Hey TV lovers, it’s us! Ya know… Autostraddle. Carlytron returned from her big vaycay this week and was a little behind at work and was unable to produce the whole kit and kaboodle herself, so we’ve got another team effort here, along with Carly’s own summarized Glee re-cap.
Things have been super busy for us lately — working on exciting new stuff! — but we haven’t forgotten you! We’ve missed you. Did you miss you us? Well, just like Cougar Town resuming production, we’ve come back to you! And even though Flash Forward recently halted production, the network insists it won’t leave you either. See? The future is bright!
Back to your regularly scheduled programming…
The Team Autostraddle Television Awards for the Week Ending 11/28/09!
Hey That’s Haviland on my Teevee Award – Eastwick
Episode 109 – Paint & Pleasure
(By Riese)
This week we all watched Eastwick for the first time because Autostraddle’s BFF out lez actress Haviland Stillwell was in it! Eastwick is about a group of Suburban women who gain witch powers after being left by their husbands, based on the movie Witches of Eastwick starring Cher, Michelle Pfeiffer and Susan Sarandon, which was based on a novel by John Updike, one of America’s greatest most prolific writers who died in January. At this point I don’t think the on-screen versions have much to do with the book anymore.
Anyhoo, Haviland Stillwell played a girl with straight hair who went to an art party with Kat’s ex-husband which makes Kat jealous. Kat is one of the witches!
For us the viewing audience we also discovered that secretly all this time, Eastwick has been storing away some of our favorite hot ladies; like Cherie Jaffe (Patricia Arquette) and Sara Rue, as well as Lindsay Price who you may remember as Steve Sanders’ girlfriend on Beverly Hills 90210.
So, Mystique painted a bunch of crap paintings because she really let herself go and express herself, and this dude got her an art show b/c he liked her work. And then the dude bought all of Mystique’s art to impress Cherie Jaffe, and it works. I think Cherie was just trying to get over Shane and would’ve seduced Kat later, or Haviland. Except Haviland isn’t into Shane. Anyhoo!
So that’s how we get to the art show where Haviland is canoodling with Kat’s ex-husband on the balcony and Kat has a panic attack which causes little mini-tornado but Haviland survives and was like, “whatever, my hair looks even better now b/c of the wind, Bumble & Bumble can’t even put this shit in a bottle.”
Luckily Haviland is rescued by her date b/c Haviland is little and he has strong man-arms! Look at this foxy cast ‘o characters!
Unfortunately Eastwick has not been picked up for the full season … which is confusing, b/c excluding Lost premieres and finales, Eastwick‘s premiere pulled in ABC’s highest viewers and young adult numbers in the time period with regular programming sine 2007, and it still continues to beat Jay Leno. If you want to Save Eastwick, check out Save Eastwick on facebook and sign the Save Eastwick Petition.
I interviewed Haviland about her experience on set via BBM, she said “I loved working with the cast and director and everyone involved to create the scene! It was very collaborative and fun and quick. Exhilarating.” Also she’s sick right now with swine flu or swamp fever or something, so she could just be talking crazy.
Gayest Moment of the Week Award – Stargate Universe
Episode 109 – Life
(by Intern Daphne)
Hey there Friendos, it’s your Belgian SciFi geek again. You saw last week’s episode of Stargate Universe? Yes? No? I hope so, because you really should. Since this is the first time we’re discussing this show, I’ll give you a super brief “what’s it about”. Stargate Universe is about a bunch of people (soldiers, scientists, a hot daughter of a senator…) stranded on an ancient spaceship, trying to find a way to get home. However, they have a device that allows them to switch bodies with whomever, wherever, so they can still visit their loved ones, but just in another body. Got that? Ok, let’s move on then.
This episode starts with everybody doing push-ups and jogging around the ship. I don’t think they should burn precious calories and energy running around like it’s a high school gym class. Anyway. Guess what they find while exploring the huge ship? Yes! A device that may get them back to Earth. The big discussion is whether or not to try it. (They find something that might get them home almost every episode.) Besides Colonel Young wanting everybody to get a psych evaluation and Lt. Scott finding out he has a son, nothing exciting happened in the rest of the episode… Except the part where two girls started kissing on my screen!
It’s IOA member Camile Wray’s turn to use the communication stones. She gets transferred into the body of a soldier on earth. Obviously Camile goes visiting her girlfriend, and thank god the directors let Ming-Na (who plays Camile) do that acting instead of the soldier whose body Camile is in. 
OMG you guys, when Camile stands at her doorstep and her gf is confused and she doesn’t know if it’s really Camile, Camile says “Have you thrown away that ugly chair yet?” in Chinese, and they fall into each other’s arms. Such a beautiful moment.
Camile and her girlfriend have a wonderful night, cooking, eating, snuggling, talking in Chinese or whatever, making jokes about the chair. There is a dark side about it all though, as you can notice. You just feel the sadness through the haze of happiness.
Only thing I don’t really get: they make love, but Camile is actually in the body of another woman… Isn’t that confusing for the girlfriend? When Camile and her gf have to say goodbye, their goodbye is devastating.
Girlfriend: “Wuo ai ni.”
Camile: “I love you too.”
And the girlfriend burst out in tears. Last thing we see Camile do on earth is tell her parents she is fine, though she can not tell them it’s really her.
What I liked about this episode, apart from the awesomeness of Stargates, is that it portrays a high-ranking gay woman. The fact that it’s possible, and it’s ok to be gay. Because you know, it is.
I’m Trying To Bite My Tongue And Not Give It a Snarky Award Because I Still Love It – Glee
Episodes 110 – Ballad & 111 – Hairography
(by Carlytron)
Both of these episodes were sub-par but at least the plot moved a bit. I watched them both back to back and actually can’t tell them apart in my mind right now necessarily; they sorta felt like one giant episode.
The overall theme was DISTRACTION. Write that down, I don’t know if it’ll come across too clearly in the episodes (JK they use the word “distraction” at least 35 times all told). Everyone is too distracted by something to realize what’s really going on. Yeah that sounds about right.
There was way too little Lynch and Emma, so Kurt had to hold up most of the awesome during these episodes with bon mots like these:
“I mean he’s cheating off a girl who thinks the square root of 4 is rainbows.” (re: Brittney)
“A makeover is like crack for me.”
“Your room looks like where Holly Hobby and Strawberry Shortcake go to make out.” (re: Rachel’s room)
Basically here’s what you need to know: the writing is still not very good, things are still a little dumb, and they keep exploiting and/or stereotyping every possible minority group under the sun.
Rachel falls in love with Will when he sings to her (like, immediately) then she cleans his house and is only finally dissuaded from pursuing him further when an older student tells her to give up the ghost; Kurt gets close to Finn and actually professes his love for him except Finn thinks it’s a song title and misses the boat entirely; everyone sings a million songs; Quinn decides to keep the baby and entertains the notion of letting Puck help raise it; Quinn realizes that Puck is a manwhore and decides to give the baby to Terri; Terri’s sister continues to be a complete disaster of a human being; the Lynch sells the Glee club’s secrets to their two competitors; EVE PLAYS A RIVAL GLEE DIRECTOR OMG I LOVE EVE SO BAD; deaf kids sing a song and my reaction was “oh no they di-in’t!” because in an earlier scene they were clearly making fun of the hearing impaired and the whole thing was just completely exploitative; Kurt gives Rachel a makeover which backfires because he sabotaged her because he is a SNEAKY GAY SCHEMER; Finn tells his mom that he got Quinn pregnant and then — under Kurt’s guidance — tells Quinn’s parents the same (via song) so they kick her out and she goes to live with Finn’s family; WILL STILL DOES NOT KNOW THAT TERRI IS NOT REALLY PREGNANT OH MY GOD.
Anyway, that’s what happened.
Second Gayest Moment of the Week Award – American Music Awards
(by Riese)
You Can’t Do That on Television! Obviously the gayest moment of the week happened off-camera this week: the ABC guy who we’re imagining literally thrust his entire torso onto the control board in reaction to Adam Lambert stuffing a male dancer’s head in his crotch. The result? The gesture was muted. Yes, muted. As in, there was no sound. That’s amazing. It makes just about as much sense as canceling Lambert’s appearance on Good Morning America the next day although Chris Brown, a convicted beater of women, will be guesting on the show next week. HEY ABC REMEMBER WHEN YOU CANCELED MY SO-CALLED LIFE? I h8 u.
Great Outdoors Award – Parks and Recreation
Episode 210 – Hunting Trip
(by Sarah)
I laughed more at this show than anything else I watched this week. Season 2 is so so so much better!
So every fall, Ron Swanson takes the men in the office on a hunting trip. When Leslie finds out, she lobbies to get everyone else on the trip, too. Ron has to give in because it’s a department-sponsored trip. So everyone treks up to the woods and many discussion about gender ensue.
After some pantsing antics, someone accidentally shoots Ron in the head, and Leslie ends up taking the blame. The best part is when the park ranger interviews Leslie. He’s super sexist, and she responds with sexist cliches so he buys her story. I imagine they left the camera running while Amy Poehler came up with as many lines as she could think of (i.e. a lot), and then used the funny ones (i.e. probs all of them).
April and Andy got some quality time together back at the office, which led to a lot of neck hickies. Grossers.
Next: Hot Almost-Naked Aliens on V, Grey’s Anatomy Special Comment, 30 Rock, How I Met Your Mother, and a hot girl of the week from Modern Family!
