed, I miss his crazy hair-dos, I miss his smile, I miss his smell...Anyway, where was I? Oh yes, it was obvious that Chris and Phil would get voted off last week. Despite Chris' valiant effort to introduce the world to the nasally style of singing, he just wasn't that great, and when the numbers get thinned out the little teenage girl votes can only carry a guy so far. As for Phil, he just seemed like a good guy, I mean sure there were rumors of him cheating on his wife with the very hot, very sexual Haley Scarnato, but how can you blame the guy? You've seen his wife when she was cheering him on from the crowd, I mean how can a guy not cheat when his wife is showing the wear and tear of having popped out a couple babies?

Anyway, last night they sang Bee Gees tunes. The Bee Gees being one of the more underappreciated bands of all time, they endured being the but of everyones jokes throughout the 80s and now it's ok to admit that you enjoy their music, basically they're the predecessor to Journey in that regard. In another five years everyone will be listening to the backstreet boys again it's all a big cycle that pop bands have to go through. The biggest disappointment was that no one sang More Than a Woman, which is by far the best tune they have. And the thing that made me the most giddy? It was Randy finally calling out Blake for doing his beat-box crap during a perfectly good pop song. I don;t think it'll be enough to send his ass home, I think Lakisha is the obvious choice. There are three women who sing a similar style, they're all relying on talent to get them through, and one douche bag who thinks he's the next big thing, he's getting by one crappy beat-boxing and silly dance moves. Lakisha is way more talented than Blake, but she'll get voted off because she's the least talented of the three singers who are relying on talent. I can only hope that Blake will be voted off next week. One thing that has been on my mind, he's one of these little B-boys, shouldn't he be in better shape? I'm never one to throws stones about someone's conditioning, but he doesn't look like he could break dance at all, maybe they used to forcw to sit on the side and beat box for them, that's how he developed that skill. Anyway, I just don;t think I could bear it if he got to the finals.

Now ime to celebrate the two finest shows on television, Lost and Heroes. Some people had begun to criticize lost, saying that the show had lost its way or lost its meaning, so they made a commitment to wrap the show up after next season, so that basically means we have 28 hour-long episodes left and all the questions will be answered, and as a result there have been some crazy revelations. Not only did they give us the greatest crossover yet, Locke's father being the con-man who cause Sawyer's family to fall apart, but they also tell us that they found the wreckage from oceanic 815, and everyone on that flight died! This is crazy, I may not like the direction things are going in, but at least it has a definite direction. Tonight's episode should have even more answers, maybe they'll tell us how Ben got to the island, if not tonight, then soon.

As for Heroes, this show has just kicked ass from day 1. I'm biased, I was always a huge X-men fan, and a lot of the characters in this show are straight out of X-men with their powers. The episode last week, set five years in the future was the best one yet, Peter Petrelli was the biggest badass ever on television. I've always though it was a little unfair to give one superhero so many powers, thats why Superman doesn't translate well in modern times, but Batman is ageless. Anyway, the whole showdown between Peter Petrelli and Sylar was awesome and it bodes very well for the future of the show. Rumor has it that next season will be a split between two stories, one that takes place in the past featuring the Petrelli mother, Mr. Linderman and Soo Loo from Star Trek. The second will be a story set in the aftermath of Peter's explosion while they try to kill of Sylar. Either way I think Heroes has had the best first season of any TV show in the history of the world! I'm dying to see what goes down next monday and similar to Lost I'll pining for next season's premiere all summer. If NBC brings back The Black Donnelys and Friday Night Lights, next year could be another television season to look forward to.

Anyway, make sure to watch the season finales, unless you're too far behind, in that case shell out 30 bucks for the DVDs. Until next time...

Bender Out

So It Goes

I just found out that Kurt Vonnegut has died, now I'm not what you'd call a "reader", but if I have a favorite writer, it's him. He was basically the only guy whose books I bought just because he'd written them. In High school I was never really able to grasp what my teachers were talking about in terms of a writer's personal style, but it becamo so clear to me when I read Slaughter-House Five. In the interest of full disclosure, I only started reading it because I thought that was the type of book that a smart, artistic person would read. To be sure, most people would agree I was considered neither of those back in high school (and probably still not.) His writing really did change my life, if only a tiny bit. His stories were interesting and imaginative, but the writing was brilliant and enthralling, it was more about the journey than the destination. He is certainly deserving of a small tribute before I get on to my usual gibberish. He died yesterday, so it goes.

Speaking of my usual gibberish, American Idol has been going on and I haven;t been keeping up. The last two weeks have been sub-par for me. I definitely wasn't a fan of the Tony Bennett week, although most of the contestants are best suited for such songs, that doesn't mean it's fun for me to listen to it. Rock Chick, Gina Glocksen got voted off which was a bit of a downer, I usually enjoy the contestants who think of themselves as rockers first, I love seeing them try to keep their rock cred every week while singing watered down versions of songs that can't really be captured in a minute and thirty seconds. It was sad to see her go when we could have gotten rid of Phil Stacey, who seems like a nice guy but really doesn;t bring anything to the table. As bad as last week was, this week was a slap in the face. The music didn't fit the skills of the two talented singers, and I'm really starting to fear that this Blake Lewis kid might win, everyone keeps gushing over him but he's awful. Latin music is fun, and it gave Sanjaya yet another look to go for during his performance, but it's not really made for these type of singers who want to turn every song into a ballad and specialize in the Patti LaBelle ending to songs but not much else. I watched both shows, mostly just to see what Sanjaya was gonna do, and also to see what Haley would wear (she looked sexy on both shows this week btw.) Tonight she showed an ample bosom to go along with those long legs, perhaps her legs had distracted me from all the other fine aspects of her figure, I noticed this just before she got voted off!! How could the voters betray me like that? Don't they understand that the hottest girl should be kept on right up until the point where there are only great singers to keep on instead? These rules apply to the train wreck that is Sanjay as well. I'll even let you guys keep that damn Blake Lewis on, but that means that Phil Stacey and Chris Richardson get the boot before the hot girl and the train wreck. I feel like I'm dealing with amateur hour here, who would rather watch Phil sing than Haley? It's completely ridiculous. They announced that next week is Country week. If I wasn't thrilled with the idea of seeing Sanjaya look ridiculous in a cowboy hat, I would boycott next week's show. But I swear, if Sanjaya gets the boot next, I'm not watching until they get a good genre and/or guest singer.

Ok, enough venting about Idol, I've been on a great run in terms of movie watching lately. In the last two weeks I've seen The Lookout, Blades of Glory, and Grindhouse in the theater and caught Layer Cake on video. And all of them delivered at least to expectations. Blades of Glory is not quite on the level of Anchorman or Talladega Nights, but it was pretty damn funny, Amy Poehler and Will Arnett were great as the bad guys and so was Jenna Fisher as their sister. The best of the movies though was The Lookout. It's definitely the best movie so far this year, I can;t recommend it highly enough. The plot sounds like a typical heist movie but the characters are a lot more interesting than most movies that get made these days, the plot may fit together a little too nicely at some points but it's both tense and emotional, and most movies can;t even pull off one of those things these days let alone both. Do yourself a favor, go see it. Anyway that's all I got.

-Bender Out

Entertain Me!

Yesterday I caught up on all my sports thoughts, so I have to get caught up on my entertainment thoughts from the past couple weeks.

First things first, American Idol has had a couple eliminations since I last talked about it. Last week Stephanie Edwards was voted off, and it didn't surprise me that much, strictly from a talent stand point she was probably in the top five, but she never really did it for me. Something about her personality rubbed me the wrong way, as iof she thought she was a lot better than she was, she also seemed a little to ready for the fame, and when you have that lack of likeability you'd better be blowing everyone away with your talent. As far as this weeks elimination of Chris Sligh, well he was kinda the opposite, he was really likeable but he wasn't that talented. His singing was good enough but I never really thought he had a chance because he was too much like Taylor Hicks. Similar contestants never seem to win back to back years, and I think most Idol fans realize that Taylor had no business winning and they couldn't repeat that mistake. I really enjoyed that Gwen Stefani was the celebrity guest this week, she would never make it to the second round in an Idol competition, but she's really hot, very personable and has a great pop sensibilitywhich is far more important for a popstar than straight forward singing talent has ever been. As for Sanjaya sticking around, I'm of the opinion that he's the best thing that ever happened to this year's edition of the show. I tune in to see four people, Lakisha and Melinda cause they sing so damn well, Haley because I've decided she has a great body and sanjaya, because he also has a great body. Wait, no, I meant Sanjaya because he's totally wacky, between his hair-dos and wacky performances it's alomost as if William hung were being brought back week after week. Plus he makes the other more mature contestants seem more legitimate. My real hope at this point is for Sanjaya and Haley to hang around longer than that fraud Blake Lewis, musically he's like a homeless man's JT (thank you, Bill Simmons.) I'm so utterly unimpressed by his performances, and it makes me cry when Simon reacts with anything other than scathing remarks for him. 311 isn;t looking for a new singer, so there's no need to completely bite their style, if goes on and wins this competetion, I swear I won;t watch any more Idol, at least not until next winter anyway.

Just after Idol ended there was another great episode of Lost. Since coming back from their hiatus Lost has had more than a couple episodes that were greatly entertaining, but had nothing to add to the big story. Wednesday's episode was the king of such episodes. It seemed to me like the writers had an old script they had submitted to the new Twilight Zone a few years back but it never made it to air. The episode was great as a one hour experience but it wasn't anything more. Simliar to the last Hurley episode, it was all filler, greatly entertaining filler, but still filler all the same. The worst part of this episode was that they killed off the Nikki character who was quickly emerging as the second hottest woman on the show. Sure Kate is still on the show, but lets say you're on this island, and you're a guy, who are you supposed to go after if you're not Jack or Sawyer? Maybe they can write someone else onto the show, but it's not looking good for the castaways.

All during my TV watching I saw a ton of ads for new movies coming out. since when did so many heavily hyped movies come out in March? Over the last two weeks they've realeased Shooter, Pride, TMNT, The Last Mimzy, Reign Over Me, The Lookout, Blades of Glory, and Meet The Robinsons. I feel like it's the middle of summer, they all had tons of ads, big stars and big hype. This is over two weeks, not to mention it comes on the heels of 300 and just before we get Grindhouse. I'd say that all of these movies are at least worthy of a DVD rental and I'd probably be willing to see TMNT, Reign Over Me and Shooter in the theater if there weren't so many better options right now. Robinsons looks pretty damn funny but it'll have to take a back seat to The Lookout and Blades of Glory which are bordering on must see for me. The Lookout sounds like my kinda movie to begin with but it's also getting great reviews. The best news, Isla Fisher is in it as well and she's damn sexy. As far as Blades fo Glory is concerned, I have yet to miss a Will Ferrell movie in the theaters, and I would never miss the opportunity to see Ferrell doing his Neil Diamond impersonation for an hour and a half.

The best news for me was that they previewed next years pilots on AOL today. It was like they wrote this article just for me. The top highlights on the list of pilots were Football Wives, The Sarah Conner Chronicles, and Cavemen. Football wives is based on the birtish series that was totally over the top, I've never seen Footballers' Wives but I've heard the stories. I expect that the plots wioll be toned way down, there will be a lot less homosexuality in the american version which has of course switched from soccer players to football players. My most bold prediction is that this show will be more successful than the CW series "The Game." That show also centered around football players wives and it was another flop in the storied career of the oh so sexy Brittany Daniel. Do you think Brittany ever walked on the set and longed for the great writing from the series Swan's Crossing? Now Swan's Crossing, that was a show.

The Sarah Conner chronicles is a new series that takes place in between the first two terminator movies. I don;t know if it's gonna be as great as it sounds just because it's tough to make a show like this live up to the movies given the low budget of television, but I'm glad to see them trying, if I had to describe this idea in one word that word would be "awesomeness." As far as the Caveman series goes, it's a full sit-com based on the characters in those Geico.com ads. I love the ads as much as anyone, but I find it hard to believe this show will be a hit. I'll be more than happy to watch all six episodes of the show, maybe I'll sit back and enjoy it while having the roast duck with the mango salsa. I was also excited that Carrie-Anne Moss will star in a new series, it sounds pretty cool, just a new way to approach a mystery, the show all the suspects and tell their version of what happened at the time of the crime. This show could be really cool if it's done right. The other cool things were that Parker Posey, Jordana Bewster and Lucy Liu will all be in new shows and there's apparently a spin-off of Grey's Anatomy, which I won;t watch but should be a big deal. So now I'm starting a countdown for next fall already.

Anyway, That's all for today, enjoy the tourney.

-Bender Out

Idol chatter

Shocking results from American Idol last night where one of the girls who could actually sing was sent home. Sabrina Sloan was probably the fourth best singe, and she even looked like a pop star to boot. I don;t know if it was because she sang that En Vogue song this week or if people just didn't like her for some unknown reason, perhaps she should've followed my advice and dressed sluttier, who knows what could've happened. The second biggest surprise was that Sundance Head was sent packing. I was never really that impressed by him, they'd been hyping him up since his initial audition, but he never really backed it up. He sang "Jeremy" on Tuesday, and when I heard him doing it I wanted to cry a little, part of my soul died that night and I'll never be the same. But seriously, that song had no business being on American Idol, I feel like a lot of the audience doesn't even know that song, and his rendition came off a lot like SevenMaryThree, which was a southern rock imitation of those grunge bands from the mid-90s. So truthfully I'm not that upset about Sundance going home, it's more of a situation where I wish they would have put poor Sanjaya out of his misery. Sanjaya has a decent voice but he's akward for a 17 year-old let alone too akward to be on this show, he should come back in about five years. The other two dismissals were a lot more satisfying to me, Antonella Barba was borderline to make it to the final 24, and then with her scandal and everything else it became abvious that she was getting voted through for all the wrong reasons, she'll be better off to just get out of the spotlight and go back to being a normal, attractive young woman who sings well at karaoke night. I actually was very happy to see Jared cotter get voted off. Of all the contestants he seemed to have the most out of touch sense of self. After he was voted off, he seemed legitimitely pissed and shocked, and he even said as much. He probably thought he was the favorite before he got voted off last night, but in reality his singing was medocre by competition standards. The show should pick up next week when they start their theme episodes and only one person will get voted off per week. Hopefully Sanjaya will get voted off, but if not him my predition is Jordin Sparks again. She seems to not really have her own niche and comes off as a less talented version of Melinda, but that's just one man's opinion. That's all I've got on Idol for this week, I'll be back soon to talk about March Madness, a lot of crazinees this week to see who will get into the tourney, til then.

-Bender Out

Brief Hiatus

I'm back to do a little recap of the last week. I've been in mourning since Eddie Murphy was snubbed at the Oscars last week. That whole best supporting actor category was full of great candidates, I would've been somewhat happy with any decision so long as Mark Walberg didn't get the nod. I always end up rooting for the person who is least likely to be back for a second chance, such as Bill Murray a couple years ago in Lost in Translation. This year both Eddie Murphy and Jackie Earle Haley fit the bill, I don;t think anyone could've imagined Murphy or Haley ever getting a nomination, in fact most people didn't even know that the former Kelly Leak was still acting. Anyway, seeing Alan Arkin win the Oscar was a little disappointing even though I like him and he seemingly got the edge because he's been pretty great for a long time and this was in some ways a lifetime achievement award. I enjoyed Little Miss Sunshine and I enjoy the idea of a comedy getting a nomination, but Little Miss Sunshine didn't seem best picture worthy to me, and it somehow became one of the more overrated comedies in recent history.

I just have to comment on American Idol, in case you were worried I'm still completely hung up on the show even though the shows came and went without a comment so far. Well there's so much still on my mind three full days later. First off, Kelly Pickler still looks phenomenal, she may look a little different, switching to a more traditional country look and filling out in some areas, but she was filling out that blue dress better than the designer had ever imagined. On to the eliminations. I was pissed to see Leslie Hunt sent packing, she sang well enough and she had a quiet unassuming nature, I'm just thinking that her lack of self promotion and ego in addition to that awful song did her in. I had never heard that song before, but from now on I'm going to remember it as the stupid song that eliminated two contestants in one week. Poor AJ Tabaldo was done in by that song, and perhaps the whole, "is he gay?" thing. As for Nick and Alaina, they didn't really impress me, despite the fact that Nick was a local kid, he was still my least favorite, and alaina was probably going to go only as far as her looks could take her. My last note on the show was that Sanjaya completely over-acted the shocked reaction that he wasn;t going home. He probably really did think he deserved to go home, but he wanted to make sure that even the least perceptive viewers could tell that was his thinking. It was the level of acting you might see in one of those awful Skinemax movies, not the great ones that featured Shannon Tweed or Lisa Boyle/Cassandra Leigh, I'm talking about the really low budget ones like the new one with Tanya from the Real World. But I digress, I'll give Sanjaya a pass because he's young, my predictions for next weeks eliminations are Sanjaya, Jared Cotter, (both of which will have Paula near tears) for the men, and Haley and Jordin for the women, proving that people will continue to vote for Antonella for all the wrong reasons. By the way, Paula won't shed a tear for any woman eliminated.

A few quick TV notes, the season finales of both Monk and Psych aired on Friday. Do yourself a favor and add both of these shows to your Tivo, they are similar quirky mystery/comedy shows which I enjoy greatly. On Psych there's great chemistry within the cast and Dule Hill seems a lot more suited to this comedic sidekick role than being a bit player in a vastly overrated White house drama. And if you don;t know about Monk by now, you really should, it was always a good show but it really kicked it up to the next level when Traylor Howard joined the cast, she really should be this generation's Meg Ryan, I don;t understand why she hasn't done more movies.

Speaking of that overrated White House drama, I completely gave up on Studio 60. It was a great idea for a show, but the execution hasn't quite done it for me. They should have spent more time figuring out how to write funny jokes, and less time on the "who cares" romance between Matthew Perry and that blonde Christian character. The Black Donnellys, which is currently airing in Studio 60's spot was surprisingly good, to the point where I'll be watching the next few episodes in hopes of it being the next great show.

Thats all I'm gonna get into for now, I'll be back soon to update all my sports thoughts, there's been a lot going on especially in College Basketball. but for now...

-Bender Out

American Idol Results

Ever since season two I've been completely hooked by Idol, and at this point I can;t bear the idea of not putting my two cents in after every show. I was a little disappointed tonight to see that Paul Kim was voted out. He was one of my early favorites, not necessarily to win the competition, but I enjoyed his performances. Maybe people were put off by the fact that he didn't wear shoes, and admittedly his song selection wasn't great, but he had a great voice and should have made the final twelve. As for the other three, I can't really complain, I didn't think much of any of them, I would've rather seen Antonella Barba go home than Nicole Tranquillo, I think she just picked a bad song and had enough talent to stay around. The highlight of the show for me was that Simon acted like a dick to the very end, throwing one last shot at Rudy after he'd been voted off. The lowlight was Fantasia's performance, not that there's anything wrong with her, but I'm definitely not the intended audience.

Enough about Idol, there were a bunch of little things in the sports world I wanted to mention. A big night in the NBA, Dwyane Wade dislocated his shoulder and should be out for about 6 weeks. He'll back in time for the playoffs, but right now the heat are very much in danger of finishing on the outside looking in. It was tough to watch Wade start crying on the sideline and then to see him rolled off in a wheelchair seemed like a bit much for a shoulder injury. The real highlight of the night for me was when Shaq dunked on Mutombo then wagged the finger in his face, the refs gave him a technical, but it was probably worth it, Mutombo has probably wagged his finger over a thousand times, and Shaq may have even been a victim before. The only other noteworthy event was the lack of trades before today's deadline. I guess Andrew Bynum is too much to ask in return for one of the best point guards of all-time. I don;t know if Kidd would've made the Lakers a champion, but I think they're rating Bynum too highly.

A mixed bag of news for the Patriots fans, Adalius Thomas will be available as a free agent, and the Pats could definitely use him. He'd fit right into their style, unfortunately he'll probably be getting huge offers due to the raised salary cap and the lack of other free agents. The really bad news for the Pats is that Chad Jackson has a torn ACL and it's just another sign pointing to Jackson being a huge bust.

Last note today, good luck to one of my favorite baseball players of the last ten years, the mighty El Guapo is making a comeback. Rich Garces signed with the Nashua Pride in hopes of making it back to the bigs, if nothing else it should sell a few tickets for the Pride.

That's all I've got for today.

-Bender Out

American Idol: Day 2

I've been having fun with the beginning of the live American Idol episodes, but I have to begin with a crazy story. Tommy "The Duke" Morrison, claiming that he never really was HIV positive. This story just doesn;t make any sense, no matter what the truith is. Morrison retired ten years ago due to a positive test for HIV, but now he says it was a false positive. Wouldn't you take a second test just to make sure? If it really was a doctor's mistake, wouldn;t he be unleashing a nasty lawsuit against his doctors? If he really was and is carrying the HIV virus, how could he get doctors in Arizona to say that tests now show he has no signs of it? This is not the end of the story, they really need to answer these questions in the future. The biggest question is, why would Tommy Gunn get back in the ring now? He was a mediocre boxer ten years ago, and there's no reason that should be any different now, in fact he should be a step or two lower on the totem poll, to the point where medocrity is something he could strive for. There's even a chance that his return bout goes so poorly, that no one will care what the truth is in this case.

Onto entertainment, which is usually more upbeat, but tonight I have sad news. Tomorrow night is the final episode of the OC. I know many of you are shocked to hear that this show was even still on the air, but it was, and it will be for one more night. The show never delivered on its initial promise, it could have been something much more, but sadly it burned out faster than Dawson's Creek. Perhaps if they had concentrated on Rachel Bilson more, put in some plotlines where she hung out in a bikini for a whole summer's worth of episodes, but alas, it's all too little too let. I'm actually glad it's finally being put to rest mercifully, I found everything after the first six episodes to be unwatchable, there was buzz about a hot lesbian relationship and some other racy storylines but it never had the magic of Bevery Hills 90210 and will be forgotten much sooner.

Ok, now for my favorite guilty pleasure, trying to decide who is the hottest girl on this year's edition of American Idol. Well unfortunately, this year my rooting interst will have to based on talent. There are certainly no Carrie Underwoods or Kelly Picklers in this crowd. I watched closely, hoping to find a diamond in the rough and the best I could come up with were Haley Scarnato, who has the same body as the post-idol Katherine McPhee and Nicole Tranquillo who looked good right up to the point where she started making ridiculous faces when she started singing. The worst news is that these two girls, along with the mildly attractive Antonella Barba and Alainna Alexander, will be gone soon. I lump those last two girls together for no other reason than they blend together in my mind, and I'm completely unimpressed. All hope is not lost, if Sabrina Sloan or Amy Krebs starts dressing sluttier, they could be darkhorses over time. They would have to be counting on "hottest girl at the party" factor. You know, the interesting phenomenon where a guy will convince himself that a mildly attractive girl is really hot due to the fact that there are no other decent looking girls around. But the most likely scenario is that I'll have to root for one of the girls who isn;t really attractive but is very likable and talented as well. The three most likable contestants were the girls that had that "gee shucks" factor. They were very unassuming and they got they based on their voices as opposed to their "star factor." The three women in this category are Leslie Hunt, Jordina Sparks and Melinda Doolittle. Hunt is goofy and likeable , she's a dog-walker by day, and the most unassuming contestant this year, she sang Natural Woman, and her voice sounded good, (worth noting, her brother Mike stood up and cheered loudly.) Sparks is this years young girl contestant, and she's sweet and sings pleasing songs, but will eventually lose out because of her lack of understanding of the songs. And Doolittle is a great singer who could win if she can get over the idea in her head that she isn;t a star. The most impressive performance was Lakisha Jones, who stands alone as the favorite right now, she sang the song from Dreamgirls and managed to put Jennifer Hudson to shame. But I'm not one for hopping on the bandwagon, so as of now I'm rooting For Melinda Doolittle.

General observations on the show, it drives me crazy when the performers song songs that I don;t know or they try their own arrangement of a famous song. Save that for the later rounds, these two types of performances would strike me as the best way to get yourself eliminated early on. Also, I've long suspected that they line up the performances based on how well they do in rehearsals, and after tonight there's no doubt in my mind. Are you going to tell me that it's just a coincidence that the girl who was by far the best was last on the show? It'll become more and more clear as the season goes on if you hadn;t noticed it already in the past.

The real star of this show is definitely Simon Cowell. He makes this show what it is. Not just with his analysis which everyone seems to think is mean spirited but is probably the most honest thing coming form any of the judges, but more for his "bad-guy" personality. Sometimes it reminds me of watching wrestling, I half expect him to turn to the audience and start shouting "shut up" while he covers his ears. It really is great entertainment, tonight's highlight was when he claimed Ryan Seacrest was trying to hit on one of the women, and Seacrest didn;t know how to react. On one hand, it was a nice way to combat the gay rumors, but on the other hand he's supposed to fight with Simon. Seacrest decided not to shout back, "Don't you know I'm gay you idiot?" Instead he didn;t respond.

On a final note in the world of sports. Maceo Baston had a nasty dunk for the Pacers tonight. I bring this up not because I'm all about nasty dunks, but because I had no idea that Baston was still around. It's been over ten years since he was trying to become part of the new Fab Five at michigan, that's a long time for someone to still be grinding it out without ever really making it in the NBA, anyway, good for him.

As Always

-Bender Out

Trade Talking

Trade deadlines are a funny thing, in some ways they are the most exciting part of the season, but in other ways, nothing ever happens. Every year there are huge names thrown out there in trade rumors, and then the deadline comes and goes without anything close to a blockbuster deal. Of course there are exceptions, a few years ago Gary Payton got traded for Ray Allen, but other years the biggest name was Scott Brooks. So right now we're hearing huge names, (Jason Kidd, Vince Carter, Pau Gasol, Mike Bibby, even Keving Garnett,) but my money is on no big deals. The main reason is that unlike baseball, there is much better value in trading a star during the off-season as opposed to mid-season. Most of the offers these teams will get will involve draft picks, and they want to be sure that those draft picks are as high in June as they think they'll be now. The only guys who make any sense to be traded now are Kidd and Carter. Kidd because of his marital troubles off the court and Carter because his contract is up at the end of the year. The problem is that no teams are willing to risk giving up good players in return, because they don't want to mess too much with their chemistry that has them succesful to this point. The Lakers are rumored to be offering Jordan Farmar, Kwame Brown and Chris Mihm for Kidd. I can't imagine that New Jersey could get at all excited about that group, especially since the key piece coming their way would be Farmar and the Nets already have a rookie poiunt guard they're high on in Marcus Williams. I hope I'm wrong and all the aforementioned stars are traded in the next day, but history says we won't be so lucky.

That's enough sports for today, I wanted to give some initial thoughts on the first night of the American Idol live competitions. It was the twelve guys last night, and there really weren't too many highlights from a singing perspective. The most notable things were the beat box kid who just sang a normal song, and the asian guy who decided not to wear any shoes. I wasn't really a fan of the no shoes thing, but I like the way he sings, hopefully he'll be around for a while. Thoughts about the competition in general are that a lot of people are going for style over substance. I guess this is the Taylor Hicks factor, they're intentionally angling to be very likable and quirky to make up for a lack of pure talent. Taylor was not the most talented contestant last year but he felt the music, danced poorly and he had gray hair, all of which got him a lot of votes. This year's most obvious Taylor Hicks impersonation is being made by a kid named Chris Sligh. Sligh looks lack Jack Osbourne but has a good enough voice and is trying to ooze personality. In his pre-show interview he basically stated that his strategy was to stand out in ways other than singing, which while it is a good strategy, should never be stated on the show. Also worthy of noting is how overhyped this kid Sundance Head has proven to be. He's gotten a lot of camera time, and he's got personality, but it seems like every performance is worse than the one before. He probably won;t get voted off right away because he is unique, but if there is any justice he won;t make it to the final twelve.

As for the show in general, the best part last night was the battle of the divas. Ryan Seacrest vs. Simon Cowell in an insult war, which is kinda fun because they both deserve it. I'm expecting an impromptu edition of "Yo Momma" to break out before the end of the season, complete with guest appearance by Fes himself, Wilmer Valderrama.

I am an unapologetic fan of these reality/competition shows, going back to watching Starsearch in my youth. That's half the reason I'm pumped for the new season of Dancing with the Stars. There aren't any really sexy ladies a la Stacy Keibler, but I was happy to see Ian Ziering on the list for this season. The world needs more Steve Sanders, I've always been a fan of his since he became my first ever celebrity sighting outside of The Atrium Mall in Chestnut Hill, he and Luke Perry were out one of those insane celebrity appearances they were doing when 90210 first got on the air. Their combined age at the time of that sighting, a youthful 80 years old.

That's all for today.

-Bender Out