TVSquad

This morning, the Today gang dressed up for Halloween like they do every year, and this year it was a Star Wars theme. Besides the characters mentioned above, we have Meredith as Princess Leia, Kathie Lee as C3P0, Natalie as Amidala, Al as Han Solo and many Storm Troopers.

There's an awkward silence a couple of minutes in as each character is introduced. Lauer gets off a funny line about why he was late.

In this week's episode of House, James Earl Jones played an African dictator. Much of the plot centered on whether he should live or die, and whether the doctors should make that decision in order to save innocent Africans that he would kill if he survived.

Ok, here's the thing about this. Jones is undoubtedly a great actor, but he didn't seem like an evil dictator ready to wipe out half the population of his country. He seemed more like his character Terence Mann in Field of Dreams, a kindly old guy who needed to be shown the way.

When I first came across this video on my web travels, I thought it was part of that infamous Star Wars Holiday Special that aired in the 70s and hasn't been seen on television since (I think George Lucas is trying to forget it even exists). However, this is actually from Donny & Marie, and it's just as surreal, if not more. Long before she was dancing with other stars, Marie played Princess Leia to Donny's Luke Skywalker. Kris Kristofferson plays Han Solo (and looks like he'd rather be someplace else), the voice of Darth Vader is Thurl Ravenscroft (Tony the Tiger!), and General Harkin is played by...Paul Lynde!

The most incredible part though is Redd Foxx, who hovers above and gives little bits of wisdom. The 70s were a very screwed up time. I also don't think that Donny & Marie would get very far if they tried out for American Idol. I used to watch this show though.

(Note, the first video after the jump is completely out of ;sync. Believe me, it wouldn't be any better if the sound and video were together.)

(S06E01) A long time ago, but somehow in the future . . .

Who would've thunk it? When Family Guy premiered back in 1999(!) many people tossed it away as a pale imitation of The Simpsons and kind of ignored it. Who knew that eight years later, at the start of the show's 6th season, Seth MacFarlane and his crew would be able to get the approval of George Lucas himself to air a spoof of Star Wars Episode IV: A New Hope. It shows how far Family Guy has come since it returned to the prime-time airwaves.

Before action figures became collectibles that should never, ever be removed from their little plastic bubble packaging boys and girls actually played with them. Sometimes, the adventures that these little characters had were not what they were intended for. In fact, I'm sure that some of these action figures did things that would make a grown man blush.

(S05E17) As I got into this episode, two things occurred to me. First, since next week is the season finale, when did they decide to cut this season to 18 episodes? More importantly for our purposes here though, this episode felt very familiar. It took a minute, but when Lois and Mayor West got to the debate, I remembered what it was. The main story was very similar to the season two episode, "Running Mates."

The thing about sketch comedy is that it's sometimes difficult to judge the show as a whole, because some sketches work while others fall flat. I wouldn't call Robot Chicken a "sketch show" but I think the same idea applies. The writers and animators fire a ton of scenes at you like buckshot, and while some hit their target, others are either not funny at all, or just zip by too fast for you to catch them. In its own weird way I guess it's kind of a stop-motion Laugh-In. One of my favorite scenes from the Adult Swim series is the one where the Emperor gets a phone call from Vader after the first Death Star is destroyed. He would have called sooner but he's been flying around trying to get a signal. I'm pretty sure that's Seth MacFarlane doing the voice of the Emperor. Check it out yourself after the jump. Favorite line: "What the hell's an aluminum falcon?"