Saturday Double Feature

Yesterday afternoon, I sat down to watch TV and discovered, to my HORROR, that that evil bitch, TiVo, had neglected to record the season premieres of not one, but two shows on Thursday night. That's right. Neither The Office, nor Grey's Anatomy was waiting for me to hit play and enjoy my afternoon. So, I angrily deleted the channels we don't get from the satellite feed for the umpteenth time. This is the reason TiVo failed to record my shows - it was too busy recording Grey's Anatomy from the satellite feed we don't get to record the channel it was set up to record the show on. Grrr. I don't know why it didn't record The Office. Just being spiteful, I suppose. That bitch.

Ok, I realize TiVo isn't a person, and you may think it's incapable of doing these things on its own, but I know. Oh, I'm onto you, TiVo! You'll rue the day you messed with me!

Anyway, after dinner, and before the boys' bath time, I decided to see what else TiVo had recorded recently. I had set it up to record The Manchurian Candidate, which it had actually succeeded in doing, but since Harrison was in the room playing, I thought I'd go for something a little lighter. I noticed Zoolander from a few days back, and decided to watch that instead. Then, after the boys' baths and putting them to bed, I watched The Manchurian Candidate.

As I was watching TMC, I came to the realization that both of the movies I'd chosen to watch were about brainwashing. More specifically, brainwashing with the intent of political assassination. Wow, that's a weird coincidence, I thought.

Afterwards, I continued comparing the films. Zoolander was funny. (No, really, it was. I loved Jon Voigt as his father, "I'm not a professional film and television actor. Goddamn it Derek, I'm a coal miner!" in the coal area of New Jersey, no less. And the Merman commercial. And the gas fight to "Wake Me Up Before You Go-Go.") TMC was a drama. But other than that, they had a lot of similarities. Let's see, both leading men were brainwashed in a political intrigue involving Asian countries. Both movies featured characters who didn't like the main characters coming to their rescue. Both leading men had a dead parent. Both leading men had no sense of humor, but told a single joke and felt immensely proud of themselves for doing so. Both featured the deaths of innocent characters. And both of the villains were spectacularly bitchy - Angela Lansbury in TMC, and hilarious Will Farrell in Zoolander. Mugatu's hair and beard, and his matching poodle - priceless!

Well, I forgot the rest of my oh-so-brilliant comparisons. Time to get the boys in bed. I've wasted several hours trying to find free downloads of my missed shows -- DAMN YOU, TiVo! -- and will have to cave in and pay to download them. Hubby is not at all sympathetic. He's so above TV now, he has proclaimed The Sopranos as the only TV show he cares about. Hmmpf.