When exactly is VH-1 going to lay the decade retread franchise to rest already?

Seeing the usual suspects like the notorious J.E.W. Michael Ian Black, Rachael Harris, Mo Rocca and Hal Sparks act the plum fool gets my motor running just like all other nostalgia whores who can relate to the joys of this guilty pleasure, but even I'm reaching my fill of repetitive strolls down memory lane. First it was I Love The 80's, then I Love The 80's Strikes Back and now I Love The 80's in 3-D. What's next? In ColecoVision?

Just how long is it going to take Marc Cherry to rescue his brainchild from the abyss of sophomoric storyline hell? Desperate Housewives has gone from must-see TV to a barren wasteland in just one season. Teri Hatcher has devolved into an unwatchable caricature (another teary-eyed Susan/Mike breakup? Oh, that one's original...) and the George/Bree pairing is like Liza Minnelli and David Gest reincarnated. For the sake of sex with hired help, trim the fat and get back to what made it such a phenomenon right out the gate. Why the hell is Mary Alice still doing voiceover narration? Who cares about Alfre Woodard's character and shroud of mystery? (As much as it pains me to type that, the Betty Applewhite backstory is a write-off that serves no purpose.) Bring the lead actresses back together with the inclusion of Nicollette Sheridan for comic relief on a plot that includes everyone on Wisteria Lane. If none of the fab four seem to care what's going on next door, why as viewers should we?

Here's something else to pin on the ubiquitous mallrat of pop, Mariah Carey. Not only responsible for introducing a generation raised on American Idol how to perfect empty melisma, we can now peg the trend of packaged CD collections with the misleading title of #1's. Enter Destiny's Child. It's one thing to actually have a catalogue of tunes that have all hit the top spot like The Beatles, Elvis and so on, but only 4 chart toppers, a couple of blink-and-you-missed-it tracks and the rest chalked up as pointless filler does not a number one compilation make. I am so ready for the two props masquerading as group members to sit their asses down somewhere on a permanent vacation and for Seabiscuit to just get the wedding ring already from her camel in shining armor so the already prominent hips can make like Pillsbury dough mix and expand further. But if the godawful first single, Stand Up For Love (Diane Warren is as adept at penning shlock as Kate Lanier is as writing flop screenplays) wasn't painful enough, the gall to stamp a false seal of approval has me more baffled than Tina Knowles' costume choices.

Quote of the day: "It was very courageous of MTV to start the show with a genuine transvestite." - Sacha Baron Cohen on Madonna at the 2005 MTV European Music Awards

Labels: Destiny's Child, Madonna, music, rants, TV