February 2000 Archives

People aren't going to be wondering what I'll be wearing to the Oscars, gossiping about what model I've been canoodling with at some hoity-toity bistro, and there probably won't be a magazine spread of me glamorously lounging in my Beverly Hills pied de terre.

The most an ordinary schmoe like myself can hope for is to be infamous. Like Joey Buttafuoco. Or Monica Lewinsky. Or, God help me, John Wayne Bobbitt.

If you haven't connected the dots yet, the only way people like me ever get any notoriety is by doing something incredibly stupid in the public spotlight, like Rick Rockwell, Mr. Multi-Millionare from Who Wants to Marry a Multi-Millionaire?

And believe me, as Mr. Rockwell is finding out, infamy is never pretty.

Because if a thing like that happens to me, I'll have to go on TV to smooth things over and explaining why I did something so incredibly stupid.

And of course, in doing so, I will end up looking even more stupid.

And as this infamous character I'll have to deal with the media looking into my background and finding all of the other incredibly stupid things I've done. And when you've done something incredibly stupid, anyone you've ever known will turn on you.

Oh, yeah, I can see it now. There's Mom on Extra talking about the time she caught me humping a throw pillow. There's my ex-roommate on 20/20 talking about the time he caught me peeing in the kitchen sink.

And course I'll have to go on the Today show and discuss these new revelations. And as I attempt to explain away the incidents as "acts of youthful indiscretion" or "bad judgement calls," I'll end up looking even more incredibly stupid.

Of course, I'll have to endure the Jay Leno jokes making fun of the incredibly stupid things I've done. And Letterman's gonna have to get his shots in. And the kids from Saturday Night Live are gonna have to get a piece of me. (At least it'll give Tim Meadows some work.) And the ladies from The View aren't going to take too kindly to me and incredibly stupid stuff I've done.

I mean, humping a pillow and peeing in the kitchen sink -- there's no spin doctor in the world who's gonna want to touch that.

Now if the incredibly stupid things I've done touch a public nerve, Ted Koppel will have to gather incredibly-stupid experts and discuss how I could get away with something so incredibly stupid, and ponder the effect my incredibly stupid actions will have other incredibly stupid people.

Which will make me look even more incredibly stupid.

Of course I'll attempt to cash in on my infamy by appearing in a series of incredibly stupid commercials and making light of my incredibly stupid actions.

And of course, in doing so, I'll end up looking even more stupid.

But dammit, I'll be famous!

But the next time Oliver Stone subjects you to another four-hour rant wherein Nixon's kicking puppies and pushing crippled old women down flights of stairs, spare a few thoughts for the good things the man named Milhous gave us. Richard Nixon opened China and stared down the Russkies eyeball to eyeball. Nixon set the table for our decisive, straight-set victory in the Cold War. Nixon gave us Spiro Agnew. Did Jack Kennedy ever give us Spiro Agnew? LBJ? Millard Fillmore?

Goddamned right they didn't.

Achievements like that would cement any president's legacy, but the dour little Quaker kept on giving. Not content to let bygones be bygones, never satisfied just turning the other cheek, Nixon remembered each slight, stewed over every wrong, vowed bloody revenge against every perceived foe. And he was thoughtful enough to document every last fit of rage. Yes, Nixon gave us The Enemies List, and with it, gave the petty, the paranoid and the just plain vicious a new standard to measure up to.

Sure, plenty of rulers, leaders and captains of industry have doggedly hunted down those that done them wrong. But none have cried havoc and let slip the dogs of war with quite the same savoir-faire of Richard M. Nixon. Slander, character assassination and malicious whisper campaigns date back to ancient times. Nixon elevated them to an art form with a gift of language that could eviscerate even the most entrenched foe. When Nixon called you a cocksucker, then, goddammit, a cocksucker is what you were. For some, payback's a bitch. For Nixon, it was a passion to be pursued with zest and zeal.

So God bless you, Richard Nixon. Even if you are, you know, burning in Hell.

Now maybe it's not exactly clear what Richard Nixon's all-consuming lust for revenge has to do with television. Plenty, as it turns out. Because while the president's taste in TV programs doesn't really gibe with ours -- save for our shared passion for Petticoat Junction -- your TeeVee pals do have one thing in common with Richard Nixon: a blinding desire to lay the smackdown on any and all who dare oppose us.

You see, we get a lot of mail here at TeeVee. And while some of it is thought-provoking and insightful, we can't write every letter under a pseudonym. No, it's those other letters that, under the best of circumstances, wear on our souls and, under the worst, have us erecting stocks and hangman's scaffolds.

Most letters, like this e-mail from reader Lilbarry, are harmless enough:

I am just curious is there any good show that this web site thinks is good.

Unfortunately, not all of the e-mails we get are so innocent. Many are downright cranky. We want to think the best about you people -- that you're a refined sophisticated lot taking time out of your busy schedule of corporate mergers and high finance to have a well-deserved chuckle at the hands of TeeVee -- but the Dark Side keeps overpowering the better angels of your nature. The result? We can't help but conclude that many of you folks are just a bunch of meanies.

Or maybe Sprtmassge was just kidding around when he wrote to our Peter Ko:

Where did you learn how to write? And was your diploma single or two-ply? By the way, your ass is that thing you sit and your elbow is the thing in the middle of your arm. You're the biggest idiot and have no business reviewing anything but your own sorry career. Maybe you should hop back on your rickshaw and go into the "take out" business -- but leave the fortune cookie message writing for a professional.

We have to admit it: Sprtmassge's esoteric digs threw us for quite the loop. Rickshaw? Pete doesn't own a rickshaw; he leases a very fuel-efficient Mitsubishi. And fortune cookies? We don't write those. This is a Web site about TV. What the hell is Sprtmassge talking about anyhow?

And then it hit us -- rickshaws and fortune cookies are often associated with people of Chinese descent. With the last name "Ko," it is reasonable to assume that Pete can trace his lineage back Chinese way. Hence, Sprtmassge is using vivid imagery and easy-to-recognize stereotypes to hilariously lampoon Pete Ko and all people of Chinese ancestry.

Boy, that's really funn... um, well, you have to admit it's pretty cleve... ah, at least you can say that Sprtmassge has a well-developed sense of hum...

Oh, fuck it. Sprtmassge is obviously a real asshole.

Now Christian charity commands that we let such insults go unanswered. And perhaps the truly enlightened man is able to forgive and forget, to hate the sin while loving the sinner.

But Richard Nixon sure wasn't enlightened. And on this particular day, at least, neither are we.

So we logged on to AOL and -- just for research purposes, mind you -- looked up the profile of our good friend, Sprtmassge:

Member Name: Brad, PT 6' 180 lbs. Muscular/handsome/masculine
Location: Midtown West NYC
Birthdate: 33
Sex: Male
Marital Status: Specialize in therapeutic full bodyrub -- oil massage -- for specific injuries or just to get rid of tension.
VERY RELAXING!!!
Have a portable table to come to you or you can come to my quiet studio.
Reasonable Prices
Occupation: Physical Therapist with a healing touch -- NO PIC COLLECTORS PLEASE
Personal Quote: "Give yourself a treat -- you deserve it" -- or give one as a gift to someone else.

We can't answer that question. But we're certain that our more mischievous readers -- particularly those in the midtown Manhattan area on the lookout for a good physical therapist with a healing touch -- probably can.

So feel free to drop a line to our favorite race-baiting physical therapist, Sprtmassge. We particularly encourage picture collectors to pay him a visit.

And hey, if members of the Triad or the Yakuza should want to stop by for a little rubdown and a friendly chat, well, that's just the way the fortune cookie crumbles. Isn't it, Sprtmassge?

Nixon was right. It is fun to make nice with your enemies. Our shoulder muscles feel looser. Our brows have unfurrowed. Even our sciatica has started to clear up. And what's that spreading across Boychuk's face? Could it be the traces of a smile?

Yes, we should have started swinging the cudgel of retribution years ago.

So in that same spirit of blinding rage that moved the Ol' Trickster to drive his enemies into the sea and fashion crude tools from their bones, we present what is sure to be the first of many TeeVee Enemies Lists. Assembled here are the readers, groups and assorted nonprofit organizations who -- in the hearts and minds of us Vidiots -- have risen above the level of mere irritant to the exalted heights of painful ass rash. To the victors, go our respect, our congratulations for a job well done, and, of course, enough public abuse and ad hominem vitriol to send you running back home to Mammy.

And to those of you who didn't make the final cut of the Enemies List, don't despair. You'll get yours soon enough.

Enemy No. 1: Odd Man Out Fans

It happens every year. We review a spate of new shows, the majority of them are invariably awful, and we're forced to do our critical duties and send them off to their final reward. Most people accept this rite of passage, maybe grouse a little about the cruel vagaries of our tastes and then get on with their lives.

But there's always one group of fans clinging to the hope that if they shower us with enough e-mail, we'll rethink our unreasonable standards and hail their tedious parade of mediocrity as the feel-good hit of the year.

This year, fans of the program Odd Man Out have been hit one too many times with the denial stick. And in the case of reader LilLeo15, the blows apparently left lasting damage.

You people are sick...I LOVE ODD MAN OUT. You have no clue as to what comedy is obviously!!! And there are tons of reasons to love odd man out. You people just try to pick on teenagers don't you?

Oh... we don't have try too hard. We can just print letters like this one from Tim Coolong, who writes:

Came up with a stupid article written by your Greg Wenn. Well all I can say is this guy is an idiot. Telling people if they like the Odd Man Out TV show, they are banned from your site.

Hmmm... I like the show. oh NOOOOOO, that means I'm banned from your site, what will I ever do.

Oh, we don't know, Tim. Brush up on your literacy? You might even seek out some tutoring from reader Tom Bye, who offers this Odd Man Out-inspired syllogism:

i just want to say that you guys are a bunch of losers. why don't you try to put on a tv show... by the way you really are losers

Which we can't really deny. Of course, we're not the ones devoting time and energy to proselytize on behalf of a show that ABC's already canceled. So we guess that when it comes to delivering the big payback to our Odd Man Out enemies, God has beaten us to the punch.

Enemy No. 2: Online Newsgroups

Don't get us wrong. We love the idea of online places where people with similar interests can meet and kibitz about the issues important to them. But we hate it when they're commandeered by idiots.

Let's say, for example, you've got a Web site that, many years ago, ran a humorous little article poking fun at drug maker Glaxo Wellcome's hilariously inappropriate commercial for Valtrex. Maybe you remember it: soft lights, couples walking on the beach, cheerful narration. Which wouldn't seem so terribly out of place if Glaxo Wellcome wasn't trying to sell you a treatment for genital herpes.

A wry commentary about the oft kooky world of advertising? Not if you've got genital herpes, apparently. Right, AmandaLee?

this is the kind of attitude that promotes the thought that people with genital herpes are dirty and should not enjoy the kind of lifestyle that others do. it is disgusting and degrading. people with this unfortunate illness do not deserve to be looked down upon.

Besides sores and discomfort, it looks like one of the symptoms of genital herpes is diminished reading comprehension. The article wasn't mocking people with genital herpes; it was taunting the eminently mockable Glaxo Wellcome commercial.

But try telling that to whoever posted the TeeVee article to alt.support.genital-herpes or rec.health.itchy-crotch. Before you could say "Man, it sure stings when I urinate," we were buried under a sea of hate mail from one irritated herpetic after another.

Fumed reader SETXdarlin:

I want to say that I was offended, and this article only helps to enforce the negative stereotype associated with those of us with Genital Herpes. I am not a vile person, I am not a slut and neither are the vast majority of people with this disease.

Foamed reader charon:

It's about lies, or ignorance. Do you think people like having genital herpes?

Fomented reader Spastic Colon (and Christ, we swear we didn't make that name up just to pile more shame on the head of the put-upon herpetics):

This message is meant for the alleged writer who authored the above referenced article, as well as the purported editor who allowed the subject article to be published.

Huh. Guess genital herpes affects your ability to write coherent sentences, too.

Enemy No. 3: Lazy Students

You've got to love the Internet. In the old days, when teachers assigned a research paper or a project or a book report, students had to trudge off to the library and spend hours of back-breaking research, looking up facts and reading books and typing footnotes.

But now, thanks to the miracle of the Information Superhighway, students have all they need to produce an A-plus report right at their fingertips. Now all students have to do to get the information they need is to send off an e-mail to complete strangers, asking them to do the assignment instead.

At least, that seems to be the tack that Jenna Redlinger is taking when she writes:

I am doing a project in school about teen violance and how violent T.V. shows are a main factor, if you cloud give me anything, like satistics, to back up my opion it would help a whole lot.

Jenna, we'd be glad to help. Just pepper your paper with a few of these "satistics" -- rigorously fact-checked by our staff for accuracy -- and get ready to knock your teacher's socks off. And we mean that non-violently, of course!

• For every hour of TGIF programming that teenagers watch, their spelling and grammar scores fall by half.

• Three out of five teenagers who write to TV Web sites complaining vociferously about the review for Odd Man Out undergo savage beatings.

• Teenagers who watch Odd Man Out are 33% more likely to contract genital herpes.

Additional contributions to this article by: Philip Michaels.

"Oh hogwash," I said. "He's just reeling from the fact that I dumped him before this episode."

"What did you say?" asked the boyfriend.

"I said I dumped him. Dan Rydell was my TV boyfriend, and after he took off for four weeks without an explanation, I decided I was dumping him."

"You have a TV boyfriend?"

"Doesn't everyone?"

"No," the boyfriend shot back. "Only the crazy people."

That's not true. I am no more or no less crazy than anyone else; I just acquire TV boyfriends. It adds something to the viewing experience. I said as much.

"That's boyfriendsssssss, as in plural?"

"Well, yeah. Why should I restrict myself to just one TV boyfriend? I do have cable."

And now that my secret is out, I cannot watch television with the flesh-and-blood boyfriend without him giving me guff about my harem on television.

ER:

"So who's your boyfriend on this show -- Carter? Mark Greene?"

Ew! Give me some credit. If you must know, it's the hot Croatian doctor.

"So that's one sports anchor and one hot Croatian doctor."

No, I told you, I dumped Danny back in November.

"You still watch the show."

Only to revel in his post-dumpage agony. You'll notice he's only had second-string plot lines since I left him.

"Any boyfriends here?"

Nope. I never date married television characters, or engaged ones.

"That's weird."

Television adultery is sick and wrong. I refuse to stoop to that.

"Let me guess: you like Michael Wiseman."

I wish. I don't believe in dissing a sister. He and his wife are still carrying torches for each other.

"How noble of you."

That doesn't discount the doctor. He likes show tunes, honey. Sound familiar?

"Who would you date now?"

On this show? Jack McCoy. In fact, I may be already. I just don't know it.

"Don't know it?"

Hey, Dick Wolf never told us explicitly that Jack and Claire were having an affair. Why would it be any different with me and Jack?

"You know, Munch is single over on Law and Order: SVU."

Forget it. After Mike Logan broke my heart, I vowed never to date another detective on Planet Wolf. It's DAs or it's nothing.

"Oh God, I don't even want to know."

Relax. It's the human. John whatshisname.

"You don't even know his last name?"

Ask me if I care. He's cute and malleable. I don't need to know anything beyond that.

"You're just using him!"

He's a television character. It's okay.

"You're watching the show on Mute!"

Hey! I just told you I'm not dating him for his wit or personality.

Anyone?

"I'd be too scared to even try."

There's my portable news boyfriend!

"I thought you didn't date engaged men."

Well, he's engaged in real life, but not on The Daily Show.

"That's some pretty elaborate logic."

Anything for Jon. He's so cute! He's tiny! He's my travel boyfriend. What is he, like, three feet tall? I could stuff him in the overhead compartment on flights. That's so convenient.

"You're so sick. Why am I still with you?"

"Don't even--"

Oh, that's just awful. I can't date minors. But if Bill had a brother, I'd--

"Bill?"

Totally! If Bill's imaginary older brother was anything like Bill, dating him would be like taking a trip to another planet every day.

"So now you're dating the imaginary siblings of imaginary characters."

Noooo. I'm just hypothesizing.

"I'm going to guess there's a Rob Lowe skeleton in your closet."

Hah. I have a thing for Toby. But I fear it would never work out.

"You've lost me."

I'm a shiksa. Oh, Aaron Sorkin, you give with one hand and you take away with the other.

"Still gloating about Danny's subpar plots on Sports Night?"

You know it. That'll teach him to disappear for four weeks without notice.

"Do you mind if we watch this? There's an hour until your Croatian boyfriend comes on."

No problem. Hey... who's that?

"That's the Rock."

That's the Lisa's new wrestling boyfriend is who that is.

"Oh, for--"

Why don't you just drink a tall, cold glass of shut-up?

"That settles it, I'm getting a wrestling girlfriend!"

Excellent!

"You're not supposed to say that."

"Look," I said. "Like it or not, we have relationships with television shows. They unfold in serial, so we get to know the characters. Couple that with my uncanny ability to guess the plot of any show in less than fifteen minutes, and I need something to keep me watching. If inventing interest in a character lets me watch the show with fresh eyes, then what's the harm?"

That's the explanation that saved our relationship. Well, that and the boyfriend's newly-developed habit of acquiring advertising girlfriends, movie girlfriends and TV girlfriends.

But I'm cool with that, I really am. Besides, I didn't reveal the biggest reason for stocking my harem with television characters: if they ever annoy me, I can change the channel and fall in infatuation all over again.

And last night, Friends just tapped out the vein.

For those of you who didn't watch the hour-long extravaganza, the show presented an alternate reality: Rachel was unhappily married, Joey was a successful soap star, Ross was also unhappily married, Chandler was a slacker comics writer, Phoebe was a distaff version of Gordon Gekko and Monica was an obese slob.

While there were some very deft touches -- Lisa Kudrow's performance showcased her range as an actress and Joey's back in his pimpin' digs from a few seasons ago -- the show stunk. It didn't stink because it wasn't well-thought-out. It stunk because most of the humor came at the fat girl's expense.

Possessed of a adenoidal whine, clad in threads only a John Waters character could love, and sporting a rat's-nest hairdo, the alternate Monica is a mess. She doesn't have an interesting or rewarding job. She dates a bore. She's always vacuuming up high-fat food. And, horror of horrors, she's a virgin until she and Chandler stumble into bed together.

Of course, the punch line in the relationship's consummation is that Chandler confuses a full-sized couch with Monica during foreplay.

Even after Monica finally gets carnal, a lot of jokes are made about her -- a fat woman! -- having a sex drive. Ha, ha, ha, fat women with libidos are funny! Not.

So thank you, Crane-Bright-Kaufman Productions, for teaching us the following lessons through humor:

• Fat women don't deserve to dress nicely. In fact, they have no sense of style.

• Fat women would rather stuff giant packs of Kit Kats in their nightgown pockets than shower and wash their hair.

• Fat women deserve to date bores or losers, and should be grateful for the attention.

• Fat women are not erotic objects, and therefore when they express a sex drive, it's a pathetic joke.

• Fat women are valuable friends only if they act as insipid sounding boards for others.

• Fat women are totally responsible for their own loser-like existence because they would rather stuff their face than have a rich and rewarding life.

Or, if you want to use this episode as an object lesson, we can conclude that fat girls can have personality quirks and friends who tolerate them, a successful boyfriend, a great job and a stunning wardrobe if she'd just get it together and lose 200 pounds.

I know there's a persistent current running through the media about how frighteningly thin some actresses are getting. I know that Jennifer Aniston and Courteney Cox Arquette are two of the actresses brought up repeatedly as examples of actresses who are a little too skinny. I haven't been watching the show that much this season because, frankly, it's a little unnerving to watch the formerly curvy Aniston looking like Karen Carpenter, and I can't even look at Cox Arquette without expecting her to lapse into ketosis on screen.

But if this episode was the producers' idea of flipping the bird to the critics, they bungled badly. If producers don't want their actresses' appearance to be an issue, then pretend it isn't. Ignore it. Refuse to acknowledge the issue. Kaufman-Bright-Crane Productions didn't do a damned thing last night to alleviate the persistent buzz around their stars' appearances. If anything, the contempt they display toward fat women goes a long way in explaining why Aniston and Cox Arquette look the way they do now.

Perhaps we'll see another alternate-reality episode, one in which women who are vibrant and comfortable in their own bodies take center stage. I somehow doubt it; perhaps my counterpart in an alternate reality can report on it, but I don't think I'll be able to.

Do you consider bitterness and cynicism attractive qualities?

Do think the extra weight a man carries is "just more to love?"

Would you agree to sign a prenuptial agreement?

And finally, and most importantly, are you physically and genetically a woman?

If you can answer "yes" to all of these questions then you might have what it takes to marry a Vidiot! Taking a page from Fox's Who Wants to Marry a Multi-Millionaire?, we're giving our female readers a chance to share a night of wedded bliss with a couple of the fellas from TeeVee! But unlike the folks at Fox, we're going the extra mile -- because not only will you marry a Vidiot, but you'll also receive a fast Nevada divorce, all in the same day!

Because most of the Vidiots are spoken for, we have two eligible bachelors -- Vidiots James Collier and Gregg Wrenn. Now, we don't want ruin their chances of finding a mate, but we should warn you, they have rather...interesting views about marriage:

On Themselves:

James: "James likes watching sensitive TV shows like Judging Amy and Once and Again. Eating Swanson TV Dinners by candlelight. Puppies, kittens, and the laughter of children. Cuddling and sharing thoughts and feelings with a special lady. Sunsets. Long and romantic walks on the beach. And sodomy."

Gregg: "I like eating Dinty Moore Beef Stew out of the can while watching reruns of The Dukes of Hazzard, football, NASCAR, the gregarious company of men, and chicks with big titties. Oh yeah, and all that fuckin' romantic stuff Collier said, that's goes double for me."

On Relationships:

James: "It's important that James and his special lady keep the lines of communication open. If she has certain fantasies...about, say, a three-way, James wants to know."

Gregg: "Hey man, I'm fuckin' just looking for warm body."

On Trust:

James: "James needs to know she's gonna be there. If she says she'll tape Star Trek: Voyager for him, James needs to know she's gonna follow through. If she can't do something as simple that, what the hell did James marry her for?"

Gregg: "I don't want her touching my fuckin' truck. Or messing with the fuckin' settings on my stereo. Or fuckin' rearranging any of my DVDs. And she better keep her fuckin' claws off of the controls for my satellite dish. Other than that, I'd totally trust her fuckin' judgement, man."

On Sex:

James: "James likes it when a woman gets a little freaky. Like going to work and wearing no panties and calling him up and telling him about it. Yeah, James likes that."

Gregg: "If she's got the plumbing, I'll do the plunging. Fuckin'-A!"

Of course, it's not easy being married to a Vidiot. Between James' strange insistence on referring to himself in the third person and Gregg's frequent night terrors, it's a task that would discourage almost any woman! That's why we've come up with a simple filtering process to find out whether or not you are worthy of being their wives.

Are You Worthy of James' and Greg's Love?

1. E-mail a photograph of yourself in a swimsuit and a 250-word essay explaining why you would be the perfect mate for James Collier or Gregg Wrenn to teevee@teevee.org.^*

2. After we've suitably mocked all entrants, six finalists will be chosen.^**

3. The six finalists will be flown to Las Vegas for an evening of boozing and gambling with James and Gregg. The next morning, both Vidiots will choose their brides and marry them in a cheap Las Vegas chapel.^***

4. After the marriage has been consummated (but not before Gregg has cheated on his bride with one of the other finalists), winners will be served with divorce papers and a restraining order.

Don't Wait! Enter Today!!!!!!

* Entries and photographs become the property of TeeVee.

** All finalists must provide a birth certificate stating they are 18 years or older, as well as a notarized letter from a doctor stating that they are "clean."

*** James reserves the right to choose more than one bride because, in his words, "James has more love than just one woman can handle!"

Despite my abundant mortification potential, I tune in obsessively to Freaks and Geeks every Monday night at 8 p.m. Of course, I end up watching half the show with my face buried in a sofa cushion, shrieking "Oh God, is this scene over yet?" and writhing in empathic humiliation. At 9 p.m. I straighten up, switch over to CBS for Everybody Loves Raymond and flip over to Fox -- and therefore Ally McBeal -- during commercial breaks. It's always a channel move guaranteed to make me do another screaming dive into the sofa cushions. Television-Induced Secondary Embarrassments strikes again.

But Ally McBeal and Freaks and Geeks make me uncomfortable for two very different reasons.

Freaks and Geeks makes me squirm because it hits me where I live. There are no neat wrap-ups, no unconditional happy endings, no deus ex machinae to bail out the protagonists at 8:53 p.m. every week. The only thing constant on the show is a kind of desperate optimism; Sam and Lindsay Weir try to reinvent themselves every week, and run into the boundaries of human nature, including their own, every time. Most teenage shows present each rite of passage into adulthood as some magical moment wrapped in a Paula Cole theme song; Freaks and Geeks recognizes that the defining moments for most kids on the cusp on adulthood don't happen during prom or graduation; they're lurking like land mines in cafeteria conversations and family dinners.

Because we're the viewers, we can watch these events slide into sequence and see what's coming. And then we can shriek as we watch characters foul things up beyond repair, all the while acting with the hopeful best of intentions. It wouldn't be so painful to watch if the characters on Freaks and Geeks didn't seem so human. But a combination of solid writing and sympathetic acting has produced a cast of main and supporting characters who turn out to be fully-rounded characters, replete with ordinary strengths and flaws.

Would that I could say the same thing for Ally McBeal. I've always had a hard time identifying with any David E. Kelley character on any of his shows, but trying to connect with any of the sociopathic ciphers on Ally would be like trying to commune with howler monkeys. In the first season on the show, Kelley introduced the conceit that we could see Ally's inner thoughts, and therefore have proof that television characters have the same flights of fancy and irrational impulses as the rest of us. Unfortunately, the kook factor remained and the contrasting premise -- that of someone whose job it is to execute logical arguments in a very structured profession -- has been thrown to the aforementioned howler monkeys.

The result is a collection of oddballs who have no filter between ego and id, and a corresponding lack of understanding vis a vis cause and effect. Every episode centers around the revelation or execution of some personality quirk and everyone else's self-centered reaction to the quirk.

I end up shouting into the furniture cushions because the entire show embarrasses me. This season has been one forehead-smacking moment after another: a mother who's confused and angry about her crumbling marriage getting upbraided by Ally the Electra-fied Daughter; Georgia, the one lawyer in the firm who operated in a thin sphere of reality, leaving after her pig husband Billy takes to bringing a tramp posse to work; or a foundling baby magically bestowing brittle ice princesses Nell and Ling with the maternal urge by dint of urinating in their faces. Add the men's group meetings where groups of penis-obsessed men work themselves into a frenzy chanting "Bitch!" at their absent wives plus a hokey series of reverse-discrimination incidents, and the entire season becomes a tooth-gritting festival of mortification.

So why should I be embarrassed over a well-paid, much-lauded producer's very public tail spin? Because nobody else seems to be. The show keeps winning awards -- thereby proving that when the People are permitted to make Choices, they make bad ones -- and none of the people contributing to the show appear to be remorseful for propagating a series that makes men look like asses and women look like castrating shrews or lovesick puppets. I'm embarrassed that television viewers like this show, and I'm embarrassed that I still bother to click over and see what wacky contretemps America's favorite comic law firm has gotten embroiled in this week. The only point of pride I have when it comes to Ally McBeal is that I have yet to see a full episode.

By contrast, I'm always pleased to be watching Freaks and Geeks. If Ally induces embarrassment for someone else's egregious misstep, Freaks causes humiliation-by-relation. I'll never schtupp someone else's fiance in a car wash (ahem, Ally), but I can guarantee you that I've pined after unattainable people with the same hopeful futility as Sam, Neil and Lindsay.

Freaks and Geeks is ultimately worth watching, not because flashing back to long-buried high school memories is fun, but because it shows you the shining little moments you'd also buried as well. There are moments of preternatural understanding and unexpected compassion. Most importantly, the show celebrates the everyday heroism of pushing optimism before experience. The characters on Freaks and Geeks all get bruised, but they carry on, still hopeful that things will get better.

That's why I'll continue to watch Freaks and Geeks, assuming NBC lets me. I can't help but hope that things will get better for the geeks and the freaks, if only because I can't help but need the reminder for myself.

Big deal, I say. ER does that every week.

Hmmm, what's that? ER isn't packing its hallways three-deep with ex-cast members? The mass of humanity that parades across the set each week is the show's current cast?

Good Lord.

The addition of Maura Tierney, late of NewsRadio, to the ER ensemble swells the ranks of the existing cast to 13. For those of you keeping track at home -- and lately, it's required an assortment of calculators, spreadsheets and abaci to follow the comings and goings of the ER gang -- that's double the number of actors who appeared in the regular cast when the show debuted in 1994. And that total doesn't include the assorted Maliks, Connies, and Randis that flit on and off the screen each week, helping ER's ever-expanding army of doctors mend bones and tube patients.

Including Tierney, ER this season has added five new bodies to the rotation -- Paul McCrane as the villainous Dr. Romano, Michael Michele as the inept, child-hating pediatrician, Erik Palladino as the dumb palooka resident, Ming-Na Wen as the haunting visage of cast members past, and Goran Visnjic as the hunky Croat doctor. At this rate, Cousin Oliver will be scrubbing in by this time next year.

It says something that until I looked up the cast list at the ER Web site, I could not, under penalty of being locked in a room with Kellie Martin, tell you just exactly what the name of Goran Visnjic's character was. Dr. Hunky Croat? Luca Brasi? Ernie Kovacs? Latka Gravas? Frankly, I'm stumped.

ER's cast has swollen to the size of a Cecil B. DeMille biblical epic despite the fact that actors are departing the show at breakneck speed. Gloria Reuben has already left, apparently deciding that singing back-up for Tina Turner is more fulfilling career-wise than the three minutes of screen time allotted to each ER regular every week. Julianna Margulies will follow Reuben out the door by season's end. And be sure and tune in this Thursday, when Martin departs the show after her character, Lucy Knight, is mauled by bears loose in the E.R.

Or something like that.

How bad have things gotten? In last week's episode, Laura Innes -- one of ER's leading lights -- appeared on the program for all of two minutes before she was hustled off to the sidelines. Ming-Na's contribution? Slinking through the E.R. in a black cocktail dress at the end of the show, with nary a line of dialogue. It's as if ER has adopted the same policy that the President's cabinet observes during the State of the Union address: One person has to be sequestered off in a bunker somewhere just in case disaster strikes.

The problem here isn't that ER is in danger of exceeding the fire marshal's limit for how many people can be in the room at one time. It's not a matter of the opening credits' glacial pace, or the fact that you can't keep tabs on who's who without constructing elaborate flowcharts.

The problem is simply this: ER's bulky cast size has turned a pretty good show into an unwieldy, plodding mess.

This sort of thing is not exactly unprecedented. A few years back, Chicago Hope was a very good show, better even than ER. Several hundred cast changes later, though, Chicago Hope went into the dumps, largely because the show's producers ended up jumping back and forth between dozens of poorly developed plot lines for dozens of uninteresting characters.

If nothing else, we can at least take comfort that history inexorably repeats itself.

Assume the typical episode of ER runs 52 minutes sans commercials and Gigantor-length credits. Divvy that time up among 13 characters, as the show did Thursday night, and that comes out to four minutes on screen per person. That doesn't leave much room to work out niggling details such as depth, back-story and character arc. What you get instead is a loose collection of medical drama archetypes grappling with whatever Choose-Your-Own-Adventure-style plot the writers opt to pursue until they get bored and move on.

Take Margulies' Nurse Hathaway. One minute, she's talking about going to medical school. Then she's not. Later, she's truly, deeply, madly in love with Doug Ross. Oh, George Clooney's leaving the show? Time to drop that story in the dust bin. And now, Hathaway's got her hands full raising twins -- at least until they also get tiresome.

For most people, life's dramas and detours would have a dramatic effect on their development as human beings. In the ER universe? Having twins or watching the love of your life flee to the Pacific Northwest might throw you off for an episode or two, but sooner or later, you're back to being good, old Hathaway. A love affair gone awry and a pregnancy all in one year, and she's still the same dumb mope she was 12 months ago.

Plot lines and character depth aren't the only things to peter out into nothingness on ER. Supporting characters arrive on the scene, grab an inordinate amount of face time, and then disappear quicker than a political dissident in a banana republic. Jami Gertz's psychologist, Djimon Hounsou's activist turned janitor, the delightful Abraham Benrubi and his sorely missed Jerry, have led a parade of minor characters who've traipsed through the E.R. -- some of them scoring roles in significant subplots -- only to disappear without a trace. Maybe they cut off John Wells in the parking lot. I don't know.

ER pays a price for its vanishing actors, meandering plots and emotionally stunted character development. And that is, any human interaction on the show comes across as wooden-nickel phony, every plot development comes with a side order of skepticism. Drs. Greene and Corday are in love? If you say so, Slim. Michael Michele's character is a competent medical professional? I see no evidence to back up that conclusion. Maura Tierney is a medical school student that was only moonlighting as a maternity ward nurse? Of course, she was. It says so here in the script.

On the surface, of course, things couldn't be better for ER. It's the top-rated program in the country. A super-sized contract with NBC will keep cast and crew deep in the folding greens long after you and I are buried in unmarked graves in a potter's field. ER just won Best Drama at the People's Choice Awards -- and any awards show where Shasta McNasty vies for creative accolades is an impressive one, indeed.

But that's all on past momentum. If ER continues its southerly descent, high ratings are going to be harder to come by and NBC will be less willing to shell out big bucks for what's rapidly becoming a latter day Trapper John, M.D. If that happens, the show will peter out like one of its plot lines, and a lot of good actors are going to be out of work.

And considering the mammoth size of the ER cast, that would cause a recession-sparking jump in the unemployment rate.

No, the news makes us weep because as clever as we think we are at making up ridiculous items and posting them to our pissant little Web site -- and mind you, after a couple of gin fizzes, we think we're really clever -- the real world comes along and kicks us square in our collective ass.

Case in point: the news that the World Wrestling Federation, home of cartoon violence, soap-opera storylines and homo-erotic subtext, plans to start its own professional football league.

In our wildest moments, could we have thought up a prank where the WWF's Vince McMahon tires of putting on silly, pretend sporting events and decides to branch out into silly, real sports? At our most drunken, could we imagine the WWF vowing to succeed where the likes of Dick Ebersol, Ted Turner, the USFL and the WFL have all failed?

Not a chance. Too broad, our in-house comedy elitist bastards would sniff. Nobody would buy it. Now let's get back to work on that April Fool's parody site about monkeys.

But cruel fates and WWF genius McMahon have trumped us. By this time next year, the new XFL -- with the X standing for extreme, exciting, and several other words that don't start with X -- vows to begin playing football games where the outcome isn't even predetermined. And when that happens, McMahon says, viewers will clamor for the XFL's smashmouth, in-your-face attitude, ratings will soar and America will clasp the new league to its bosom tighter than an Nikolai Volkoff chokehold.

And, really, why shouldn't that happen? After all, folks scoffed at the idea of wrestling reaching a broad audience. And now? The success of WWF Smackdown! has pulled UPN out of its seemingly inescapable death spiral. People sneered when wrestling tried to extend its popularity across other media. And now? Both Mankind and The Rock have landed on the New York Times best-seller lists. The chattering classes dismissed professional wrestlers as sideshow freaks, unable to make an impact upon society at large. And now?

You want to handle that one, Governor Ventura?

So count us among the believers in the XFL. In fact, don't be surprised if wrestling's pageantry, drama and good, old-fashioned values start pumping some life into the buttoned-down National Football League. Why, in a few seasons, maybe the only difference between the NFL and the XFL will be that big ol' letter X.

And the steroid use.

In the ensuing years, here's what you'll see:

• Miami running back Karim Abdul-Jabbar a.k.a "The Runnin' Raghead" declares fatwa on Jaguar QB Mark Brunell after his infamous statement: "I don't believe in no Allah, just Jesus Christ."

• We find out that Al Davis is in charge of a secret cabal of owners who want to use the NFL for their evil purposes.

• The New York Jets and New York Giants play a steel cage game, the implications being that "the loser leaves East Rutherford."

• Paul Tagliabue's daughter, the evil Paula, is nearly forced out of the commissioner's office after she is tricked into marrying Al Davis.

• Upon the return of Buddy "The Master of Evil" Ryan to the NFL coaching ranks, several quarterbacks mysteriously disappear.

• After vowing to never return to football, John Elway is forced to lead to the Denver Broncos to victory after his family is kidnapped by Detroit QB Charlie Batch.

• Nice-guy Peyton Manning dyes his hair black, grows a goatee and turns "heel." "That choir-boy crap wasn't helping me win the gold," Manning sneers after pulling a Pearl Harbor-job on teammate Marvin Harrison.

• Old-man wrestler Ric Flair challenges old-man football player George Blanda to a punt, pass, and kick competition. The match ends suddenly when both men nod off halfway through.

• Referees will miss obvious calls that even a blind man seated in the farthest seat could see... on second thought, that's not terribly different.

• In order to add more personality to the game, Titans star Jevon Kearse is renamed "Jungle Man" and wears only a loincloth and helmet while he plays.

• The San Francisco 49ers are renamed the San Francisco Fairy Dust. In their gold lamé uniforms, they enrage and engage opponents by acting "fabulous."

• The Atlanta Falcons steal a victory over the New Orleans Saints when head coach Dan Reeves drugs the referees and replaces them with some of his players.

• Pandemonium breaks out during a Oakland Raiders-Dallas Cowboys game when a Raiderette smashes a Dallas Cowboy Cheerleader over the head with a folded chair.

• The starting quarterback for your New Orleans Saints? Hulk Hogan.

Additional contributions to this article by: James Collier, Philip Michaels.

No, the only ball-dropping that went on Sunday happened at ABC.

I don't mean ABC's coverage of the game. The camera work was top notch, Chris Berman and Al Michaels turned in yeoman efforts, and Steve Young continues to give every indication that he'll be a fine addition to any broadcast booth if and when he decides to stop incurring weekly brain injuries. Even Boomer Esiason's flat insights were less spectacularly obvious than usual.

The halftime show? Sure, Disney's grim view of a dystopian future populated by giant stick-men and lip-synching pop stars was chilling. But consider the Super Bowl entertainment alternatives of recent years -- Up With People, KISS, Diana Ross, Michael Jackson in a salute to the world's children. I'll take my chances with the Stick Men, thank you.

I don't even have that big a problem with Barbara Walters and the gals from The View hyperventilating over the taut buttocks of football players -- though if you just want to put that in perspective on the ol' creepiness scale, just imagine Peter Jennings at the Women's World Cup fulminating on Brandi Chastain's funbags. Barbara Walters wants to act like a jackass, it don't skin my cat.

ABC's gaffe had nothing to do with the Super Bowl itself. It had everything to do with how the network used the game as a platform to promote its programming. Somewhere in the neighborhood of 88 million people watched the Super Bowl on Sunday. That's 176 million eyeballs glued to your network for three-plus hours, a captive audience ready to hear about all the ways you plan to entertain them in the coming months.

In ABC's case, those plans apparently include Regis Philbin, Dennis Franz's naked ass, more Regis and, possibly, shadow puppets.

The first hint that ABC had opted to surrender the Super Bowl field? One of the perks that comes with broadcasting the big game is the hour of prime time that follows the final gun. Gorged on Fritos and lulled into a stupor by the preceding onslaught of football, beer and carbohydrates, most Americans can't summon up the energy to blink, let alone change the channel. Thus, the network is ensured boffo ratings, even if it decides to air grainy footage of two hamsters mating.

ABC's pick for this year's coveted post-Super Bowl slot was The Practice, a David E. Kelley drama in which attorneys grapple with a legal system not entirely unlike the one we have here on Planet Earth. Nothing wrong with that choice -- except that it shows a stunning lack of creativity and long-term thought.

In the old days -- the 1980s and early '90s -- networks used the hour after the Super Bowl as a launching pad for their best and brightest new shows. The post-Super Bowl slot gave us our first glimpse of a jive-talking, fool-pitying B.A. Baracas on The A-Team, a squad of troubled Baltimore detectives on Homicide, and tedious Daniel Stern-voiced monologues on The Wonder Years. All debuted after the Super Bowl. All enjoyed nice runs.

So what changed? Simple. Remember Grand Slam with John Schneider? The Last Precinct with Adam West? MacGruder & Loud with... uh... MacGruder and Loud? They debuted after the Super Bowl, too, and, apparently, made quite the impression.

With the risk no longer worth the reward, networks opted to use the time after the Super Bowl to air established shows, old reliables with a built-in audience to guarantee big ratings. You can trace this strategy back to NBC, which, in 1996, followed up the Dallas Cowboys-Pittsburgh Steelers tilt with an hour-long, star-studded edition of the inexplicably popular Friends. That this episode with guest Brooke Shields convinced NBC to green-light Suddenly Susan only compounds Warren Littlefield's sins.

So in the grand tradition of post-Super Bowl installments of The X-Files and 3rd Rock From The Sun, ABC followed suit with The Practice. Not that it had much of a choice. Word around the campfire is the Mouse Network's creative cupboard is bare -- hence the All Regis, All The Time programming strategy. Other networks roll out midseason replacements, ABC trots out more Millionaire.

That explains why the network burned an episode of a popular show Sunday night. But it still doesn't account for ABC's puzzling promotional decisions.

Sure, the ABC ads with Reege were clever. But think about it -- is there really a person in the Western World right now who's not aware that Regis Philbin is giving away millions of dollars to ordinary Americans who boast a middling recall for trivia? Yeah, those ads about the ABC dramas were riveting. But The Practice has won Emmys, Once & Again has sewn up the weepy housewife demographic and NYPD Blue has been on the schedule for seven seasons. Why spend time preaching to the choir? And any energy spent promoting Spin City -- a show that, in all likelihood, won't be around next fall -- is energy wasted.

ABC has a pretty good show called Sports Night. It's getting trounced in the ratings. Why not use the platform the Super Bowl gives you to let people know that it exists? Drew Carey's a funny fellow. How come his show rated only a few fleeting glimpses on Sunday? Norm and Two Guys and a Girl aren't my cup of tea. But, hey, maybe it might be a good idea to inform viewers that the shows are still on the air.

The point? Eighty-eight million people tuned into your network Sunday. Why not give them a reason to come back?

The Mouse People don't need my advice, though. They run the top-rated network in the country, the first time anyone can say that about ABC in five years. Of course, that jump is largely thanks to the help of Millionaire, specials like ABC's millennial blowout and one-time events like the Super Bowl, not sitcoms or dramas. But hey, a win's a win. Or it will be, until Millionaire's popularity fades, the chickens of ABC's creative malaise come home to roost and the network scrambles to fill its schedule with World's Deadliest specials and Who's The Boss reruns.

At least they'll always have Regis.