Here we go again.

I’d seriously gotten used to spending time with my family, reading and going outside. The last few months have been like one of those dreams where you know that you aren’t YOU, but you just run with it. Now that TV is actually back I can slide back into sloth like a nice warm bath. Last Thursday hit my Tivo like a tonne of bricks. It’s like Tivo used to have this cool manager that let him slack off, surf the web and take 30 minute smoke breaks, then Corporate sent in a ballbust to whip his whole division back into shape.

“Tivo! Why aren’t you recording 30 Rock?!”

“I….I….I was going to….”

“WELL, RECORD IT!? Then clean up this warehouse! There’s old episodes of Good Eats all over the place! Is that Planet Earth over in the corner? They’re not going to watch that again! DELETE IT!”

Speaking of: why didn’t anyone BUT Josh ever tell me how great 30 Rock was? I caught the last two episodes and I am officially hooked. It’s about as close to Arrested Development as I’ve seen on TV since AD’s untimely demise.  You see, I can’t just take Josh’s word on things like this. He’s almost always right, but he also watches Ugly Betty and Desperate Housewives so it’s hard to trust him. To his credit the list of shows he recommended that I resisted makes for a rather impressive resume: Arrested Development, Battlestar Galactica,  and 30 Rock, to name a few. The problem is, he recommends basically everything. It’s like voting for every presidential candidate. You will always, at least partially, win.

(Also, I take back anything I’v ever said about Hulu.com. It has every episode of Arrested D. available at an instant. I leave it playing in the background while I work. They… um…. it’s better than iTunes.)

Other shows that he’s tried unsuccesfully to cram in my TV hole include 24, Grey’s Anatomy, The West Wing, and Serious 30 Rock (Studio something or other).  I’m sure those are all good shows but I have to resist falling for them. There are only so many hours in a day and there are comics to be made. Comicareseriousbusiness.

I guess you can untie the virgin from the pike and stop stoking the fires at her feet. We also won’t need to sacrifice these goats and suckling pigs to our golden TV idol after all.

Damn it.

That’s right, the strike is (probably close to) over. Why? Because some Disney fuck wad said so. A part of me hoped that it would go on forever and this lack of TV would cause us to evolve into a new society governed by intellect and good will rather than greed and self destruction. Then I realized that only SCRIPTED TV was effected. If this had continued any longer, we would have nothing to watch but game shows and reality TV. Personally, I’ve seen enough of “Are You Sluttier Than a Fifth Grader,” “Who’s Dad has the Bigger Dick?,” “Celebrity Coke Addicts in Thunderdome,” “Celebrity Coke Addicts at the Bottom of Well,” and “Celebrity Coke Addicts Work at a Jamba Juice and the prize is Cocaine.”

It will be nice to see a new The Office or Heroes at some point, but I hope I emerge from this ordeal forever changed. I would like to less dependent on TV for entertainment. Oh shits! “Admit Which Ethnic Groups You Hate (For Money)” is coming on FOX.

I didn’t actually forget because I never knew about it. That’s weird. Despite that fact that I would have no reason to turn on ABC while Lost isn’t airing, you would think the particular internets I frequent would be buzzing with Lost premier news.

For those that must be in the know, io9.com has extremely detailed Lost spoilers here, here, here and here.

TV Guide’s Michael Ausiello has some updates on the premier and a few minor spoilers. He also says the writer’s strike might be over with an announcement as early as tomorrow.

Is it just me, or have you all enjoyed this break from TV? I started to realize how little I actually enjoyed some of the shows I was watching (Prison Break), and have been able to let them go. I feel like a contrived, poorly planned, monotonous burden has been lifted from my shoulders.

It will be nice to see the writers getting back to work and the watchable shows coming back to the air. I hope the industry reemerges stronger and smarter because of this ordeal.

I wonder what long term effects the strike will have on shows like Lost that already have odd production schedules. Truncated season? 4 mini seasons instead of 3? 4 deaths per episode? Can they resurrect Niki and Paulo and kill them again?

Nostalgia Side Note:

I started Hijinks Ensue last May with the idea of making fun of geek culture, especially TV. Lost was one of the first shows I tackled. Check out those early efforts here, here, and here.

The monologue was more like 4 min of so-so stand up (no news or references), with a lot of filler. Then this happened:

[youtube:http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b9lXcUL2GQw]

Not since Little Conan Babies, or the Masturbating Bear have I been so simultaneously entertained and confused by the chalky white giant with the scarlet pompadour. The best part is that he was DEAD serious. You know he sings that in the shower.

Somehow “The Writers Guild” evokes imagery of shadowy figures in heavy velvet cloaks gathered around mammoth stone tables to perform sacred blood rights and cast runes. This ancient band of clandestine scribes is now on strike. They’ve struck… stricken… whatever. To be fair, the studios should just agree to remove all writing from DVD’s and downloaded shows. Heroes season 2 would be unaffected. O00hhh. Burn.

Today’s comic deals with the declining quality of the television show Heroes and the merits of its “creator,” one Mr. R. Timothy Kring. I’ve decided season 1 was a fluke. Season 2 is a testament to how little this guy understands about comic books or geekery in general.

The short list:

• The only thing we wanted to know is what happened to Peter. We still don’t know.
• Amnesia is teh kop 0uts.
• Focusing on new boring characters worked so well for LOST that we should totaly do it. I hope Dora and Diego get buried alive.
• Wiping out NY was last year’s big bad. This year’s is… wiping out..oh god.
  • For instructions on how to do a new apocalypse every season, see Buffy: Seasons 1-7. Take notes.
• Mutant virus, eh? Don’t read much X-Men, huh?
• Claire’s boyfriend is a tool
• Hiro is an idiot. He was in feudal Japan about 8 episodes too long.
• Parkman’s dad is the killer? One more Hero needed Daddy issues? Seriously. Think about it for 5 seconds. Who on this show wasn’t permanently scarred by their father?

It turns out Tim Kring time traveled forward, read this post, went back in time and apologized for his transgressions. That’s certainly a different approach than we get from Lindelhof and Cuse. They are more of “Fuck off! Let me see you make a better show! Dick holes!” Where as Kring is taking the stance of “yeah, I really don’t know what I’m doing. You guys got any ideas? Where do you post your fan fics? Oh, here they are…. why are all the dudes gay?”

You can download today’s comic for your Webcomic Remixing delights here:

Have some fun with it and email your entries to comics (at) hijinksensue (dot) com.

UPDATE:

I moved the remix entires here and gave them their own category.

Holy shit. The whole TV world is exploding into crazy fucking chaos!

Via AICN.