Media Moaner 1: ITV Daytime Price Cuts
This involves an article I stole from the Daily Star I found at work on 3rd April. It talks about how certain shows on ITV are “under threat” from huge budget cuts, complete with added bullshit.
Apparently The Alan Titchmarsh Show and Dickinson’s Real Deal are some of those people under threat. Probably two of the cheapest shows to make on ITV1. Real Deal just has people sitting at a table talking bullshit about the history of how they came across their heirloom that they’re trying to flog to antique dealers that you may recognise some from Bargain Hunt as ‘experts’. We don’t care how many people died in WWII to protect the honour of this tiny locket, they’re here to sell the piece of crap. Cut the time wasting and start haggling. It’s a shame that David Dickinson, The Duke, The Man with The Tan, has been relegated to this, after leaving Bargain Hunt. Ever since, Bargain Hunt has since been taken over by over-enthusiastic Tim Wonnacott, who really does need a good slap upside the head every time he does the following:
1] Just as the Red Team are about to sell their items:
“You haven’t been speaking to the blues have you? Keeping schtum?” (Or words to that effect)
2] Just as the Blue Team are about to sell their items:
“You haven’t been gossiping with the reds have you? Not said a word?” (Or words to that effect)
3] After both auctions:
“You two haven’t been speaking to each other have you?”
4] After announcing the winners [The beginning in the *’s of this is allowed]:
“*Join us soon for some more bargain hunting* Yes? YES?!” accompanied by a quick bend of the knees. He puts some real effort into this, forcing everyone else to do the same, and it’s just not needed. Prick.
The Alan Titchmarsh show is basically a cheap attempt to copy the success of The Paul O’Grady Show (Channel 4), which actually has high profile guests. I can only assume Titchmarsh doesn’t have that many proper celebrity guests due to its early scheduling (Coincidentally, after Real Deal) and even if it did, it’s not going to have them anymore [This is speculation, they may have had proper celebrities]. I thank ITV for actually making The Alan Titchmarsh show over The Antony Cotton show, an even more pathetic attempt to emulate O’Grady. “Wow, Paul O’Grady is gay… How can we copy that success? know! Let’s take that raging homosexual from Coronation Street and give him his own programme! All the gays on television have quirky attitudes that the straights just don’t have” Great work, except it didn’t work. Cotton is a prick. Both these programmes are hardly breaking the bank.
60 Minute Makeover is another programme facing price slashes. A ‘makeover’ show which features a massive group of people painting walls, pasting and applying wallpaper, all the while some most-likely homosexual ‘designer’ walks around shouting at them and talking about how an MDF chest of drawers would look so super over there, all in the space of… surprisingly, 60 minutes. There’s only so cheap a show can get, and this is one of the examples. One piece of good news to me was that The Jeremy Kyle Show was being cut to three mornings a week. I hate Jeremy Kyle so much, the majority of the show isn’t spent hearing the guests talk about their problems of drugs and DNA testing, it’s him talking bullshit about how they should live their lives according to his elitist opinions. This is not how a chat show should work. I know it’s called The Jeremy Kyle Show, but I’ve never seen Trisha and Jerry Springer spew as much bullshit on their shows, at least Springer knows to wait until the end. After Kyle has finished one of the many rants, the people in the audience feel the need to applaud what he says; this is without giving the guests much chance to speak back. No doubt the excuses given would be just as full of crap, but it’d be nice to hear someone else speak for a change. One show I caught where one guest stormed off, not an uncommon occurrence in a chat show. Kyle went backstage to whine at him and give the “Go out and face yourself out there. Be a man wah wah”. Seconds later after the guest returns and sits on the chair, Kyle shouted some more “You’re a disgrace, wah wah [insert bullshit here], get the fuck off my stage”. Cue applause. What was the fucking point? It’s clear he isn’t doing this to actually help people, but to show off his powers of commanding people. Many chat show hosts may do the same, but in as much of an obvious manner. I commend ITV for this blessing.
Then the end of the article really angered me: “Insiders say the only shows safe from the axe are This Morning and Loose Women”. This Morning I’ve never had much of a problem with compared to other programmes. It has Phillip “The Silver Fox” Schofield, which is always a plus. I have to disagree with them on the fact that they feel the need to clap every artist that plays. One example was Will.I.Am’s ‘I Got It From My Mama’, you could tell he was dying inside when he walked on screen slapping his hands together. I could understand his pain because the song was shit and not something you should hear on early morning television. A few lyric samples:
“If the girl real sexy, nine times out of ten. She sexy like her mama. And if her mama real ugly. I guarantee ya she gon’ be ugly like her mama.”
Loose Women on the other hand gets me seething. A show worthy of its title, a collection of women with vaginas’ like buckets that the even biggest black mans’ cock wouldn’t touch the sides. Main offender: Carol McGiffin. An ugly cow with a massive nose who brags about she has no kids or stable man in her life so spends all her money on expensive shit, cheap men and holidays that no one gives a shit about. A real empty husk of a human being Even her fellow “loose” women shuffle uncomfortably on their chairs as she goes into another rant.
There's a reason there isn't a stable man. The alcohol wears off the next day.We get it, you’re a whore. Now shut up. This has to be costing more money than many of the programmes mentioned above, which are cheap already. Get a bit of variety ITV, have a panel of blokes occasionally. But if it were just a group of blokes, sexism protests would sprout all over the country. Because that just wouldn’t do. What we’re stuck with is an aging panel of 35[ish?] plus year old skanks who have to mention an ex-boyfriend of theirs who has a dodgy toenail or whatever whenever a serious issue is raised, because the two are inexplicably linked somehow.
On a final note, a puzzler. In Eminem’s Stan, these lyrics peaked my interest:
“If you didn't wanna talk to me outside your concert
you didn't have to, but you coulda signed an autograph for Matthew
That's my little brother man, he's only six years old
We waited in the blistering cold for you,
four hours and you just said, "No."
That's pretty shitty man - you're like his fucking idol
He wants to be just like you man, he likes you more than I do”
A six year old at an Eminem concert? C’mahn, don’t bullshit me. This might be explained that Stan ran home to get his brother after the concert then they both waited in the blistering cold for four hours. Either way, a six year old Eminem fan? Any parent who lets a six year old child listen to Slim Shady’s songs is irresponsible. I’m not dissin’ you Slim, I do enjoy some of your banging lyrics.
