Don't forget!

The Biggest Loser, season 9, begins tonight at 8 p.m. EST on NBC! It's 2 hours long, as usual.

Another show I failed to mention that is premiering in January for its ninth season is American Idol. The show slipped my mind because I did not watch season 7 or 8. I don't have any specific reason why - probably other shows were on that I wanted to watch - but I'll try and watch the good/bad auditions and see from there if the season is worth watching and being emotionally involved in, hah. I haven't cared at all for the past two season's winners and runner-ups. Either way, American Idol season 9 premieres on Tuesday, January 12 at 8 p.m. One reason I would advise others to turn in who may have been annoyed with AI the past few seasons is to see how Ellen DeGeneris is as the fourth judge, replacing Paula Abdul. It'll be interesting to see how she meshes with everybody, and one of my favorite celebrities, Victoria Beckham, will also be a guest judge during some of the auditions - which I will love to see!

Do reality shows reward obesity?

Does the Biggest Loser reward obesity? I'd argue.. yes.

When's the last time you saw a reality show that focused on skinny people trying to gain weight? Yes, it's a legitimate problem. It's also a struggle. It also comes with negative comments towards the person trying to gain the weight, and possibly depression and could lead to eating disorders to gain that weight. However, I've never seen such a show on television focusing on this problem.

There's been the Biggest Loser, Celebrity Fit Club, and Dance Your Ass Off. I rarely watched the last one, and only watched the season of Celebrity Fit Club with Screech on it (I wanted to throw the television set at him every time he was on screen) but if you look specifically at the Biggest Loser... think of how many rewards they get. The $250,000 cash prize at the end, $100,000 if you win at home, all the prizes after each challenge (usually monetary)... does the Biggest Loser reward obesity? Before you say "of course not!"... think of what got these contestants there in the first place. One of the qualifications for the show is to be morbidly obese with a high BMI.

One thing that made me really, REALLY hate the finale of Season 8 was the deal that Subway made with Shay. I quote from this Examiner article:

...But to help motifcate the California step-mom of two to continue losing weight and get healthy, Biggest Loser and Subway have made the 30 year old a huge offer. For every pound Shay loses between now and the Season 9 Finale (2010) Shay will receive $1,000. A clearly shocked Shay gladly accepted the challenge and blank check saying "You'll be seeing a 204 pound Shay."

OKAY. An all-out monetary bribe for her to lose weight, although she was already on the show for nearly the entire season! This is absolutely despicable and unfair. Yes, she was the largest one on campus. But no one was forcing her to eat all the food. Her obesity problem was absolutely terrible. I think it's unfair to the other contestants and to everyone else losing weight that she gets paid directly $1,000 for each pound she loses! Why not have Subway and the Biggest Loser donate $1,000 to a charity of her choosing rather than a check directly towards her? How many more people would apply to the Biggest Loser if they weighed over 500 pounds, knowing they could get so much money in doing so? I feel that people would apply only for the money and not the desire for losing weight.

The Biggest Loser almost lost a viewer on finale night. Don't make the same mistake again in the Season 9 finale. And Shay... donate the money.

New seasons!

Now that it is January, it is basically time for a new round of reality show seasons to be coming out again! Two of my favorite reality shows - one which has been consistently good, and another which faltered - will premiere new seasons in the coming weeks.

The Biggest Loser, Season 9, begins on Tuesday, January 5 at 8 p.m. on NBC. They've been running promos for weeks, focusing on fat twins and the "fattest guy so far"... really, this is so predictable each season. They always get a fatter person to top the prior season's fattest person. This season, it's Michael, one half of a mother-son team. They'll be wearing white t-shirts, which is such a terrible idea because they're going to be stained in 15 hot minutes. Michael weighs 526 pounds with a Body Mass Index (BMI) of 65.7. This basically means that 65.7 percent of his body is pure fat. I do have one major bone to pick with the Biggest Loser, so expect a post prior to the premiere. I can't wait to watch Jillian Michaels and Bob Harper to kick their asses into shape. But lets lessen up on the product promos, k?

Project Runway, Season 7, will begin on Thursday, January 14 at 10 p.m. on Lifetime. Last season was terrible and I can't believe how awful it was after so many great seasons on Bravo. I wonder if the long wait between seasons and the network changeover and the new L.A. film location has anything to do with it. Maybe this is why Project Runway Season 7 was filmed back in New York, and we'll see if that gives the show it's old magic appeal. Not much information is available yet on this season, except that Nicole Richie will be a guest judge on the season premiere. Hopefully Heidi Klum and Tim Gunn treat her well.

Don't forget to tune in!

Jersey Shore and MTV's best PR move ever

I'm almost ashamed to say that one of the castmembers from MTV's "Jersey Shore" reality show is from the town next to mine. That person will remain nameless, in order to protect my anonymity. As much as I love this trashtastic show, I have some bones to pick with it. So, my analyzing of Jersey Shore begins... NOW!

The PUNCH. I'm in a select group of people that believes MTV was not going to show the punch in the episode way before they showed promos of Snooki being punched. It was a classic PR move - show a controversial moment, air it in promos, and then say "we're not going to show this in the episode." They get the viewers that watch that moment in promos and want to see it in its entirety, and MTV takes it away. This is why MTV has a great PR team in planning this out.. if this is how it played out. In the original episode, producers decided on a black screen with only sound of the event. The picture comes back with Snooki in the fetal position on the ground of the bar, with her roommates trying to punch the asshole who hit her. Anyone who wants to see the punch, it's easily found on the internet as it quickly went viral, and can be watched here.

I bet Angelina is upset that she left the show in the second episode after basically not enjoying her time there. This show has blown up so much, cast members have gotten spreads in gossip magazines and have been on TMZ, Funnyordie, Perez Hilton... you name it. They hosted MTV's New Years Eve celebration special last night. I wonder who kissed at midnight... if Ronnie and Sammi are still doing their thing... but I will continue to watch this show, which has become my #1 guilty pleasure show of 2009 and will probably continue in 2010.

Happy New Years readers! May 2010 be filled with fist pumps. As Snooki said last night, "Fists are for pumping not punching!"

A very Kardashian wedding

In all the hubbub of actually watching the Khloe and Lamar wedding, I forgot to liveblog it. It may have been because I was too teary-eyed watching parts of the episode [it should be said that the actual ceremony only took up >10 minutes of the entire 2-hour special], or maybe it was because I was baking a cake at the same time, or maybe it was because I had a friend staying over that night. For either/all reason[s], I couldn't liveblog the episode, but I did watch the hell out of it.

Episode in a nutcap [since I already blogged two times today]... Kim is sad and jealous because she is not with Reggie Bush when this was filmed, but they are back together now. There were rumors online that as soon as the wedding was over she immediately headed over to New Orleans to reconnect with him. Either way, the entire 2 hours she bitched, complained, whined, etc etc to anyone and no one who would listen about how it was she who should be getting married [like Khloe] or pregnant [like Kourtney] and in a sense, I feel her and kind of agree. She was with Reggie for a looooong time... but, if you look back into the past... Kim has been married before, in Vegas, and it was annulled, because teenage weddings hardly ever work out.

I felt really bad for stepdaddy Bruce the entire time. Khloe's logic of not telling Bruce until she had a ring was not the best plan, especially considering they are all celebrities and news of the wedding was leaked to the tabloids before Khloe told Bruce. Poor Rob was stuck in the middle, and we finally saw Adrianne Bailon's bitchier side, when she rejected Rob's advances to get her back. I thought he was dating the manager of Dash [the clothing store the Kardashians own] but maybe not anymore.

I was hoping to see more Kourtney during the episode! She's so cute pregnant and they barely talked about her. There were more scenes of Douchey Scott talking to Rob about how he should get Adrianne back, but ended with a line that was something like, "But don't take my advice cause look at me" and it was actually a funny, yet self-depricating moment. Thanks Douchey Scott!

Tearjerkers of the episode were definitely whenever they talked about Robert Kardashian [senior] and how he could not be there to see Khloe get married. Bruce's touching toast at the rehearsal dinner had me in tears as he said someone very special was missing and should have been there. It actually made the wedding seem more real [jk jk]

Wished for more scenes of the actual wedding and party afterwards, but E! definitely decided to focus more on the drama of making a wedding happen in >2 weeks and less on the actual event.

My rating: B+. What could have made it better - less Kim whining, more preggo Kourtney, more funny Douchey Scott moments, more wedding shots, less of Khloe talking in the interview room.

Preview of Jon and Kate +/- Eight

Before the season finale of Jon and Kate Plus 8, there's been a ton of montage-type episodes, basically to extend the time J+K can be on the air with new episodes before they are dunzo. Finally, tonight, there is one new episode about the kids, and another half-hour episode of "unseen footage." Unless the unseen footage is Jon being drunk and acting a fool, I might switch channels come 9:30 p.m. tonight. I am looking forward to the first episode at 9 p.m. when I read the description.

THE KIDS ARE ENROLLED IN GYMNASTICS!!! (Picture from Radar Online)

There was an episode at least one season ago where Kate ordered this crazy bus that was outfitted with Gymboree-type equipment and the sextuplets went crazy. It was super cute and I remember Kate mentioning that if she had time, she'd enroll them all in gymnastics. Apparently, that happened, which is awesome. As a former gymnast, I am ecstatic to see these crazy kids run wild in a gym while Kate watches and is terrified of them getting hurt (kids doing gymnastics always get hurt!) It will be amazing to watch.

If I'm not mistaken, the last episode will be on Monday, November 23rd, during Thanksgiving week. Don't quote me on that though, because after a quick Google search I can't find a substantial enough site to confirm the date. Either way, it's coming up, and then all we'll have left is paparazzi photos and cover stories. And maybe Kate having another show, Kate plus 8. And maybe Jon having a reality show. And hopefully an E! True Hollywood Story...

As a follow-up to my last Project Runway post..

The first part of the 2-part season finale of Project Runway has came and left... and lets see how things went.

Like I expected, Althea and Irina took up 2/3rds of the final three. The third finalist is Carol Hannah, who I didn't even know existed. Seriously, she was THAT boring and lame this entire season. Zzzzzz. In the finale, Christopher cried as usual and I couldn't understand what Gordana said when they were both "auf wiedersehen'd."

Either way, the collections they were all creating didn't stick out for me. Just boring. And Irina's was basically all black, and she lives in a fabulously crappy NYC apartment, but does have a cute puppy. I bet she paid more for the puppy than she does for rent each month, if I remember correctly she lived on either the Upper West Side or the Upper East Side. Both are expensive.

Night before the show, Carol Hannah or Sallie Mae or whatever her name is was vomit-y and it was gross. She came into NYC late to work on the collection because she was so sick. She didn't look that great, but to be fair, I don't remember what she even looked like this entire season. So really, she could look like that every day on the show and I wouldn't have noticed.

Part two of the season finale is Thursday at 10 p.m. on Brav... I mean Lifetime. It's funny how a show can go from being awesome to boring with a change of network, eh?