TVSquad

When I'm not pumping out my latest TV rant for the ol' Squad here, I write pretty infrequently for another blog with some old college roomies called The Suite Spot. It's really nothing more than a bunch of disgruntled twentysomething males talking about whatever we want.

Anyway, a few weeks ago, my buddy Keith wrote something that astounded me: he's canceled his cable TV service. And not just cable - I mean everything. Basic service too. The man is TV-less.

Wha?!? Just how the heck can a red-blooded American male say no more to cable TV? Good-bye ESPN? So long crappy late night soft-core porn? Farewell Desperate Hou... wait, nevermind. That one sounds great, but you get my point.

Is Keith still watching TV? Sure, tons of it. But he's doing something that many of us only use as a supplement to our normal TV viewing. He's watching everything online.

Um, I don't know if anyone has told you yet, but the economy of the United States, and the world, is in the crapper. Seriously, I saw it one day while doing my business. It was just floating there ... one step away from being flushed into the world of depression. I had to get it out with a piece of toilet paper, and it's now drying on my bathtub ledge. Gosh, I hope it's okay.

Anyhoo, things are bad out there. And, not just for us working peons. This recession is affecting everyone, from the muckity-muck CEOs of the soon-to-be bankrupt corporations, to the hot dog vendor outside of Penn Station whose wieners are spending longer and longer amounts of time in their hot water bath. Somewhere in the middle of this are the television networks. Buffeted by both good and bad news, these former stalwarts of the economy are getting knocked around, as well. The meaning, for us poor schlubs, is a restructuring of television as we know it.

Fourteen million. That's not the number of dollars that are being lost in the stock market every second (I'm sure it's much, much more). It's actually the number of views that Seth MacFarlane's Cavalcade of Cartoon Comedy reached during three weeks on the Interweb. Now, if he only got those numbers during the initial run of Family Guy on FOX.

To those that are totally lost because you've been staring at your 401K numbers for the last month, Cavalcade of Cartoon Comedy launched on YouTube on September 10th. Sponsored by Burger King, it featured original animated content from Seth MacFarlane and his gang of miscreants. In a press release from Media Rights Capital, Cavalcade became the number one most-viewed channel on the video website a mere 48 hours after its launch. Since then, it has garnered not only the 14 million views mentioned above but 100,000 subscribers to the 'sethcomedy' channel. Making it one of the most subscribed YouTube channels of all time.

(M10) Well, now - wasn't much going on there, huh? That isn't a negative comment though. Other than the 9/11 minisode featuring Jimmy, "Smoke" was probably my favorite one out of all ten. Just the 62 Truck boys doing what they do best - saving lives. No words were spoken (hence, the lack of a quote at the beginning of the post) as the guys rushed through one of the worst fires I think we've ever seen on Rescue Me. Tommy saved a young girl and Lou brought out a dog. Not bad.

(M9) "It's just the same as drinking water... right?" - Mike

All these guys do is eat, sleep, drink, and get laid. Occasionally, they fight fires. Seeing as how they do it so infrequently, I can't say that I'm surprised that Mike (still the Probie in this episode) forgot to fill the cooler with drinking water before going out on a call. All Mike does is eat, sleep, drink, get laid, and forget stuff.

(M8) "The "thing" is the food you would most like to eat after you bang her." - Lou

No joke - I have had this same conversation before with friends. Same premise (person, place, and thing) and we came down to discussing "the Jessicas" too. The Biels. The Albas. The Langes. And yes - The Rabbits. However, the thought of getting crayon on my naughty bits never crossed my mind when I was talking about hopping (no pun intended) in the sack with Roger Rabbit's woman. Then again, I wasn't standing in a burning building while trying to fight off painful shit cramps.

(M6) "I love you." - Janet

Here it is folks - the minisode that actually aired last night. For those just joining the action, I went ahead and reviewed this week's episode after seeing it online. I didn't watch the broadcast. Big mistake - on my part and FX's. They uploaded next week's installment, "Sandwich," by accident. They've also since pulled the wrong video from sites like Crackle and Hulu and they've yet to upload the right one. Oddly enough, I was able to find it on MySpace and I've embedded it at the end. All that being said... I wish "Sandwich" had been the right episode because this one stunk.