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Retro Television Review: Hang Time 4.7 “Assault and Pepper Spray” and 4.8 “High Hoops”

Posted on by Lisa Marie Bowman

Welcome to Retro Television Reviews, a feature where we review some of our favorite and least favorite shows of the past!  On Mondays, I will be reviewing Hang Time, which ran on NBC from 1995 to 2000.  The entire show is currently streaming on YouTube!

This week, it’s all about self-defense and marijuana at Deering High!

Episode 4.7 “Assault and Pepper Spray” 

(Dir by Patrick Maloney, originally aired on October 3rd, 1998)

This was a weird episode.  Kristy has a job working at the mall.  Since this is a Peter Engel-produced show, that job involves wearing an ugly outfit and selling corny dogs.  One night, when she gets off work, she’s mugged.  Despite her efforts to try to move on with her life, she still struggles with PTSD.  So far, so good.  I’ve been in similar situations and it’s not something you ever really get over, even if you do eventually manage to get on with your life.  After taking a self-defense class and discovering that she’s not good at beating people up, Kristy decides to carry pepper spray instead.  The next night, while she’s walking out to her car, someone comes up behind her.  Startled, Kristy uses the pepper spray.  OH NO, SHE JUST SPRAYED MICHAEL!

Now, don’t get me wrong.  It sucks that Michael got sprayed in the face.  I carry pepper spray myself and I’ve accidentally sprayed myself in the face enough time that I know what it can do.  (That’s one reason why I carry it.)  But Michael also knew what had happened to Kristy earlier so he should have known better than to sneak up on her.  Everyone on the show acts as if Kristy drew a gun, turned around and shot Michael but all Kristy did was spray him in the face.  (And again, it really was Michael’s fault that he got sprayed in the first place.)  Feeling guilty, Kristy says she’s going to give up the pepper spray and take another self-defense course.  No, Kristy!  The pepper spray worked!   Just because Michael ends up crying about it, that doesn’t mean that the pepper spray was a bad idea.  If Kristy had sprayed someone other than Michael, everyone would be talking about how lucky she was to have it with her.

I mean, take me for instance.  I run.  I dance.  I know how to kick.  I like to think that I’m in pretty good shape.  But if some dude who outweighs me by over a hundred pounds is coming at me, I’m going for the pepper spray.

The plot of this episode left a bad, coppery taste in my mouth and brought tears to my eyes.  Let’s move on.

Episode 4.8 “High Hoops”

(Dir by Patrick Maloney, originally aired on October 3rd, 1998)

Rico is eating more than usual.  He’s laughing at strange moments.  He’s paranoid about people sneaking up on him.  He’s screwing up at practice.

OH MY GOD, RICO’S ON THE WEED!

Which weed?

THE WEED WITH ROOTS IN HELL!

Yes, this is another Peter Engel-produced television show about the dangers of marijuana.  This time, it’s Rico who is getting high and running the risk of hurting himself and his friends.  The team discovers that Rico is now a stoner when he opens up his locker and a baggie of weed literally flies out of it.  Rico says that pot is no big deal.  Hammer says that his cousin used to think the same thing but now he lives in the park and thinks that he’s a squirrel.  (I think Hammer’s cousin may have been doing something more than just marijuana if that’s the case.)  The team is scandalized and who can blame them?  Athletes doing drugs?  WHO EVER HEARD OF SUCH A THING!?

(Wow, I’m doing a lot of yelling today.)

Despite knowing that Rico is now a drug fiend, Hammer still asks him to fix the brakes on his motorcycle.  Unfortunately, Rico gets too stoned to fix the brakes and Hammer ends up having a serious accident as a result.  You have to wonder why Hammer would have trusted Rico with that responsibility to begin with, especially considering that this episode has an entire B-plot about Mary Beth, Kristy, and Michael taking auto shop because they think it’ll be an easy A.

(It turns out that not only is not an easy A but Kristy manages to get trapped in the trunk of the teacher’s car while installing a radio.  It was kind of dumb but, as I’ve said more than a few times, Megan Parlen and Amber Barretto were a strong enough comedic team that they could wring laughs out of even the dumbest of situations.)

Anyway, Hammer comes back to school with his arm in a sling and looking for revenge.  He uses his one good arm to try to beat up Rico, which is all it takes for Rico to realize that he needs to clean up his act.  So, the lesson here is to beat up all of your drug-abusing friends but don’t use pepper spray if they come at you.

I’m glad that’s cleared up.

Retro Television Reviews: The Screaming Woman (dir by Jack Smight)

Posted on by Lisa Marie Bowman

Welcome to Retro Television Reviews, a feature where we review some of our favorite and least favorite shows of the past!  On Sundays, I will be reviewing the made-for-television movies that used to be a primetime mainstay.  Today’s film is 1972’s The Screaming Woman!  It  can be viewed on YouTube!

In this made-for-tv movie from 1972, the great Olivia de Havilland plays Laura Wynant. Laura is a wealthy woman who has just been released from a mental institution. She goes to her country estate to recuperate but, as soon as she arrives, she starts to hear a woman’s voice in the back yard.

“help me …. help me….” the voice cries.

Laura looks around and she soon realizes that the voice is coming from the ground! A woman has been buried alive in the backyard and will soon die if not rescued! At first Laura tries to dig up the woman on her own but her hands are crippled by arthritis. An attempt to get a neighborhood child to help her dig just leads to Laura being confined to her home, under doctor’s orders. No matter how much Laura tries to get the people around her to listen for the sound of the woman crying for help, everyone just assume that Laura must be imagining things.

Further complicating things is the fact that the person who put the woman in the ground is still out there. And, when he discovers that Laura has been hearing voices, he decides that maybe he needs to do something about both Laura and the screaming woman….

The Screaming Woman is an effective psychological thriller and, considering that it was made for early 70s network television, surprisingly suspenseful. If the film were remade today, I imagine it would try to keep us guessing as to whether or not Laura was hearing an actual woman or if it was all in her mind.  However, by revealing early on that Laura actually is hearing what she thinks she’s hearing, The Screaming Woman puts us right into Laura’s shoes and we share her frustration as she desperately tries to get someone — anyone — to take her seriously. It helps that Laura is played by Olivia de Havilland, who gives a very sympathetic and believable performance. De Havilland, who started her career appearing in Errol Flynn movies back in the 30s and who most famously played Melanie in Gone With The Wind, was one of the longest-lived stars of Hollywood’s Golden Age, living to the age of 104 and winning two Academy Awards for Best Actress.

The film is based on a short story by Ray Bradbury. In the story, it’s a little girl — as opposed to an old woman — who hears the voice. I haven’t read the short story so I don’t know how else it compares to this adaptation but, as a film, The Screaming Woman is an entertaining and creepy thriller and, when viewed today, it serves as a reminder of what a good actress Olivia De Havilland truly was.  She takes a simple thriller and turns it into a meditation on aging and the one person’s determination to do the right thing even when the entire world seems to be against her.

Lisa Marie’s Week In Television: 3/26/23 — 4/1/23

Posted on by Lisa Marie Bowman

Here’s some thoughts on what I watched this week!

Accused (Tuesday Night, FOX)

This week’s episode featured a couple seeking revenge on a white supremacist who drove a car into a protest and who was never punished for his crime.  The search for vengeance is usually a compelling topic and the episode had the potential to explore some very interesting ethical issues but, as has been the case for many of Accused‘s more recent episodes, it was all a bit too heavy-handed to really work.  It didn’t help that this week’s episode was rather poorly acted by almost everyone involved.  A part of me thinks that Accused‘s biggest weakness is its anthology format.  Between introducing a new group of characters on a weekly basis and also trying to tell a complex story, Accused often seems as if it’s trying to cram a bit too much into just 45 minutes of runtime.

The Bachelor (Monday Night, ABC)

It’s over, that’s the important thing.  It’s hard not to feel that, for all of the drama surrounding sex week, Zach mostly just slept with Gabi because he knew he probably wasn’t ever going to see her again after he dumped her for Kaity.  This was a season of The Bachelor that left me feeling just a little bit icky so let us never speak of it again.

Dirty Pair (YouTube)

I watched this 90s anime on Saturday morning.  The plot was next to impossible to follow but a lot of things blew up and the theme song was pretty cool.

Farmer Wants A Wife (Wednesday Night, FOX)

Agck!  Listen, just because you marry a farmer doesn’t mean that you have to castrate a bull.  Seriously, I’ve spent some time on some farms and I’ve seen some bulls and I assume that I’ve met some people who have castrated bulls but it was definitely not something that I needed to know about or be in any way involved with.  Just saying.

Five Days At Memorial (Apple TV+)

I started watching this absolutely devastating miniseries on Saturday.  I’ve still got one episode left to watch so I’m going to hold off on saying much more about the show until I’ve watched that episode.  I will say that Five Days At Memorial, which deals with what happened at a New Orleans hospital in the aftermath of Katrina, features some truly horrific images but it’s not just out to shock the audience.  There’s a lot going on beneath the surface and it’s impossible to watch this series without wondering what you would have done if you had found yourself in the same situation as the doctors and the nurses at Memorial Hospital.  I’d like to think that I would have refused to abandon my patients.  I would also like to think that I would have been the one person willing to stand up to the doctors who had decided to play God.  But, in the end, it’s impossible for me to say what I would have done in that situation because I’ve never been in that situation.

Ghosts (Thursday Night, CBS)

Todd, the obnoxious podcaster, returned!  Alberta was happy when her great-granddaughter checked into the B&B but Alberta was much less happy when it looked like she might hook up with Todd.  This was a sweeet episode.  Not only was it nice to watch Alberta discover that her talent had been passed down to her descendants but it’s always enjoyable to watch the ghosts recoil from Todd’s very presence.

Half Nelson (YouTube)

I reviewed Half Nelson here!

Law & Order (Thursday Night, NBC)

I enjoyed this week’s episode of Law & Order, mostly because everyone from Cosgrove to Sam to McCoy got a chance to call Price out for being arrogant and self-righteous.  Sam is typically such an underwritten character that it was immensely satisfying to watch her shut down Price with an armor-piercing one liner.  (It’s just unfortunate that the show left some ambiguity as to whether Sam’s anger was motivated by her ethics or her feelings for Price.)  Price definitely did not prove the judge’s guilt beyond a reasonable doubt and I imagine the verdict will get overturned on appeal.  To be honest, I kind of suspect that’s what happens with most of the guilty verdicts on this show because some of Price’s legal strategies are seriously unconstitutional.

(No, I don’t know why I’m taking Law & Order so personally.  If I can figure out why, I’ll let you know.)

The Love Boat (Paramount Plus)

I wrote about The Love Boat here!

Night Court (Tuesday Night, NBC)

I watched it but I don’t remember a thing about it.  I do know that I groaned whenever anyone other than Abbi and/or Dan was onscreen.

Poker Face (Peacock)

“Play Staplehead!”  I watched the fourth and the fifth episodes of Poker Face this week.  After initially being hesitant about the show, I have to say that I’m pretty much hooked now.  The fourth episode, with the heavy metal band murdering their drummer so that they could steal a song that he unwittingly stole from an old sitcom, was wonderfully executed.

Saved By The Bell (Wednesday, E!)

E! was doing a Saved By The Bell marathon!  I watched the No Hope With Dope episode.  I loved how everyone else was talking about celebrities who had died as a result of doing too much cocaine and Jessie immediately started talking about how she was hooked on caffeine pills for a week.  Like, I get the feeling Jessie probably brought up that experience a lot and her friends probably got tired of having to listen to her go on about it.

Survivor (Wednesday Night, CBS)

I wrote about Survivor here.  Poor Matthew!  He seemed like a genuinely good guy and my heart broke for him when he talked about how much pain he was in.  That said, if I never have to watch that clip of him falling off a cliff again, I’ll be happy.  Seriously, I was shocked he wasn’t pulled from the game earlier.  (I do hope that he gets a second chance.)

Tulsa King (Paramount Plus)

I finally got around to watching the first episode of this show.  Sylvester Stallone plays an old school mobster who is released from prison and sent down to Oklahoma by his bosses.  The Family says that they want Stallone to set up business down there but actually, they just want to get him out of New York.  I have to admit that, as much as I like Stallone, I didn’t care much for the first episode.  Maybe if everyone in Tulsa was a jerk, it would be fun to watch Stallone threaten them but everyone seemed to be so nice that I just wanted Stallone to go back to New York.  I’ve been assured, though, that the show gets better so I’m not going to give up on Tulsa King just yet.

Waco: American Apocalypse (Netflix)

This three-part docuseries about the siege of the Branch Davidian compound in Waco is a real Rorschach test.  Do you watch it and see a story about a manipulative and dangerous cult leader or do you watch it and see a record of law enforcement incompetence and government arrogance?  Either way, it was a fascinating and thought-provoking look at the tragic siege.

Welcome to Chippendales (Hulu)

I binged this miniseries on Sunday.  It was enjoyable in its own tacky way.  Murray Bartlett was well-cast as the doomed choreographer.  Kumail Nanjiani should play more villains.

Yellowjackets (Showtime)

I’m glad that Yellowjackets is back for a second season and I’m intrigued to see what happens.  But seriously, I am so worried about what’s going to happen to the new dog!

Retro Television Reviews: California Dreams 4.13 “We’ll Always Have Aspen” and 4.14 “Lorena’s Place”

Posted on by Lisa Marie Bowman

Welcome to Retro Television Reviews, a feature where we review some of our favorite and least favorite shows of the past!  On Saturdays, I will be reviewing California Dreams, which ran on NBC from 1992 to 1996.  The entire show is currently streaming on YouTube!

The California Dreams are in Aspen!  Wait …. what?

Episode 4.13 “We’ll Always Have Aspen”

(Dir by Miguel Higuera, originally aired on January 6th, 1996)

This episode opens with the California Dreams in Aspen, Colorado, hanging out at the Costa Ski Lodge.  Why are they there?  They’re there because this episode was originally meant to air during season 3, after the episode where the Dreams went to the ski lodge and convinced Lorena’s father not to kick that old crank out of his isolated cabin.  Why did NBC hold off on showing this episode for so long?  I’m not sure but it certainly does lead to some odd continuity errors.  For instance, Tony announces that he’s “hunting ski bunnies.”  Obviously, this was meant to air before Tony and Sam became a couple.  Lorena and Jake are also dating in this episode.

This episode is also one of the rare ones to focus on Mark.  Mark is shocked to discover that his ex-girlfriend, Jenny (Catherine Nagan), is staying at the lodge.  As he explains it, he and Jenny were once totally in love but then Jenny left him so that she could train to be on the U.S. Olympic skiing team.  At first, Mark refuses to speak to Jenny but then Jenny explains that leaving him was the biggest mistake of her life and that she is tired of skiing.  Mark and Jenny spend the day together and Mark realizes that Jenny actually does love skiing too much to give it up.  So, Mark gets dumped again but this time, he was the one who suggested that Jenny should break up with him so I guess he feels better about the only member of the Dream to never have a romantic partner for longer than one episode.

In the B-plot, Lorena’s father leaves Lorena in charge while he goes off to do …. well, I’m not sure why he left.  But him leaving means that Lorena is in charge of the big winter festival.  Why would her father leave Lorena, who is a teenager, in charge of the Lodge’s biggest event?  I’m starting to suspect that he is just not a very good businessman.  Anyway, all of this leads to Jake having to wear a silly costume and Sly taking part in a yodeling contest.  That was kind of funny.

This wasn’t a bad episode and it was nice to see Lorena and Jake back together but …. eh.  The California Dreams belong the beach.  They’re surfers not skiers.

Episode 4.14 “Lorena’s Place”

(Dir by Don Barnhart, originally aired on March 30th, 1996)

The first thing that I noticed about the 14th episode of the fourth season of California Dreams is that it aired over two months after the 13th episode, which itself was an episode that had been filmed for the 3rd season.  I don’t know what exactly was going on behind the scenes at NBC but it appears that the network decided to end season 4 by burning off a few old episodes that, for whatever reason, didn’t air when they were originally supposed to.

(Of course, Saved By The Bell did the same thing.  The episode where Screech is made hall monitor was filmed for the first season but, oddly, didn’t air until after the show’s Graduation episode.)

This episode finds the Dreams back in California.  Eager to date a pretentious douchebag named Alan, Lorena turns her loft into a coffeehouse and hosts a poetry reading.  Lorena also reads Alan a poem that her father wrote for her mother but which Lorena claims that she wrote for Alan.  Alan is so impressed that he memorizes the poem.  Then, after Lorena tells him the truth, he destroys the poem.

Oh no!

Not to worry.  The Dreams hold another coffeehouse reading.  Alan, for some reason, comes to that one as well and recites the poem.  Sam records his words and recreate the poem for Lorena’s parents.  So, not only is the poem saved but Lorena gets a new boyfriend!  But Alan kind of sucks so hopefully, he’ll never show up again.

This episode was very 90s but it was a Lorena episode and, since Lorena is the character to whom I most relate, I enjoyed it.

Next week: Season 4 comes to an end!

Retro Television Reviews: Half Nelson 1.3 “The Deadly Vase”

Posted on by Lisa Marie Bowman

Welcome to Retro Television Reviews, a new feature where we review some of our favorite and least favorite shows of the past! On Fridays, I will be reviewing Half Nelson, which ran on NBC from March to May of 1985. Almost all nine of the show’s episodes can be found on YouTube!

The pilot for Half Nelson was pretty good!  Now, let’s see if this rest of the show lived up to its promise.

Episode 1.3 “The Deadly Vase”

(Directed by Alan Cooke, originally aired on March 29th, 1985)

I cannot escape Robert Reed.

Seriously!  Robert Reed is one of those actors who seems to show up every week in my retro television reviews.  If he wasn’t starring in The Brady Bunch Hour, he was guesting on The Love Boat or Fantasy Island.  And now, he’s the guest villain in this week’s episode of Half Nelson!

Reed, with his graying perm and his aging porn star mustache, plays Seymour Griffith.  Griffith is a fabulously wealthy Beverly Hills attorney who is planning on becoming even more wealthy by stealing a valuable vase and selling it to a crooked antiques dealer named Morgan (Cesar Romero).  Unfortunately, while stealing the vase, Griffith kills the owner.  (Griffith is also having an affair with the dead man’s wife.)  Somewhat inconveniently, for Griffith, the dead man was a client of the Beverly Hills Patrol!  Rocky Nelson is on the case, both because he’s romantically pursuing the dead man’s daughter (Michelle Johnson) and also because Rocky believes in justice.

This week’s villains

The tone of The Vase is notably different from the pilot that preceded it.  The Pilot had its comedic elements (such as Rocky continually borrowing famous cars from the studio) but it was ultimately fairly serious and it even ended on something of a down note, with Police Chief Parsons (George Kennedy) committing suicide rather than face justice for the murders that he committed.  In the pilot, Rocky was definitely out-of-place as a New Yorker in Los Angeles but, at the same time, he was finding his way around his new town and learning how to fit in.

The Deadly Vase, on the other hand, reimagines Rocky as a short, Italian version of Eddie Murphy’s Axel Foley from Beverly Hills Cop.  Chester (Fred Williamson), who was a supportive boss in the pilot, is suddenly a bit uptight about Rocky investigating a crime in Beverly Hills.  He even sends his newest recruits, Kurt and Beau (played by Bubba Smith and Hang Time‘s Dick Butkus), to follow Rocky around Beverly Hills and make sure that Rocky doesn’t offend any rich people with his New York attitude.  This episode pretty much just duplicates the plot of Beverly Hills Cop.  During one car chase, The Heat Is On plays on the soundtrack and it’s hard not to notice that the other musical cues are almost identical to the ones heard in Beverly Hills Cop.

Smith and Butkus aren’t the only new members of the cast.  Dependable character actor Gary Grubbs joins the show as Detective Hamill, who is far less a fan of Rocky’s than Parsons was.  Hamill shows up long enough to order Rocky to stay off the case and to get growled at by Rocky’s pit bull.  Hamill also gets to have a conversation with Dean Martin about whether or not Frank and Sammy and Shirley MacClaine would be willing to do a benefit for the Beverly Hills police department.  Dean is only onscreen for a few minutes but it’s still nice to see him there.

Joe Pesci, who was so strong in the pilot, spends most of this episode looking more than a little annoyed so I’m going to guess that he may not have been happy with the show’s new direction.  About the only time Pesci seems to be having fun is when Rocky is hired to play a hot dog in a commercial.  The director of the commercial is played by Donald O’Connor and yes, Pesci does wear a hot dog costume.

Joe Pesci getting dressed up like a hot dog pretty much saved this episode as the mystery itself was fairly bland and Robert Reed never really felt like a worthy opponent to Rocky.  Hopefully, next week’s episode will be a bit of an improvement …. or, at least, let’s hope the show finds another excuse to put Joe Pesci in a hot dog costume.

Film Review: Murder Mystery 2 (dir by Jeremy Garelick)

Posted on by Lisa Marie Bowman

Four years ago, Nick and Audrey Spitz (Adam Sandler and Jennifer Aniston) solved a convoluted murder mystery and became minor celebrities.  Nick quit his job with the NYPD.  Audrey quit her job as a hairdresser.  They opened up their own private detective agency.

Unfortunately, as a narrator explains to us at the start of Murder Mystery 2, things haven’t gone smoothly for Nick and Audrey.  They’ve struggled to establish themselves as detectives.  In fact, Nick doesn’t even have a P.I. license because he has yet to pass the exam and he balks at having to actually study criminology.  While Audrey tries to convince him to, at the very least, read a book on kidnapping, Nick is more concerned with coming up with cute business cards.  His big idea to combine the traditional business card with floss and a razor.  Personally, I wouldn’t want to use a business card to take care of my teeth but maybe that’s just me.

When Nick and Audrey are invited to an exclusive wedding, it’s a chance for them to reacquaint themselves with Vikram (Adeel Akhatar) and Colonel Ulenga (John Kani), both of whom were featured in the first Murder Mystery.  When Vikram is kidnapped and one of his bodyguards is murdered, it’s a chance to Nick and Audrey to once again prove that they’re capable of solving a crime.  When former MI6 agent-turned-security consultant Captain Miller (Mark Strong) literally emerges from the sea and takes over the investigation, it’s a chance to Audrey to meet one of her heroes and for Nick to get a little jealous.  And when the action moves to France, it’s an excuse for the film’s cast and crew to hang out in Paris for a few weeks.

I enjoyed the first Murder Mystery, which was a surprisingly sweet and funny comedy that showcased Sandler and Aniston’s chemistry while also make good use of Sandler in one of his more likable comedic roles.  Like all Sandler characters, Nick may be something of a manchild but he’s not deliberately destructive.  He means well.  The first film’s mystery was enjoyably convoluted and a lot of the humor came from just how out of place Sandler and Aniston were in an Agatha Christie-style whodunit.

Murder Mystery 2, unfortunately, it not quite as much fun as the first film.  A huge part of the problem is that Nick and Audrey are no longer amateur detectives who are both shocked and secretly thrilled to be solving an actual murder.  Now, they’re professional (if somewhat incompetent) detectives.  The first film had a sweet subtext about Sandler trying to prove that he was as good a detective as thought he was.  He had something to prove, to both his wife and to himself.  In the second film, the emphasis is more on action than humor.  Suddenly, Sandler and Aniston are engaging in high-speed car chases and battles atop the Eiffel Tower.  It all feels a bit mechanical and, much as with his direction of The Binge, director Jeremy Garelick often seems to just be going through the motions.

On the plus side, Sandler and Aniston still have their chemistry and both of them still know how to make an otherwise corny joke work.  Jennifer Aniston gets to wear a lot of really pretty outfits and Adam Sandler gets a memorable scene where he tries to convince himself that he can jump over a moat.  There’s a genuinely funny moment towards the end of the film, when a character unrelated to the mystery randomly shows up and interrupts a tense showdown.  Even though I wish the film had done a bit more with character, Mark Strong also seems to be having parodying his own image.  There are moments of Murder Mystery 2 that are actually pretty amusing, though I think chuckled more than I actually laughed out loud.  Ultimately, though, Murder Mystery 2 is rather forgettable.

Retro Television Reviews: City Guys 4.10 “Keep on the Download” and 4.11 “Havoc”

Posted on by Lisa Marie Bowman

Welcome to Retro Television Reviews, a feature where we review some of our favorite and least favorite shows of the past!  On Thursdays, I will be reviewing City Guys, which ran on NBC from 1997 to 2001.  The entire show is currently streaming on YouTube!

C.I.T.Y. …. this show is never going to end….

Episode 4.10 “Keep On The Download”

(Dir by Frank Bonner, originally aired on October 21st, 2000)

To be honest, I guess it’s kind of silly that out of all the things that I dislike about City Guys, it’s Chris and Jamal’s radio show that tends to annoy the most.

I mean, I know I spend a lot of time complaining about the way all of the student’s worship Ms. Noble but if there’s anything that truly makes me want to throw something across the room, it’s definitely the sound of Manny and Jamal announcing, “Hello, Manny High!”  The whole radio station thing has never made sense to me and I’ve always had a hard time with the idea of Chris and Jamal becoming radio superstars with their stale schtick.  It also doesn’t help that I’ve never really understood just when exactly Chris and Jamal are doing their show.  Are they broadcasting during class hours?  Are they broadcasting during lunch?  Why does it sometimes seem as if they go several days without even thinking about their radio show just to suddenly have it once become the center of their lives a few episodes later?

This episode establishes that every school in New York City apparently has its own radio station.  Adam and Malik are the radio hosts at Washington Prep and they’ve managed to get an interview with a rapper named Dr. Deej.  After they taunt Chris and Jamal with their success, Chris and Jamal react by trying to get Dr. Deej to appear on their show.  When Jamal can’t get Dr. Deej to return his calls, they decide to just have Chris pretend to be Dr. Deej.

Yes, that’s right.  The very white Chris pretends to be a rapper.  “Yo, yo, yo,” Chris says, “the doctor is in this house, pass me the scalpel, crunch me an apple….”  (Don’t get mad at me, I’m just transcribing.)  The real Dr. Deej calls in to ask how he can be on Chris and Jamal’s show when he’s actually on Adam and Malik’s show.  Uh-oh!

Having been humiliated, Chris and Jamal go over to Washington Prep, break into the booth, and steal the sign with the radio call letters.  Being two huge idiots, Chris and Jamal bring the sign to the roof of Manny High so that everyone can celebrate their thievery.  Ms. Noble sees the sign and is not amused.  When Chris and Jamal say that its just part of a prank war, Ms. Noble informs them the pranks have gone too far and they’re both off the air.  YAY!

Wow, I’m glad that radio stuff is over with.  Let’s move on….

Oh wait, we’re only halfway through the episode.

Adam and Malik announce that they will be broadcasting an on-air funeral for the Chris and Jamal show.  So, Chris and Jamal break into Washington Prep during the middle of the night and they try to sabotage Adam & Malik’s DJ booth.  While trying to move some wires around, they short out an amp.  (Wow, that really escalated.)  Because they’re both extremely stupid, Chis and Jamal break into Washington Prep a second time and attempt to leave a new amp in the DJ booth.  (I’m not sure why, since their stated goal was to sabotage Adam and Malik and they managed to do just that.)  This time, a security guard catches them and, instead of calling the cops, he calls Ms. Noble.

WHAT!?

Anyway, the situation is resolved by letting Adam and Malik use Manny High’s DJ booth until their booth is repaired.  And apparently, Ms. Noble is going to let Chris and Jamal back on the air as well.  I’m not really sure why.  I guess it pays off to break into other schools.

While this is going on, Dawn becomes so obsessed with winning a trophy in the Academic Bowl that she alienates all of her smart teammates and is instead forced to compete with Al and L-Train on her team.  Bizarrely, the Academic Bowl is held on the roof of Manny High and Ms. Noble is the host.  The final question is to list one of the three nicknames for catfish, which really doesn’t sound like an Academic Bowl question.  Because L-Train knows all three of the names, Manny High wins.  L-Train announces that he’s going to take the trophy to a pawn shop.  Ms. Noble, who is so quick to get involved in every aspect of her students’s lives, has no problem with L-Train selling the most prestigious trophy the school has ever won.

Okay, can we move on now?  Yay!

Episode 4.11 “Havoc

(Dir by Frank Bonner, originally aired on October 28th, 2000)

Chis is apparently a guitarist now.  He’s so good that the Screaming Skulls want him to be their new lead guitarist!  But Chris is already in a band, a jazz fusion band with Al, L-Train, and Jamal.  (Their band is called the — *snicker* — Jazz Posse!  I went to a college with a world-famous jazz band and even my jazz-obsessed classmates would not have been caught dead listening to a band called the Jazz Posse.)  How can he be in two bands at the same time?  Actually, quite a few musicians are in multiple bands at the same time but most of them aren’t as dumb as Chris.  Chris he has to make a choice between either being in a world famous rock band or continuing to play on the roof of Manny High.

Jamal acts as if Chris is being selfish for wanting to play with his new band as opposed to spending all of his time with his high school friends.  But, honestly, Jamal kind of sucks.  Never once does he congratulate Chris or even acknowledge that it’s cool that Chris now has proof that he has a possible future as a professional musician.  Instead of being happy for Chris, Jamal immediately start complaining about him not wanting to be in the high school jazz band.  I find it hard to believe that the Al, Jamal, and L-Train couldn’t find someone else to play guitar in their little band.  Is Chris the only guitarist at Manny High?  To the show’s credit, Cassidy actually does call Jamal out for his behavior.  Cassidy goes to Chris’s first gig as a member of the Skulls and discovers that Chris has been replaced by the band because their old guitarist came back.

The next day, Chris lies to everyone at school and says that he’s still in the Skulls.  How exactly does he think he’s going to keep this a secret, as the Skulls have been portrayed as being a pretty famous band?  Chris shows up at the Jazz Posse’s next performance and asks to rejoin the band.  He apologizes for leaving them earlier, despite the fact that Chis has nothing to apologize for and Jamal was the one being a jerk about it.  So, I guess Cassidy calling out Jamal was just something that was done to pad out the episode because no one acknowledges that any musician would rather join a successful band than play in a high school jazz band.

The Jazz Posse plays a show on the roof of Manny High as the end credits roll.  Why does everything have to be on the roof?

Music Video of the Day: Still Alive by Demi Lovato (2023, dir by Jensen Noen)

Posted on by Lisa Marie Bowman

Today’s music video of the day features Demi Lovato living every film lover’s dream.

Seriously, who wouldn’t want to get walk through the streets like a super stylish Bond villain and get to attend a private screening with a select group of your only slightly less stylish friends?  This video features Demi Lovato living the type of life that most people can only dream about.  That’s what makes it a good music video.  A music video should always bring our dreams to life.

Enjoy!