By Kate Torgovnick
(SPOILER ALERT, FOLKS. IF YOU HAVE NOT YET WATCHED THE SEASON FINALE OF THE BACHELOR, STOP READING NOW.)
Let’s say, hypothetically, you’re given a choice between two women—one named Lindsay and one named Catherine. Who do you choose? Yeah, that was a trick question. Catherine it is! And that is one Bachelor Sean Lowe chose too. Just minutes ago, he proposed to Catherine Giudici and then rode off into the sunset with her on an elephant’s back.
So who is Catherine Giudici?
By Kate E. Stephenson
Lately, I’ve noticed that every show I watch has a Kate character: The season 3 NCIS marathon I watched while recovering from the flu during the week. The DVRed episodes of Perception that I’m just catching up with. Elliot’s daughter in Law and Order: SVU. A glimpse of Castle as I was flipping through channels.
Every show I turned to had a Kate, so it made me wonder, just how often this character-defining name had been used in television and film. So I went about trying to figure it out.
The answer: 481.
By Kate Emswiler
Sometimes bad things happen to good people. And sometimes bad casting happens to good shows. For this sophomore season of “Revenge”, Jennifer Jason Leigh was introduced as Emily’s mother. When I first learned of this, I was stoked. Good idea! I thought. A good actress that I could imagine being related to Emily Van Camp. This will be awesome!
Silly, silly me. The idea might’ve been great, but the reality is so profoundly disappointing, it’s liable to dampen my love for this dark and twisty thriller series. In the past, I’ve loved JJL’s performances; she dominated as the sad-eyed, mumble-mouthed girl suspended in adolescence, unsure how to progress into womanhood. The problem is, now she’s a mature woman and she still hasn’t climbed out of her teenage years. Yes, her character as Emily’s mother is supposed to be unhinged and somewhat immature, but we can’t trust a character who seems to have no moments of real lucidity. It’s boring for one thing, and weirdly embarrassing for another – like watching an older woman dress like a 15-year-old. Perhaps it’s just not the right vehicle for her, but her performance on “Revenge” is one-note. And that note is: Lame.
Calling all “Buffy the Vampire Slayer” fans. How did Kate Nash spend her Halloween, you ask? Apparently, she headed to a viewing of the Buffy musical episode, “Once More With Feeling.” This incredible hour of musical television has become the new “Rocky Horror Picture Show,” with actors performing along with the big screen as the audience partakes in a slew of goofy traditions. In other words, it’s awesome.
Above, watch Nash as Buffy. And see pretty much the whole show over at Bleeding Cool.
The new TV show that I am curious about? “Animal Odd Couples.” Especially since the premiere episode airing Wednesday night features Kate, a Great Dane, whose best friend is Pip, a deer. Here, watch them frolic. All of a sudden, I’m having flashbacks to “The Fox and the Hound.” Let this story not end like that one.
By Kate Emswiler
Halloween is upon us, spooky readers, and with it the season of scary programming. Something about this time of year turns our thoughts to the macabre and we naturally seek out movies and TV shows that will satiate the desire to be scared silly. Not being a huge fan of the horror genre myself, I like to see these things in small doses and mainly during this one season. During the rest of the year, I just don’t feel the need to be routinely horrified by TV shows — “Jersey Shore” notwithstanding.
That’s why I find “American Horror Story” peculiar. Surely there are some people who love horror so much that they want to see scary, awful things on a weekly basis. But it seems exhausting to have an entire TV series that’s basically one long horror movie. And unless I’m watching it during the month of October, it just feels like a tiresome series of sickening episodes.
“American Horror Story” comes to us from Ryan Murphy, the creator of “Nip/Tuck” and “Glee”, and it has gruesome elements of “Nip/Tuck” along with “Glee”’s signature “hot mess” quality of schizophrenic storylines leading viewers down paths to nowhere. But “American Horror Story” also has a laziness to it that seems to be a direct result of being a TV show in the horror genre. This is to say, if some plot development seems to be too odd or not working well, they can just chalk it up to the fact that the character is hallucinating, or seeing ghosts, or is in an insane asylum so nobody can tell what’s real and what’s imaginary/drug induced. No need to explain anything, ever.
By Kate Emswiler
In this social media-saturated era, election years are more exciting than ever. Watching the debates, following blogs, firing off opinionated tweets and Facebook statuses — it’s all part of what has become a media frenzy surrounding the country’s political goings-on. It’s often highly entertaining, though sometimes it resembles a circus.
For me, the upcoming election has also sparked a greater interest in politically themed TV series. This includes soapy, unrealistic series such as ABC’s “Scandal”. I love getting a salacious behind-the-scenes peek into the underpinnings of our political epicenter (outrageously exaggerated as they may be). Thus, I’m finally checking out the original Hulu series “Battleground”, all about a group of campaign workers in the battleground state of Wisconsin.
I’d wanted to watch “Battleground” for a long time, but frankly I’d been dragging my feet because it’s a web series, only streaming on Hulu. It’s silly, I know, especially since the series boasts a great cast (Jay Hayden, Ray Wise) and producer Marc Webb is the director of “(500) Days of Summer”, among other things. So what was my big hang-up? For one thing, I feel like there are always other series that I’ve been meaning to watch in their entirety (like “Breaking Bad”) or other series that I need to catch up on (like “Weeds”). Web series that I know very little about are so far down on the priority list, and in very tiny font.
But in this day and age, web series can be just as well done, compelling and star-studded as some TV shows.
A couple of weeks ago, I fessed up about my raging Netflix addiction, and now this week I’m writing about TV again. Clearly I have issues that I’ll need to confront with the help of Netflix Anonymous. The first step is admitting you have a problem, right?
ANYWAY.
I don’t have cable TV. I’m a girl on a budget and I just don’t channel surf enough to rationalize spending money on cable, especially when I spend my free time for Netflix. I’d rather throw those extra dollars into a faster internet connection. However, every so often a new season of a show I absolutely love is on, and I have to make a weekly effort to follow it.
Last night, for example, was the season three premiere of “The Walking Dead.” Fortunately, my boyfriend and I were able to tune in at my parents’ house, but that won’t always be the case.
So what do you do if you’re a cheapskate (like me) or a Dish Network subscriber but you still want to keep up with your shows?
Simple Answer: Streaming.
By Kate Emswiler
How important is sexual tension? On a TV show, I mean. Some might say it’s the very thing that holds certain shows together – the “will they or won’t they?” question mark hovering between two characters throughout every episode, hints and innuendo that come so close to bursting into something wildly passionate … but pull back in the nick of time, just before credits. The constant anticipation.
Whether we’ll admit it or not, most of us would prefer to dwell in the “will they or won’t they?” for as long as possible because once the tension is released we have these two disappointingly happy characters who are flush with new love, but devoid of their signature crackling repartee. Gone are the barbed jokes, the coded language, the backhanded compliments. Gone is the mild cruelty that masks desire simmering just below the surface. Gone is, well, most of the good stuff that viewers turn on the TV for because it turns them on.
Drama and comedy alike have to grapple with this issue. Some series, like “Grey’s Anatomy”, have a solid ensemble and multiple strong storylines supporting each episode. Thus, whether or not you are in favor of Derek and Meredith together (and happy), it doesn’t make or break the show because there are still other characters to provide plenty of tension, excitement and humor.
By Kate Emswiler
After crying through yet another “Parenthood” scene last week, I wanted to write a Kate-book post about the show’s top 10 tear-jerkiest moments. But once I started, my list went well beyond 10 and was, well, terribly sad. Usually the show manages to strike a fine balance between humor and heart, but a list of all the intensely emotional parts was just too much poignancy to bear. So I figured I’d focus on this one recent scene that had me in such a face-crumply state.
SPOILER ALERT: The following will contain references to recent episodes of “Parenthood” so you should not venture into it if you haven’t watched these episodes and would like to keep the mystery alive.
By Kaitlin Marie
One time my boyfriend and I were chatting about life and psychology and parties and people (we were in college at the time) and he told me, “Everyone has an addiction.” I was quick to disagree, but then he cocked his head, gave me a skeptical look, and asked, “Do you have a book in your purse right now?”
I did have a book in my purse. I like to have an emergency novel on me in case of unplanned, wait-requiring circumstances. Or if I have to eat lunch by myself and don’t want to look like a loser with no friends. A book says, “I’M ALONE BY CHOICE BECAUSE I’M READING, BITCHES!”
I suppose up until that point, I had considered the word “addiction” as a label to be applied to serious problems like substance abuse or gambling. I wouldn’t have thought I was book-addicted. But nowadays we toss the word “addiction” around like it’s a joke.
Examples:
1. OMG I’m, like, sooooooo addicted to mochaccinos.
2. UGG boots are totally addicting*. You can’t just have one pair.
* It’s “AddictIVE”, not “addictING”!
** “Addicting” isn’t even a WORD!
But I digress.
Because, guys. GUYS. Netflix is, like, sooooooooooo addicting. For realz. Continue reading
By Kate Torgovnick
This, my friends, is Kate of the TLC series “Breaking Amish,” about five 20-somethings who leave behind their Amish and Mennonite roots and travel to New York to live it up. Kate’s father, an Amish bishop, apparently was not too pleased that she agreed to be part of the show and kicked her out of the family. The series shows Kate dreaming of becoming a model … and developing a drinking problem. While in Florida visiting friends, Kate was even busted for a DUI.
Anyone slightly interested in this turn of events will want to tune in next week, according to the Examiner. Apparently, Kate’s co-stars Rebecca and Sabrina are staging an intervention. And are maybe telling Kate’s father about her arrest? All I know is … man, I love TLC shows.
Got a Kate-
