TVSquad

I'm not always floored by what springs from the mind of Andy Milonakis, who, according to TMZ, recently gave a homeless guy a buck, but I like that he does his own thing and stays true to himself.

Before I joined the TV Squadders and before he had his show on MTV2 (The Andy Milonakis Show), I did a phone interview with the youthful-looking Milonakis (he's 31 now) about the Web videos he had been making that had caught the eye of Jimmy Kimmel and led to his deal at MTV. Back then, his humor didn't always hit, but when it did, I found it hilarious. And, even when it landed with a thud, I had to admire him for trying something different. Also, Andy and I are the same age and both seem to have a penchant for the absurd, so I was pretty much tuned in to his wavelength from the beginning.

Below I've placed a Muppet sketch from the Ed Sullivan Show, though don't expect to see any familiar faces like Kermit, Miss Piggy, Fozzie or Gonzo.

The bit is actually quite simple: a slinky-like Muppet dances a little jig while his smaller friend tries to join in. What I love about this bit is that it demonstrates how talented the Muppet puppeteers are. The choreography and movements of the two puppets is very subtle, and no movement is superfluous. Watch how the little Muppet examines the "feet" of the bigger Muppet. It's no more than a slight twist of the puppet's "head," but it conveys volumes.

I'm sitting here watching Robot Chicken Star Wars online with video commentary from creators Seth Green and Matt Senreich, and in the opening sequence Green explains how the animators actual animated a real AT-AT toy to duplicate the Imperial Walker scene from The Empire Strikes Back. Green mistakenly refers to it as a Hasbro toy, but as all Star Wars fans know, it was Kenner that made the toys, not Hasbro.

Of course, the fact that I would even know that makes me exactly the sort of Star Wars geek the folks at Robot Chicken were aiming for. I hate to admit I wasn't as floored by the special as I was hoping, and somewhat disappointed to see sequences reused from past episodes, but it was clear, based on the special; the interludes with Green, Senreich and Breckin Meyer; and the aforementioned commentary, that these guys really love Star Wars, and that alone made it worthwhile.

[via Pop Candy]

Starting today, the long-running soap opera Days of Our Lives will be available on iTunes for the usual $1.99 per episode. Fans can also get episodes a bit cheaper by purchasing twenty episodes for $9.99.

According to Variety, placing Days on iTunes is most likely a move to get more people to watch the series, which has lost some viewers over the last year or so. Frankly, I don't see why more soap operas aren't made available this way, or, even better, made available for free online. Soaps more or less require a person to be tuned in day in and day out, and fans, one assumes, would love to be able to go back and catch up on whatever they might have missed.

This, however, leads to another question, which is "how old are the people watching Days, and how many of those people are going to use iTunes for anything?" Something tells me an iTunes promotional push isn't going to be much help.

If you follow the "alternative comedy" scene, you've probably seen Neil Hamburger before. He's appeared on Tom Green's online talk show hosting "Poolside Chats," and has also popped up on Tim and Eric Awesome Show, Great Job!, not to mention a few episodes of Jimmy Kimmel Live on ABC and Red Eye on the FoxNews channel.

Hamburger is actual Gregg Turkington, a musician, actor and writer who has released a few "comedy" albums. He resembles a lounge performer who was mugged just prior to getting on stage, and his sets consist of lots of bad jokes peppered with uncontrollable coughing fits. That is, however, the point of his act. He's not so much a bad comedian as he is someone playing a bad comedian, and once you're in on the gag, it's quite entertaining.

You've come a long way, Conan. It's tough to believe you stepped in as host of NBC's late night almost fifteen years ago, but you did, and you know what, for a first timer I think you did okay.

Conan is so comfortable in his role as host now that it's somewhat endearing to watch his first show after all these years. He's not nearly as animated and spring-loaded as he is now. In fact, he appears downright humbled to be stepping into Letterman's timeslot. Of course, after a few years I don't think many of us even look at Late Night as Dave's old show anymore. It's all Conan's game, now, baby.

We've been hearing about the new Clone Wars cartoon for some time now, and finally a little taste of the new series is available on the Star Wars site.

We've been told previously that this new series would focus on the clone wars that took place between episodes two and three (Attack of the Clones and Revenge of the Sith) and those of us who are both Star Wars fanboys and animation nerds were excited to see what this new animated series would look like.

At least, it will be starting on July 1.

Pipeline, CNN's broadband site that was launched in 2005 under a subscription model, include four live streams plus archived video footage. According to The Hollywood Reporter, CNN never talked about how many people actually subscribed to the service, but I must say this seems like a good choice for CNN, considering how the majority of online content, news and otherwise, is offered for free and supported by advertising. If you charge, folks will simply go somewhere that doesn't.

In addition, CNN will also be redesigning the site for its relaunch.

So there you have it, news junkies: now you can have CNN playing on your computer, FOX News on the TV, NPR on the radio, ABC News on your iPod, and your butler reading you the New York Times all at once. It'll be like getting shot in the face with a machine gun of information. Yee ha.

A few short clips form FOX's upcoming Sarah Connor Chronicles have popped up on YouTube. I've placed them below.

I'm a casual fan of the Terminator movies, but I have to admit that this new series looks really, really cool. The series stars Lena Headey in the titular role; Thomas Dekker as her son, John; and Richard T. Jones and Summer Glau.

The new series takes place after the events of Terminator 2: Judgment Day. Sarah is forced to protect her son from enemies from the future who want to make sure he doesn't succeed in ultimately destroying the machines who themselves are bent on destroying mankind. Ooh, that's heavy, but it's also the kind of ultra-violent escapism that fan boys and fan girls alike love to see. One of the things that set the Terminator movies apart from other big shoot-em ups is that it had that element of real (not forced) human drama, and I think, based on these clips, this new series will have the same.

The new series will air Sundays at 9:00 p.m. starting spring of 2008. Clips after the jump.

As any Simpsons fan can tell you, the opening sequence for each episode includes three distinct moments that change every episode: Bart's sentence on the chalkboard, Lisa's saxophone solo and the "couch gag" at the very end. Sometimes these moments are reused from past episodes, of course.

Well, someone with a lot of time on their hands has spliced together 115 couch gags from The Simpsons. The quality of the video (below) isn't that great, and I'm not sure what possessed them to put their YouTube username right in the middle of the screen, but those two minor annoyances aside, it's a nice little tribute to an element of the series fans love and the writers probably loathe by now. That's my assumption anyway, I'm guessing it's tough to keep coming up with new couch gags (which explains why we don't see brand new ones much anymore).

I've placed the video after the jump. It's just under ten minutes long.

Thanks to my pal Wild Bill for telling me about this.

As Annie mentioned in her review, Don Rickles was on The Daily Show last night. I typically don't watch The Daily Show until the day after, because, at the old age of 30, I'm out like a light by 8:00 p.m., barely able to finish my bowl of oatmeal.

I usually skip over the interview segments of the show, but today I actual watched the segment with Rickles. I may be a fan of a lot of today's "alternative" comics (a term as meaningless as "alternative music"), but I also have a lot of respect and admiration for older comics such as Rickles. And it's genuine respect, not that fake respect you exude because they're old and society demands it from you. No, Rickles is a very funny and amicable gentleman, and even at the age of 81 the man is still as sharp as he ever was.

Will Ferrell has yet another video up on his Funny or Die comedy video site. You should skip down to the bottom of this post right now and watch the video (after the jump) without reading the next paragraph, because I'm going to talk about the short and I don't want to ruin it for you.

Okay, did you watch it? Good.

What did you think? I thought it was mildly amusing, but not nearly as funny as The Landlord, and besides, Charles Schulz did essentially this same gag with Snoopy's doghouse over forty years ago. I suppose the fact that's it's a portable toilet makes it funnier than say, a cardboard box, but still, it's not his best work. I'm not sure if I would vote this "Funny" or "Die." Is there a button for "Knock Unconscious for a Few Minutes?"

I did laugh at the text at the end telling us how they now live in an ATM kiosk. At least they're moving up in the world.

Comedian and Daily Show trendspotter Demetri Martin appears in the new Fountains of Wayne video for their song "Someone to Love." Martin plays "Seth," a big city lawyer, which is fitting since he himself went to law school, although he did drop out one year before getting his degree.

The song, like all of Fountain of Wayne's songs, is really catchy and you'll probably find yourself singing it in the shower. Or, if you're like me, you'll actually learn how to play it on guitar so you can both sing and play it in the shower. This actually warps the guitar pretty bad, which is why I break into a music warehouse every night and steal a new one.

[via CC Insider]

You think you're so great, don't you? Yeah, I'm talking to you. You there with your non-rotting skin and your oh-so-civilized way of not eating the flesh and organs of the living. Maybe it's time you stepped out of your comfort zone and learned a little about your fellow man (or, more precisely, your walking dead man).

Ed Helms (The Daily Show, The Office) tries to put a human face on the zombie by showing us that the living dead are not that different than us. They have jobs, friends, play the guitar, absent-mindedly pick decaying flesh from their faces -- well, I guess there are some differences.

At any rate, if you want a good laugh, and also maybe even get grossed out a little, the video is below.

If you've heard of Super Adventure Team, a short-lived MTV series featuring puppets a la Thunderbirds and Team America, you're a batter person than I, because I hadn't heard of it until recently, even though one of my favorite comedians of all time was behind it: Dana Gould, who would later go on to write for The Simpsons (he left the series last year).