West Week Ever – 7/3/14

That’s right, folks – we’re a day early this week! Nobody’s gonna be online tomorrow, with it being the holiday and all, but I didn’t feel like skipping  a week. So, here we are!

Girl Meets World finally debuted last Friday night, and I almost forgot about it. Luckily, someone tweeted about it that day, so I didn’t miss it. If you were following my livetweets of the show, then you already know my feelings. If not, here we go. At its core, it’s a Disney Channel show. Sure, a lot of us tuned in for the nostalgia factor, but we’re not the target audience. This is a coming of age tale for young teens, and it’s kinda heavy-handed in that aspect. There’s a lot of lines like, “Make this world yours”, which isn’t the kind of stuff you normally get from tween shows. I kinda wanted someone to get into a pie fight or something. I guess I’m too used to iCarly, but it wasn’t…zany enough for me. Oh, and I’m scared Feeny might be dead. Anyway, I’ll tune in for more, as there’s not really much else on Friday nights. Plus, I can’t wait for the episode with Minkus that they teased after the episode.

I stopped by the Redbox last week, and finally got around to checking out the movie her. If you’re not familiar with it, Joaquin Phoenix falls in love with his artificially intelligent operating system. Man, what a weird movie. I heard everyone raving about it, and people genuinely seemed to like it, but I’m not sure I’m in that camp. It’s such a lonely movie, and I don’t envy Joaquin’s character at all. Based on his personality, it’s easy to see how he’d fall for the first thing that showed interest in him. It seems to take place in the not so distant future, but it’s a future I’m not sure I wanna live to see. Everything just seems to sterile and boring. Has human interaction become so strained and foreign that people are looking for it in other places? It just doesn’t seem like a happy existence. Anyway, the movie certainly leaves you with a lot to think about.

Comedy Central started the new season of The Half Hour, and last week featured comedian Ron Funches. I LOVE this guy, and it’s not just because he kinda sounds like Cleveland Brown. I first learned about him from Aisha Tyler’s Girl on Guy podcast, and I’ve been following him ever since. He was in the pilot for Enlisted, and he’s also a supporting character on NBC’s Undateable. If you can catch his special On Demand, do it ’cause it’s hilarious!

Speaking of comedy, Lindsay made us watch Whitney Cummings: I Love You. I tend to like Whitney’s television ventures, as I liked her NBC series and I like 2 Broke Girls. That said, I’ve never really liked her standup. She has one special where she basically yells the whole time, and it’s so annoying that I’ve never been able to sit through it. Well, this special was just as bad. Apparently, she recently went through a breakup, and man does it show! The entire hour is basically about how much guys suck, and how all they think about is sex, yadda, yadda, yadda. I was pretty much done 20 minutes in, but there were parts that Lindsay seemed to like, so maybe it wasn’t for males. I dunno. Needless to say, I DON’T recommend it.

It’s been announced that the long-awaited 1966 Batman series will finally be released in November. The available formats include DVD, Blu-Ray, and digital streaming, plus there will be a bunch of special features. To commemorate the release, there will be a special panel at San Diego Comic-Con with Adam West, Burt Ward, and Julie Newmar. I know this is big news for a lot of people, but I’m fine with my convention bootleg DVD set. They’re gonna really have to bring it with the special features for me to consider getting this.

I don’t know how I forgot to write about this, but Arsenio‘s canceled. I kinda unofficially found myself on Arsenio Watch, and he had become quite the staple of West Week Ever. Well, even though a second season had been ordered, the studio reneged and decided that he wasn’t attracting as much of an audience as they would have liked. In fact, Jay Leno even appeared on Arsenio’s show, announcing the second season. So, I guess we can chalk this up to another instance of Leno ruining everything he touches. Anyway, Arsenio got the axe. The show is losing its timeslots across the country, but it still comes on here. They’re just showing old episodes until the end of the Summer.

I’m not much of a Transformers guy, but I know that some of you are. If that’s the case, make sure you head over to The Robot’s Pajamas, as this week is Transformers Week. Vincent’s got a lot of great content, especially from some guest bloggers with whom you may not be familiar. Anyway, be sure to check it out!

I realized last week that I’ve now been on 30 podcast episodes. Considering I used to think that podcasts were silly, that’s pretty cool. I just want to thank you all for having me, and beg that you have me back on soon! Speaking of podcasts, The Cold Slither Podcast has now morphed into the Cold Slither Podcast Network, and the first offering from this new venture debuted today as the Good and Terrible Show. Be sure to give it a listen!

Links I Loved

Toy Tragedy: Soundwave, a Love Lost and then Found – The Robot’s Pajamas

238 Reasons We Love America – UnderScoopFire!

Unreleased Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles Toys PART 2! – Crooked Ninja Turtle Gang

Toy Hunting at Wizard World Philadelphia Comic Con ’14 – Double Dumbass On You

It was touch and go for a while. NBC finally got the balls to cancel Community, and fans clamored for someone else to pick up the ball and run with it. I consider myself a fan of Community, but I’ve also been vocal in my displeasure with the most recent season. Even though creator Dan Harmon was back onboard, much like the recent season of The Boondocks, the show felt like a shell of its former self. Cast members were dropping like flies, as the season started without the controversial Chevy Chase, and then Donald Glover/Childish Gambino soon followed. The season ended with an episode basically daring NBC to cancel it, and the network took the dare. It was rumored that Hulu was in talks to pick up the show for a sixth season, but those talks fell apart. Well, this week it was announced that Yahoo would be producing the 6th season as part of Yahoo Screen. It’s believed that Yahoo acquired the show in a bid to establish credibility in the programming world, especially since details on Yahoo Screen at scarce at this point. Whatever the reason, the decision has made a lot of fans very happy. To add to that, there’s even talk that the fabled movie part of #sixseasonsandamovie may actually happen, too. With the entire cast and Harmon on board, it’s a great week for the students of Greendale Community College. For that reason, Community had the West Week Ever.