Try visiting a tv blog or any kind of pop culture blog lately without finding someone talking about how great AMC’s Mad Men is. What I can’t figure out is why think it’s so great. I think it’s like one of those things people think they’re supposed to find great, so they say they do, but they don’t (like Dickens novels, and sushi).

Here’s the long and short of it: Matthew Weiner, the creator and director, is a former Sopranos writer. And it shows. Mad Men is Sopranos-level pretentious, artistic masturbation without the action, excitement, and drama inherent in a mafia drama. So it’s all the boring of a session between Tony and Melfi, but set in an office place, where no one ever gets shot or talks to the Feds.

To be fair the last three episodes have been better than anything in season two (season one is the only one I’d actually recommend my friends subject themselves to). There’s been a lot less looking thoughtfully into the distance and a lot more witty, engaging dialogue, and freak lawn mower accidents (for real, see clip below), I was also relieved to see the return of my favorite character, Joan “va va voom” Holloway, who resigned from the ad agency a couple episodes ago, at least for a brief moment.

But when Joan, wit, or bloody accidents are missing from a scene, which is often the case, the only way to cope with a full hour of Mad Men is drinking through the pain of life along with these over-indulgent characters. Here’s the game my fellow viewers and I have dreamt up. Remember, the burn of alcohol in your throat might make the pretentious, nostalgia-drama go down the hatch just a little more smoothly.

1 drink when you see someone smoking

1 drink when you see someone drinking

1 drink when Pete says something douchey

1 drink when Peggy is out of the loop

2 drinks for coping with what we call a “Sally Alert,” or the appearance of Don and Betty Draper’s incredibly obnoxious, uninteresting ten-year old daughter.

Finish your drink every time there is a Mad-Men Moment — This is hard to explain, except by saying that you’ll know one when you see one. They’re the long lingering shots on Don fingering a blade of grass, while squinting at the sun, or they’re dream sequences that mean absolutely nothing except to the ravenous online community who will spend 9,000 words dissecting it the next day. You’ll know you’ve witnessed a Mad-Men Moment when you feel the immediate urge to put yourself out of your misery or throw something through your television set. Trust me, you’ll need a lot to get through these moments.

*Warning* Watch Mad Men with beer, not liquor. We aren’t conditioned to drink like they could back then, even though we’d like to believe we’re just as cool as Don. Playing this game with liquor could lead to a hospital visit.

I’ve decided to start where Simmons began, with perhaps the greatest sitcom of all time, Cheers. On the Simmons podcast, Simmons and company recommend Vince Vaughn for the lead role of Sam Malone. I can’t think of anyone better. He’d be just endearing,  selfish, and hilarious enough behind that bar that I don’t think we’d miss Ted Danson for a second.

They also propose Cedric the Entertainer for the role of Norm, and I think that’s a good fit. But their proposal for Rhea Perlman’s Carla leaves something to be desired. Their pick is Rosie Perez. I don’t like it, honestly. Rosie is a little old and a little played. I think Wanda Sykes would be a thousand times better. She can do deadpan like Carla could, and she can bring the sass, whereas Rosie can only do the sass.

I’ve had some trouble casting Diane. No currently known actresses seem to fit Shelly Long’s combination of naivete and obnoxiousness. Violet Bickerstaff suggested Jane Krakowski. I think that’s the best idea I’ve heard yet:

The only problem with this one, which Violet also pointed out, is that if Jane Krakowski took the role on our imaginary show, she’d have to leave 30 Rock, and that would be a seriously tragic loss for TV.

And how about Dr. Frasier Crane? Neil Patrick Harris, maybe?

Help me out folks. Which characters did I miss? Which characters did I fail on?  Cast it!

Last night, Zack Morris made a rare appearance on Late Night with Jimmy Fallon to promote the return of his alter-ego’s show Raising The Bar. Apparently, Zack became an actor after high school and can now be seen on TNT’s prime time legal drama.

Here’s last night’s unforgettable experience:

To mark Conan’s triumphant return to TV, we decided to pit your three (okay, probably two) favorite nighttime talk show hosts against each other.

First things first, Leno is out of the discussion, aside from his car collection he has nothing over the other two. He’s the least funny, Krusty famously summed up Headlines: “Comedy isn’t funny anymore…You’ve got some big chinned slob reading typos from the Palookaville Post! Well, here’s a headline for ya. Nobody cares!” And that is Leno’s best bit. I understand that it’s nothing new to take shots at Leno, and I’m sure he’s a nice guy, but could you deal with that voice, over the course of a marriage, or during sex? He’s out.

I have to be honest here, I want to both f*ck and marry Conan. But since I have to pick one, I would f*ck Letterman. He’s 62, but he had a kid in 2003, so he could probably still take care of business. I have nothing to say of his competence in the sack besides that, except maybe after chasing Leno in the ratings for so many years, he’s hungry and has something to prove.
As for Conan, he’s pretty much the total package. He is tall, and maybe not everyone likes the pale redheaded part of his looks, but I don’t mind. He has a great sense of humor, especially about himself. He drives a fifteen year old Ford Taurus, so you know he’s practical. Anyone who watches his entrance knows he can accept praise, and move well. And that isn’t even mentioning the great company he keeps, who wouldn’t want to have a dinner party with Max Weinberg, Andy Richter, and Preparation H Raymond? Conan is head and shoulders above the rest, and if he hadn’t just moved to California I would marry him.

Not Popular –> <– Popular

Popular won my heart in the 90s by adding farce to the standard fighting stepkids template while indulging me in my teen-drama addiction without rotting my brain.  Think Mean Girls before Mean Girls with a tad more plot.

The show lasted two seasons from 1999-2001 on the WB and centered on two stepsisters at the same high school.  One of the girls, Brooke McQueen (Leslie Bibb), was very popular, while the other, Sam McPherson (Carly Pope), was very not.  The show’s fabulousness obviously did not derive from its common premise but from its satire of such a common premise.  We got the usual pregnancy scares, love triangles, eating disorders, and divorce issues common to teen drama, in addition to alcoholic parents, suicide, homosexuality, and terminal illness.  But add its flippant treatment of over-the-top touchy topics such as dieting, porn, and STDs (see Clip of Gold), and you’ve got something super-special.  Not to mention the fact that I get bored very easily, and this show crammed a ton of ridiculousness into its short life.  Then the series abruptly ended, and we never found out if one of the main characters –who got run over–lives or dies.  Where could the show have gone if it had survived another season?  I can’t even think of a stereotypical teen-drama topic they didn’t cover. 

Both seasons of Popular are available on DVD.  Keep an eye out for Tammy Lynn Michaels, Delta Burke, and a pre-Less Than Perfect Sara Rue as supporting characters.  Extra props for the episode bravely titled “Fag” in which a character takes up the fight against homophobia.

Sugary-sweet, with big talent and a killer script, Pushing Daisies is the very best circus you ever missed.

Our hero Ned learns at a tender age that he can touch dead things and bring them back to life - every dead thing, including his dog (his first resurrection) and strawberries (the crux of his livelihood as the “Pie Hole” pie-maker). That’s kind of boring, so there must be some moral implications to his little talent.

The first predictable problem: “First touch: alive; second touch: dead again, forever”1. Fine. A glove on a stick is just swell to pet your thirty-year-old undead puppy.

The second is what gives this show its suspenseful bursts: exactly sixty seconds after awakening his mother from an aneurysm, his childhood sweetheart’s daddy drops dead. Death has his demands, including a replacement dead thing.

For Emerson Cod, P.I. and sometimes confident trickster - and the first person to discover Ned’s secret - a delicious opportunity for blackmail is set. Emerson reckons his practice would be much more profitable if he could just ask victims who killed them. He’s not wrong, really, but the “forensic, fairy-tale” jaunts he leads Ned on (reluctantly stuck in his pie shop) are a smidge more absurd than expected.

Simple enough, right? Touch the deceased, ask him whodunit, poke him again - in under a minute - and arrest the wife. Only this bare plotline won’t fill an hour of mystery, so naturally the bloody polygamist has four wives.

Lee Pace’s Emmy- and Golden Globe-nominated stint as Ned is heartbreakingly, stomachtwistingly darling. He’s only more adorable with Charlotte “Chuck” Charles, that dear old sweetheart, who is inconveniently murdered, conveniently resurrected, and necessarily just out of reach of lovestricken Ned.

The sweetest caricature is Olive, a similarly lovestricken waitress who, intent on touching Ned, has her suspicions as to why he won’t touch his own girl. Add two agoraphobic synchronized swimmers with tastes for Prozac-laced pie, a machine that can print on anything (see: matching wallpaper and shag carpeting chez Olive), and an exploding scratch-and-sniff book intended for the world’s premier olfactorian, and you’ve got a damn good hour of mindless grown-up fairy tales.

Two Technicolor seasons were not enough to fill my heart with ooey-gooey goodness. Unfortunately, it seems the rest of America either a) hates pie or b) has no taste (one visit to a Shoney’s will solve this riddle). Pushing Daisies was cancelled, but I cleverly gave my sister the first season on DVD, thus ensuring that I may watch it forever. Look for charming Chuck (Anna Friel) in the upcoming Land of the Lost with Will Farrell (or, on second thought, don’t) and the ever-glorious, classically trained opera star Kristin Chenoweth (Olive) anywhere you can find her, including Disney’s Rapunzel and Tinkerbell. With a cast like that, you know it’s going to be good.

The Closer: The Complete Fourth Season. Brenda Leigh returns for another season of chilling unrepentant killers, sympathetic accidental killers, and everything else you love about procedural crime shows.

Designing Women: The Complete First Season. The long running sitcom finally makes it to DVD, with season two due out later this year.

Law & Order: Special Victims Unit-The Ninth Year. For those of you that just can’t get enough of those character-driven, Emmy winning, procedurals.

Land of the Lost: The Complete Series. Bone up on the cult classic before the seeing the blockbuster. It also comes in this awesome collectors edition.

Saturday Morning Cartoons: 1960s Vol. 1/1970s Vol. 1. I may be too young to remember watching them on Saturday mornings, but characters like The Jetsons, Hong Kong Phooey, and Quick Draw McGraw are timeless.

New shows (Hey, give them a chance at least. It’s not like you have anything better to do between June and September)

The Goode Family, ABC, May 27

Surviving Suburbia, ABC, May 27

Hung, HBO, June 28

Returning Favorites

Wipeout, ABC, May 27

Burn Notice, USA, June 4

Monk, USA, June 7 (Final season!)

Army Wives, Lifetime, June 7

Weeds, Showtime, June 8

The Closer, TNT, June 8

True Blood, HBO, June 14

Big Brother, CBS, July 7

Mad Men, AMC, July 19

Psych, USA, Aug. 7

Eureka, Sci Fi, July 10

Project Runway, Lifetime, Aug. 20

Nothing here floating your boat? Don’t worry. The good thing about summer is it ends, eventually. Oh, and let us know if we missed something you’re looking forward to watching.

Also, remember that you can watch the first episode of Glee on Fox.com all summer long. Desperate times can call for desperate measures.

If you are in your twenties like I am, you might have caught a glimpse of Homeboys In Outer Space while you were growing up. It was probably one of the shows you briefly passed over while flipping the channels between Full House, Home Improvement and Family Matters, and who could blame you? I mean, who watched anything on UPN? But you actually really missed out.

Homeboys featured Tyberius Walker and Morris Clay as two, 23rd century astronauts. They flew around on a car-like spaceship, piloted by the female robot, Loquatia. (Did I mention? The space vehicle is called The Hoopty?) Along with the main cast of characters, the show does follow the formulaic cast of supporting roles. The “friend” that constantly stabs the main characters in the back: Jed Eye, check! The lovely step-sister that appears from time to time, but really only has one major episode about her: Amma, check! The trust-worthy, yet clueless friend that is usually there for side laughs: Pippen, check!

A vast array of side characters that show up and play roles in only one episode and usually make the main characters look like heroes: Mr. Tan (23rd century version of the Devil), Rhymer (the evil villain), and many, many more, check! Not only does it follow the formula for the cast, but even some of the episode designs. What show would be complete without an episode about shrinking your winged car so you can fly inside your step-sister to kill the virus that is plaguing her body? Thank god the writers put that in the first 21 episodes or we might not have gotten to see it.

However, this two season TV flash in the pan wasn’t all about no-namers. This 21-episode show featured popular names such as Little Richard, Anthony Hopkins(my personal fave), Gary Coleman, Ethan Phillips, and Tempestt Bledsoe.

Why was this show canceled after only two seasons? That’s a good question. Many critics claimed the show created by Ehrich Van Lowe (co-produced various episodes of The Cosby Show and Even Stevens) continued to promote racial stereotypes. While many saw the humor it had when poking fun at other sci-fi ideas, such as Star Wars, the show just didn’t land high enough ratings for the negative attention it brought from the critics.

Aside from the serious criticisms that the critics brought up, which I do think are worth discussing, I still maintain that it’s one of the funniest shows I ever watched, and by far the best show you never watched. How can you hold back a laugh with titles like: “House Party or, Play That Funky White Music Droid,” “There’s No Space Like Home, or Return of the Jed Eye,” “Trading Faces or All the King’s Homeys,” and “Homeboys in Wonderland or, Hoopty Doopty”?

Hands down, this may have been the funniest show I’ve ever seen. If you didn’t stop to watch it while flipping through the channels as a young teen, you might never get the chance to laugh at the wacky antics of Ty and Morris. And, well, that makes me pity you.

Clip of Gold *Editor’s note from Heather: This isn’t a clip, so much as the theme song. Apparently, this is one of the shows to be forgotten by the internet.*

Rachael Ray

Giada De Laurentiis

Paula Deen

Okay, I know what you’re thinking. One of these talented women is not like the other two. Paula Deen may not be as young,  or as fit, but you’d be lying if you tried to say she had no appeal to you. Considering who the other two are and what they look like, you probably think she’d be an easy chuck. Well, you’d be wrong…and also vain.

I understand we all bring our own baggage to the table (pun intended lol) when we play this game, so let me be up front about mine.

I hate Rachael Ray. I wouldn’t f*ck her, I wouldn’t marry her. She’s chucked. She’d be chucked even if the other options were Jabba the Hutt and Gob. Not because I find her physically disgusting or something, but because she’s just too silly. Her mannerisms on 30 Minute Meals are so fake and flamboyant. It’s definitely a cooking show for dummies. She’s also the least talented cook involved here (and let’s face it, all three of these women are cooks, not chefs). I can’t take her seriously, and her cooking chatter makes me dumber. I think she degrades the art of cooking, even when we’re just talking about home cooks. In fact, her show is on in the background right now and guess what she’s doing? Crushing up corn nuts. I think you see what I’m talking about. Most obnoxious, least talented. Chuck.

Giada is pretty hot, and I think Italian food would get pretty old after awhile if we were married. Let’s face it. She’s cute and smart and pretty sophisticated, but she’s also kind of a one-trick pony. We’d have to make this a one-time thing.

As for the marry, those who watch a lot of Food Network like I do know Paula Deen is a loving wife. She’s always taking care of Michael. Also you’d get to be on her show, I mean, everyone in her family does. And she’s such a sweet heart. So welcoming and warm and supportive. Of course, you’d need to pick up an exercise routine, because unfortunately, her kind of affection may lead to some weight gain. But honestly, I don’t know what else you’d want in a Marry. Paula is the tops, y’all.