…one Sesame Street video…
Category Archives: Lady Holiday
(Belated) This Thanksgiving We’re Thankful For Jason Segel
It dawned on us a couple of weeks back when we caught Forgetting Sarah Marshall on TV (and cemented this past weekend when we suffered through The Muppet Christmas Carol on The Hub), that we owe a huge debt of gratitude to Jason Segel, as he’s almost single-handedly saved the Muppets.
Read on: The dark days of the Muppets and Segel as their Moses
Filed under Lady Holiday, Mickey Mouse Club, Muppets
Happy 41st (+ 1 Day) Birthday to Sesame Street!
We rarely miss a story here at Jumped The Snark. But we dropped the ball yesterday, neglecting to acknowledge yesterday’s milestone 41st anniversary of Sesame Street. Our bad.
So in (belated) honor of the day (which, if we’re not mistaken, is the felt anniversary) here’s one of our favorite Sesame Street clips:
And here’s a pumpkin we carved in homage to Ernie (unfortunately, we neglected to purchase black fabric to create appropriate tuft of black hair):
And we think this is a great excuse to, once again, post The Muppets: A Celebration of 30 Years, which, looking back, is probably what cemented our love for The Muppets. It provided the necessary Muppet history in the same way that Saturday Night Live: 15th Anniversary Special was a spectacular primer for our nascent 7 year-old brain. We were probably the only kid who listed his two favorite videos as the Muppets 30th anniversary special and 1986 Mets: A Year to Remember.
Congrats, Sesame Street! See you in a year for your 42nd (+ 1 day) birthday! (the glitter anniversary, if we recall correctly)
Did You Make Sure to Take Your Megadose of Riboflavin?
TIME TRAVEL!
Best hour of the year.
Halloween ‘SNL’ & Jon Hamm: Tricks, Treats and the Return of the Old Guard
Last week we hypothesized that the Halloween episode of SNL hosted by Jon Hamm would either be the best of the season or the laziest. Hamm, making his third hosting appearance, has already proven to be a go-to, top-notch host, one that brings out the best in the cast and crew. But, on the other hand, what often happens when the show is blessed with a skilled host is that they relax, relying too much on the host’s charm and natural comedic talents (see: Galifiankis, Zach). However, what we were treated to this week was something in between, and something, in hindsight, typical of a third hosting go ’round. During a debut performance the material can often be safe, figuring out if the host has what it takes, a bit of a feeling out process. If that host succeeds, then when he or she comes back for a second stint the crew is energized, knowing that they have someone who will deliver. You could see that confidence, motivation and excitement in Hamm’s second hosting job last winter. But when a host comes back for the three-peat, the crew is now so comfortable and at ease that they’re willing to taking more chances, throwing more caution to the wind. So what you receive is not mainstream yuks and recurring sketches, or weary, unmotivated punchlines and recurring sketches, but a sense of adventure laced with apathy for the viewer. This is what happens when you have a host who no longer needs to prove himself, who has tenure, which is why so many of Alec Baldwin’s shows are peppered with offbeat sketches, some that delight (like last season’s bizarre “Timecrowave“) and some that crash and burn (like “Arizona Evenings” from the same episode). Judging from this past weekend’s show, it seems that Hamm is now in that class.
More: Mustaches, kisses, Rihanna, Star Wars & Sam Kinison! Plus, WHOM did they rip off this week?
Filed under Analysis, Lady Holiday, Makes You Think, Mancrush, Saturday Night Live
Flashback: David Bowie’s Lego Crotch
A little over a year ago I posted a piece comparing the David Bowie avatar from Lego: Rock Band to his look as Jareth in Labyrinth, noting the obvious discrepancies between the groin-regions. It went on to be one of our most read posts of all time, due in no small part to the frequent search term “Labyrinth David Bowie, ” a group of words that sees its most action during the Halloween season. So, with that in mind, let’s revisit that post one more time:
Lego: Rock Band David Bowie Clearly Not ‘Labyrinth’ David Bowie
The first images and video of the David Bowie avatar from the upcoming Lego: Rock Band game hit the web this week. Vulture posits that “Bowie’s penchant for androgyny makes him a perfect candidate for being immortalized in Lego form.” However, while Ziggy Stardust certainly is the standard for androgyny, the image of David Bowie as Jareth the Goblin King in Labyrinth has been burned into my brain, and I can’t help but feel that Lego Bowie is missing something.
(Hint: It’s not the gloves)
On a related note, great Halloween costume idea: Slutty Hoggle.
Filed under Fashion Show at Lunch, Flashback!, Lady Holiday, Muppets
‘The Office’ Halloween: Over the Top
Halloween often brings out the best in Dunder Mifflin (and the “best” usually means the worst in the characters), and this year’s entry, “Costume Contest,” joined that distinguished class of strong Office holiday themed episodes. We’ll say that it wasn’t quite as good as last week’s outing, “The Sting,” but we’re also grading “Costume Contest” on the far end of a true bell curve. The holiday episodes immediately have an advantage, especially Halloween eps with their possibilities for outrageous costumes, so we have to give them something of a reverse benefit of the doubt. But, with that in mind, Halloween 2010 continued a bit of a return to form for The Office.
Really, in what has become something of a hallmark of the season, this was an ensemble effort (other great examples from season six are the staff venturing out for Andy’s play and the sex ed discussion moderated by Andy). The series really began to hit in season two when it moved beyond the UK Office paradigm of “obnoxious boss – good-natured salesman – weirdo salesman – shy receptionist” and began to more successfully integrate the rest of the Dunder Mifflin team (you saw this immediately in the season two premiere “The Dundies“), but this episode, with the clever conceit of a costume contest (for a Scranton coupon book), was truly a showcase for the whole cast. This might have led to a somewhat unfocused episode, as Alan Sepinwall argued, but we think it worked, and we’ll take a fun episode with the whole cast as the A story instead of a weak, grating episode that clearly focuses on a weak, grating Michael Scott.
Happy Chris Columbus Day!
For the kids.
Vodpod videos no longer available.Also:
What’s weird is that the same thing happened to me on the way back from Comic Con.
Filed under Lady Holiday, Nostalgia Corner
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