MagneticMediaFed

Tonight HBO is not only premiering its new drama Tell Me You Love Me (aka, the show with all that sex in it), kicking off the sixth season of Curb Your Enthusiasm, but also showing Alive Day Memories a documentary about disabled soldiers who have come back from Iraq. That is a pretty solid, if thematically jumbled, night of television.

BUT!…

All of those shows will be available On-Demand at midnight, so we might as well watch the MTV Video Music Awards: two hours of live television on a network that isn’t as culturally significant as it once was paying tribute to a medium it no longer supports. Still, Britney is using the venue to make her comeback and there’s still the slim, slim, slim chance that something really wacky could happen. Catch all the shinanagins after the jump…

10:06 — Closing thoughts. So here’s the deal. I stuck with it for an hour, and I suspect that was 48 minutes longer than most Americans. I will say this: once the show got into it’s groove after the Britney/Sarah Silverman/MTV-awfulness of the first 20 minutes things certainly fell into a groove that was at least moderately enjoyable. While I wasn’t sold on the “now we’re in a completely different room with some random performers” motif, it kind of grew on me. [INSERT: "NICE STACHE BRO" to Shia The Beef] I especially liked the room with the Foo Fighters because they had a bunch of cool guest singers (notably: Cee-Lo singing that Dead Kennedy’s song).

Honestly, the problem is that everyone in the suites seem to be having way more fun than everyone in the main room. We feel like we’re stuck in the main room.

So… I’m going to watch some explicit sex on HBO and maybe check in later. Thanks to everyone who read.

XOXO,
Rick

9:57 — Yeah! Whitney, Audrina and Lauren from the hills. Whitney looks so dumb! I love it. Is it weird that only Lauren is wearing an unrecognizable level of makeup? No? Didn’t think so. Wait a minute. She’s blonde. That’s the difference.

J-T just won another one. Finally some entertainment. HOW AWESOME IS THIS GUY!? I have a serious man-crush.

9:56 — Um, where the hell did Sarah Silverman go? (UPDATE: She hosted the movie awards not the VMAs. You could see how I would be confused what with he doing the opening monologue).
9:48 — Dude, check out that little kid dance! Too bad they quit playing the baseline from “Billy Jean.” This is the best thing all night.

So riddle-me-this. If Britney was the one big draw for this show, and the only moment that was even remotely newsworthy, why have it right off the bat? What’s the point of anyone sticking around for the rest of the show? Do we think it was because MTV knew how awful it was going to be and didn’t want to built it up any more than they were already required to by federal law? Hrmmm…

9:42 — This is from an exchange over Google-Talk from about seven minutes ago (this is what this has turned to…)

LINDSAY: BEYONCE’S TITS ARE HUGE! we think she’s pregnant.

ME: maybe her tits are pregnant

LINDSAY: twins!

9:34 — For a category called “Most earth-shattering collaboration” (yeah, I don’t know…) the presenters were Kanye and Fitty. It started out mildly entertaining as the two went face to face and Kanye had to stand on his toes, but then fizzled when there was no actual banter. This whole production has escalated to the point where every single moment has turned into a metaphor for the decline of mainstream, popular entertainment. Is it weird that this is making me sad? Like genuinely sad. The production has turned into Matthew McConnaughey’s character from Dazed and Confused. It’s the old guy hanging out with the high school kids. He’s having a good time, but everyone else just stares and mumbles under their breath.

9:25 — Justin Timberlake won an award. It doesn’t matter what it was for. He was in a remote location and started jumping up and down with the moonman in hand. It was hilarious and proved why JT is, in a way, the only thing worth remembering about mainstream popular music from this decade. He also said, “I challenge MTV to play more music videos!” and then started dancing around again. Justin rocks. I wonder what he thought about Britney tonight? Answer: NOTHING, he was too busy being awesome and making out with models.

9:20 — Rhianna just won the first of many awards. She, like her song, was boring (there, I said it!). Actually, the past twenty minutes has done little to make me think this whole live-blogging idea was anything if not a horrible decision on my part (I mean, I could be watching copious amounts of simulated sex on Tell Me You Love Me right now). I’m going to try to stick with it. TRY. If I don’t make it to 11, it isn’t my fault. It’s MTV’s.

Ooooh! I just saw a commercial for Kid Nation. That is without a doubt the highlight of tonights event.

Hey, Aziz Ansari was sitting behind Bill Hader and Seth Rogen. This means that it was in fact NOT him who I saw at the Mets game this afternoon.

9:12 — Someone better call Homeland Security because Sarah Silverman just BOMBED! Either that or they need to do a better job of micing the audience. It was total crickets (that being said, the “I’m Kanye” punch line made me laugh).

After, Alicia Keys took us to all the “parties” going on in Vegas. The best was the party with The Fall Out Boy because his mic didn’t work (theme?) — exactly the way it should be.

9:03 – Gimme, gimme, gimme… some lip-syncing! Wow. Britney came out in her underwear (natch) and kicked off the show with a really boring song that she lip-sunk (sp?) and then kind of waddled through. It wasn’t even dancing. The dancers — the people around her writhing on the floor — they were dancing (or something). Britney was just being led around by people wearing hot pants. Sorry Britney, you need your swagger back.

8:53 — OK, as I settle in to watch the show I have a sudden, overwhelming sense that this might have been a horrible decision. I mean, does anyone watch this anymore? The VMA used to be the pop-culture event of the year, but that was in a time when America’s tastes were far more unified. Now, the pop landscape is so segmented the mere idea of one unifying program is ridiculous. It doesn’t help matter that the network it airs on has been having an identity crisis for years.

I’ll try to stay positive. For example: how awesome is Pharrell? (Very awesome).

Alright, the increasingly “tight” looking John Norris is saying the “party” is about to begin…

This entry was posted on Sunday, September 9th, 2007 at 6:07 pm and is filed under Award Shows, MTV. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.