Tag Archives: Netflix

Television

Best of the Worst Hallmark Holiday Movies, 2022 Edition

It’s 2022, baby! We’ve got about 6 zillion streaming services and FINALLY they’re all making original Christmas movies. We are no longer SHACKLED to a network geared toward the middle-aged female demo making four of the exact same movie starring Candace Cameron Bure each and every year with the grand finale being a Sahara desert dry brushing of lips. We’ve got OPTIONS now! When I sat down to make my list of preferred flicks to watch, I clicked through 174 BRAND NEW original Christmas movies. And from that monster list (shout out Entertainment Weekly), I narrowed it down to a conservative 33 movies as a guideline, adding and deleting along the way. Let the records also show that CableTV.com put out a call for one person to be the “Chief of Cheer,” watch 25 movies in 25 days, submit commentary and get paid $2,000 for their services. I nearly broke my keyboard whipping up a lengthy rambling of a submission PLEADING my case that I’m already the Chief of G-D Cheer and I deserve compensation for it for ONCE. Spoiler alert: I did not get the job. Big mistake, CableTV.com, HUGE.

For anyone who cares, here was my submission that was so unjustly overlooked. I hope everyone at CableTV.com gets coal in their stockings this year.

There’s truly nothing better than pouring myself a glass of wine, snuggling up on the couch in my sherpa-lined red truck blanket, staring at the twinkling Christmas tree in the corner & smashing play on a holiday movie. It is the true meaning of Christmas.

Not only do I enjoy consuming a sleigh-load of holiday movies each year, but for the past 8 years I’ve maintained a pop culture blog (thesaltyju.com) and each year I recap the newest Hallmark & Lifetime holiday movies and share my opinions with the world (whoever stumbles upon my blog.) Considering each streaming network is now competing for who can release more original holiday movies each year, this is quite an undertaking and I feel as though my fervor to watch each one and record my thoughts before Christmas Day is impressive. I’m dedicated to watching overworked corporate girlbosses return to their sparsely populated hometown and fall in love with the local carpenter as they harmonize at the church Christmas pageant that they managed to cobble together after many holiday hijinks, sharing one chaste kiss under the mistletoe as the credits roll. And if I’m that dedicated WITHOUT pay, imagine the effort I’ll put in with a little incentive?!

Even though I make time for 20-30 new holiday movies each year (while keeping Hallmark running in the background as I “work” from home so I can rewatch old ones as well) I always make sure to revisit the classic Christmas movies I grew up on. Each Christmas season *must* include Home Alone (1 & 2), Elf, I’ll Be Home For Christmas, The Santa Clause (1&2), Love Actually, Miracle on 34th Street, National Lampoon’s Christmas Vacation & The Grinch. Of course, I’ll make room for new classics to be sprinkled into the mix, most recently Netflix’s The Christmas Chronicles has become a fan favorite in my household of one. Kurt Russell gave Santa an edge that we haven’t seen since Tim Allen in the early 90’s and I can always get down with a cool Santa sax solo.

Anyway, as you can see, I’m already crushing it as a Chief of Cheer every holiday season like it’s my J-O-B, so why not get paid for it?! I would LOVE the opportunity to watch Christmas movies and share my feedback with CableTV.com. Thank you so much for your consideration and keep the change, ya filthy animals!

Anywho, back to the matter at hand, Hallmark has really jumped the shark since the aforementioned CCB left and now that the streaming services are releasing their own Christmas movies, pumping a fraction of our ungodly subscription fees into the production value, there really is no competition. That’s not to say I ruled out the OG giants of Christmas (Hallmark and Lifetime), but I will give you fair warning that in the world of streaming cable, you can’t have both. You either get Hulu Live TV with Lifetime or YouTubeTV with Hallmark. There’s a special place in hell for ex boyfriends who cancel their Hulu Ad-Free Live TV that they know you’re using, in PEAK Christmas movie season, without even a courtesy warning. Which is how I found myself scrambling to get a YouTubeTV subscription and therefore had no option but to F with Hallmark exclusively this year (Sorry, bout it, Lifetime.) So without further ado, I’ve divided by network–in alpha order–so you can roll right past the networks you’ve chosen not to pay for (or steal logins for.)

AMAZON PRIME

Something From Tiffany’s

A product of Reese Witherspoon’s production company, Hello Sunshine, the plot of this one is a wee bit of an engagement ring mixup. Ethan gets a big ole rock to propose to his LA girlfriend, Gary gets his girlfriend diamond earrings, their bags get switched and each woman opens up the wrong gift on Christmas day. Except instead of correcting the mixup, Gary goes pedal to the metal and proposes anyway with a ring he certainly doesn’t have the coin to pay for. We all know they have to make the current partner hateable so we don’t feel like it’s cheating when there’s a spark with someone else…but I feel like they went too far here. Gary the tattoo artist is a thieving scumbag. And word on the street is it’s ok to leave your fiance when he’s a poor dirtbag with no morals. This movie was kinda boring overall save for BFF Terri who provides comic relief and rips on the shitty boyfriend, but it’s a nice Christmas in the city story overall. Definitely can tell its got that Reese cashflow.

Your Christmas or Mine?

I guess this one was geared toward the younger crowd as it featured two college students. Ah, to be young and in love at Christmas with a posh accent. Leaning on the “let’s surprise each other” but do it at the same time and completely miss each other trope, James ends up celebrating Christmas with Hayley’s family in one town and Hayley ends up suck with James’ dad in another. Obviously neither one has told their family about the status of their relationship because they’ve been dating basically five minutes. Secrets are revealed, families are the worst, and the ONLY time I chuckled was when Hayley’s family shows up at James’ mansion (he’s a Lord) and make a comment about how she could’ve pulled a proper Meghan Markle. Otherwise, this movie is a dud and you couldn’t PAY me to spend a holiday with a brand new sig oth’s family WITHOUT THEM THERE. Pure torture.

CBS

When Christmas was Young

This is primetime. The big leagues. This movie premiered after 60 Minutes! What a lead-in. You know it’s good shit when it’s getting the Sunday night feature like it’s awards season. Happy to report it did not disappoint, especially since it was the last movie I viewed this season and I already had quite an ear full of “original Christmas songs” that made me want to scoop out my ear drums with a butter knife. With Sheryl Crow as an EP, you can trust the music will be legit and it sure was. Luke Dawson (hot name) is a doucheroni country music agent who gets fired and his last Hail Mary to keep his biggest client is to get the rights to a song written by Melody. Tale as old as time, Melody shows him the charitable and family side of Christmas so he stops being such a turd and Luke repays her by giving her song away anyway so he can keep his job. All’s well that ends well though, obviously in song. I really don’t have a lot of snark for this one because it followed the holiday movie formula to a T and it didn’t have any weird actors overdoing it in the background or terribly cringetastic scenes. Round of Applause for the Canadians here, they know how to make a solid Christmas movie.

GREAT AMERICAN FAMILY

Catering Christmas

Molly is the chipper go-getter of a business owner trying to land a catering job for a rich family and Carson is the privileged nephew photographer of said family who has a boner for her. This movie was the equivalent of a Christmas cutout sugar cookie, sweet and basic. No major conflict, no exes to get rid of, and even when Carter had to pick going to Milan over staying in his hometown to be chairman of the family biz, it was *very* anticlimactic. Bonus Points for an opening scene of Carson sneaking up on his aunt and taking a picture of her before even saying hello…stalk, much?! And a suuuuper random side love story between the butler and the aunt that escalated very quickly. We went from sidelong glances to a proposal in RECORD speed.

HALLMARK

Haul Out the Holly

Holly’s parents run the neighborhood Christmas festivities every year and basically have been ruining her Christmas since she was born because instead of getting to open presents at home she has to be free labor for their festival. Less than 5 minutes into the movie we’ve got a “I’m not happy in this relationship” and Holly will be returning home for Christmas with her overachieving parents. Except this bitch has the worst parents in the world. Like someone commit these two clowns to a mental institute. Who invites their daughter home and is like, “Bye babes, Happy Christmas we’re moving to Florida right now! Sorry about your breakup, please watch our giant house and make sure it’s decorated up to HOA code!” There are no redeeming qualities to this movie as everyone is rude and weird & sketchy and she’s an ADULT. Say no and get the hell outta there! And the lead male HOA president nerdbomber is a fucking loser. I don’t care if he’s an architect, he’s giving citations for not having a porch nutcracker, someone needs to give him a swirlie and then stuff him in a locker. And OF COURSE he plays the guitar. Extra cringes for the classic bludgeoning of an all-time great Rom Com line with: “Just a girl, standing in front of a boy, asking him to be Santa.” WOOF. MAKE IT STOP.

A Cozy Christmas Inn


I only stomach’ed like 45 mins of this and I was barely paying attention but I knew the minute I heard two old biddies in a town with a stupid name say “Believe in the magic!” that this was very much not the movie for me. I dig Jodie but we all have to have boundaries and a movie where Santa is the main hunk’s dad is mine. I don’t know exact plot deets here but I know Andy is the ex and Erika is there to buy his B&B leading to the often predictable “PROMOTION OR LOVE” decision…but with lots of twinkle sound effects and lines like “stop listening to your head and start listening to your heart!” From someone who thinks exclusively with her heart this is BAD advice from the friend of the program. Extra cringies for Erika asking Santa (Andy’s dad) for Andy for Christmas. I almost puked in my hands typing that. And it wouldn’t be a “one of a kind town” without annoying AF side characters trying to bring main character energy. I don’t care about your small town life in Garland, old diner people, kick rocks.

Christmas Class Reunion


As a Julie Taylor fan (yes I’m using her character name instead of her real name) I had high hopes for this one. She’s cute, the lead guy is a babe, what could go wrong?! Everything apparently. The opening scene is a complete rip of the Carrie pig’s blood dumping but Hallmark style. Then we fast forward 15 years later to all of these goons and where they are now. The over-acting in this one is next level and the way that each character acts like where they are in life is the END OF THE WORLD. (I was unemployed and moving back home right around the time my high school reunion took place so let’s cool our jets with pretending life sucks when you’re all gainfully employed.) The couple that was soooo in love in high school is separated now (color me shocked) and is hoping the reunion would spark their magic again. Since Hallmark isn’t about showing divorce, I think we can safely assume nostalgia will trump couples therapy in the end. None of these fools have talked to each other in 15 years but doesn’t stop them from acting like they’re besties when they’re reunited and also I HAVE A BONE TO PICK. When will Hallmark learn to fill the coffee cups with at least water so everyone stops tipping obviously empty cups toward their dome piece and pretending to sip. Shout out to random unnamed co-worker of Julie Taylor for the most memorable line of the whole damn thing, “They’re saying it’s a federal investigation…as in the FBI!” Oh, is that what that is?!

#Xmas

Jen runs a home decorating shop with her sister and makes lil videos and Max is her BFF from college who helps photograph and film her. They decide to enter some sort of HGTV knock-off celeb couple contest for influencers posing as a married couple with a baby. Obvs they become finalists and let me be the first to say this Hally threw me for a loop. It didn’t really follow the formula and everyone pretty much hated Jen for most of this movie. Her mom, Max who has been in love with her forever with her friend zoning him HOARD. Jen was not a fan favorite and not to pile on but she still hasn’t gotten any better at doing an American accent since her days starring as Scarlett on Nashville. But as we’ve learned, if anything can make you stop being an asshole, it’s Christmas…and also pretending to be your nephew’s mom on a stage in front of tons of people when he says “mama” for the first time and he ain’t talkin to you. Pro Tip: If you want to make this movie more fun, drink every time Jen pops into “influencer” voice and worry about the future of our youth who live in influencer voice 24/7. For realz, I saw a middle schooler prop her phone on a shelf at Wegmans and start doing a dance in the aisle. #We’reAllFucked.

A Tale of Two Christmases

It’s on me that I didn’t read the description (or the title) with any sort of common sense and still chose to watch this. I can’t get down with groundhog day or magical alternate universe movies so as soon as Santa “granted a Christmas wish” and the clock stopped working I knew I was screwed. Not only that, but I was confused. When this parallel Christmas first started I had no way of telling which was which. I guess what I’m trying to say is I think I’m finally too stupid for Hallmark? Also ain’t that some shit that you tell some fat guy ringing a bell that you “just want something to work out for once” and you get to live out two Christmases to let you know which man candy to choose and how to crush it at your career. WHERE’S MY FAT MAN?! I’d love an insider tip, homeslice. I want to help my middle school bully sensually strip his chunky knit Christmas sweater off after declaring it’s hot in here! Anyway, no spoilers but Emma’s Christmas with fancy lawyer Max and her promotion to lead architect ends up being a real disaster and as it turns out moving home to Vermont and starting a biz with her dad and smooching the guy she grew up with is THE TRUE MEANING OF CHRISTMAS. “You know I’m not perfect, right?” “You are to me!” AWWWWWGagggmylifeawayAWWWW.

HBO MAX

Holiday Harmony

Homeless chick Gail drives around the country in a van and does open mics, but she’s keeping her followers up to date on the journey which is high key obnoxious to watch her be an influencer who can’t afford an apartment but can afford to overshare. And wouldn’t you know her van/home gets totaled by a goat or something on her way to LA for her big break. The man, the myth, the legend, JD McCoy (clearly the Friday Night Lights characters are a HIT in the Christmas movie scene), is the mechanic who will fix her van and then make it rock if ya know what I mean, WINK WINK. Not gonna lie, grown up JD was doing it for me in this movie and I’m not ashamed to admit it. Sure, the movie took an emotional turn that I wasn’t prepped for but we got a sex scene. HELL YEA. HBOMax has no rules and I DIG IT. Unfortunately that’s immediately followed by children singing which is a big HELL NO. Overall dece movie but I’d be remiss not to shine a light on the worst part…the hispanic actress that I saw in THREE movies so far this year and she was playing a loud obnoxious caricature in all three. Was she running a special on “annoying over-animated screecher” as a character?! I was mega embarrassed for her every time she graced my TV this year.

A Hollywood Christmas


Jess is directing a Christmas movie about a lawyer shutting down a bakery and as it’s shooting, Christopher, a finance bro from the network, comes to shut down the Christmas movie division, Omg SO meta. A few minutes later I discovered that Jess’s assistant has a cartoon baby voice that made me want to blow my brains out and I PRAYED that her speaking role would diminish as this flick progressed. That was my one Christmas wish this year. And that Christmas wish was quickly shattered because this girlie was basically a main character flapping that squeaker of hers to point out all of the ways in which Jess’s life was playing out like a Christmas movie. It certainly didn’t help matters that I was already cranky and starving as I watched this movie on my colonoscopy prep day. The treat your real life like a Christmas movie WHILE filming a Christmas movie that has almost the same plot all voiced by lil miss helium pipsqueak was a hard no for me. I paused it several times and it took everything in me to finish it. Then it ended on a musical number to really seal its fate as worst movie ever. PS: STOP TRYING TO MAKE THE “IS DIE HARD A CHRISTMAS MOVIE” ARGUMENT CUTE FLIRTY DATING BANTER. IT IS NOT.

HULU

Merry Kiss Cam

Jess (clearly a hot name choice this year) is an artist and Danny owns a hockey bar that was passed down from his dad. Danny is also the hottie from Bring It On and dayumnnn he aged well. Anyway, the initial attraction between these two crazy kids is they both are adults who eat snow. And honestly I can see that being listed as a kink on a dating profile. “We’re the same kind of weird if…we both eat snow.” I really need to get off of the apps. But I’ve got nothing but love for this movie. I liked both of the leads, they had the most adorable couple banter and I love a good falling in love montage, which this gave in the form of smooching at college hockey games so they keep up their winning streak. My only snarky comment is that I wish she would’ve gotten those godforsaken bangs out of her eyes. If anyone is on the fence about cutting bangs, watch Jess spend the entire movie pushing them back so she could actually use her eyes while painting.

My Christmas Fiancé

This was so bad that I honestly double checked to make sure it wasn’t a parody and I didn’t fall for it. As it turns out, the creator of this movie was serious and for that I am so sorry. When the movie started and we were getting artsy shots of food in a prep kitchen I thought wow, these TV movies are really trying to make it to Cannes these days. But then as I kept watching it became clear that there is no shot this wasn’t a student-made film. Besides the next level bad acting that reeks of volunteers from class, the camera was constantly moving like a dad behind a camcorder. At one point, a waitress comes into the kitchen probably trying to do a different accent then her own and goes, “what are you guys doing here” and I swore I was losing my mind and/or tripping on shrooms because I thought somehow my TV switched to slow motion cause it took so long for her to get that sentence out. And the CHERRY ON TOP is that this abomination to the term movie actually had a recognizable name in it with Denise Richards. I watched the whole damn thing and I still have no idea what Denise Richards’ role was other than to pop up and watch the main characters cr33p style or say a few incoherent words here and there. I don’t think even she knew she was on a movie set. She probably thought it was for her OnlyFans. I would say skip this movie but I also kind of want someone else on this earth to have gone through the torture that was watching it so pls report back so we can commiserate.

LIFETIME

Steppin into the Holiday


Billy Holiday gets fired from his dance show with his wife (IRL) because what is a holiday movie without Mario Lopez’s entire family making a cameo. He goes home for the holidays and sees an opportunity to keep twirling with his nephew’s dance teacher Ray. It may be disrespectful to critique the children in movies but this one deserves to be knocked down a peg or two. Billy’s nephew is the most annoying little shit in the history of annoying little shits. He’s a TikTok dancer who thinks he’s going to be famous so he stops studying at school so he can record himself shimmy shaking. As my sister and I noted out loud anytime he graced the screen, “what a cocky little fuck.” Besides CLF, the aforementioned obnoxious side character actress from Holiday Harmony also plays Billy’s sister (annoying shit’s mom, go figure) and gives off a REAL weird sibling energy. It goes from immature to flirty real quick when she tells him they should wrestle for the bed closest to the door. It gave me all of the ickies. Thank GOD for Cheri Oteri popping in throughout for a much-needed case of the giggles.

Cloudy with a Chance of Christmas


No. Just, no.

NETFLIX

Falling for Christmas


Sierra is a rich, spoiled asshole with an obviously gay influencer boyfriend Tad. Mid-proposal, they both fall in an avalanche or something equally as ridiculous and Jake, the small resort owner that’s about to go under, claims Sierra because she doesn’t remember who she is. Since they had a not so pleasant run-in while Jake was asking Sierra’s dad for funding to stay afloat, I thought we were watching an Overboard remake where Jake was going to punish Sierra by making her live like a commoner and learn the value of a dollar. But it turns out this guy is really dumb enough to not remember someone yelling at him one day prior and had no clue who she was until the end. There’s a magical Santa that plays absolutely no role in the greater plot other than appearing with sleigh bells music every once in a while and giving a creepy smile. Most importantly, we are served with the most horrible hair in the history of men’s hair that I was so disgusted by I got right up on my TV and rewound to snap some pics for proof.

IS HE PULLING THAT FACE BECAUSE HE CAUGHT A GLIMPSE OF HIS OLE PLASTIC HEAD ASS IN THE MIRROR?! BOOM. ROASTED. Shout out to my girl LiLo for a solid comeback and one of the few somewhat enjoyable movies this year.

Christmas with You

If I had a dollar for every time I typed the sentence “this is next level bad” into my notes app during a holiday movie viewing, I’d be able to afford the houses that all those cool kids my age are getting. Angelina is a popstar who needs to write an original Christmas song for her label and Miguel is a music teacher whose daughter is obsessed with Angelina and makes a TikTok that she notices. And that’s how two sassy ladies (Angelina and her comedic relief assistant) end up hitting up a 14 year old and her old ass dad for inspiration. Seriously, there’s no planet where I believe this hot tamale of a popstar is getting sucked in by a 46 year old man. Oh shit, nevemind, I just IMDB’ed her age and she’s 44 proving the theory VERY wrong that men age better in this scenario because I thought for sure this chick was 30 tops. Hand up, I judged the age difference here and there is none. Whoopsie. Anyway, it still doesn’t justify a very sensual dough-touching scene for these two to have while the rest of the fam makes ‘let’s get it on ‘eyes at them, INCLUDING THE TEENAGER… CRINGE MY LIFE AWAY. Unfortunately, this was also hands down the worst original song I’ve ever heard and that’s saying a lot considering I watched the Netflix original Purple Hearts where they pounded their original ditty into your brains by performing it 16,000 times. She even switched into Spanish for a hot second too so this song could blow in two languages! Feast your ears on this fiery hot garbage that somehow even fictionally got a slot on SNL. IS LORNE DEAF?!

The Noel Diary

My mom and I sat down to watch this one together and I had to run an errand and she asked if she should pause it. I told her I’d catch up. Came back with a half hour left and had the whole thing figured out so I guess I’m not too dumb for Netflix, which is comforting. This movie is obviously made for moms all over the world who think Justin Hartley is charismatic and dreamy. I’m not sellin what he’s buyin, so I could really judge this movie without falling for his movie star smile. Leaning a little more on the dramatic side, Jake goes back into his family history after his mom dies to reconnect the maid with her long-lost daughter who he obv can’t resist. My bone to pick here is that this girlie full-on cheats to be with him. Clearly no one at Netflix is doing their research cause that’s a hard no in holiday movie-land. You don’t cheat, you just emotionally connect with someone better and then your partner does something horrible and inexcusable and you don’t have to feel guilty that you don’t actually love them. DUH. But don’t ask me what I think of this movie, ask my mom who was sobbing on the couch as the credits rolled.

I Believe in Santa


Magazine writer Lisa says the word wiener to her boss within 5 mins and I was sold…until I laid eyes on Tom. This is the creepiest male lead I’ve ever peeped and I am not exaggerating when I say that this guy would be much more fitting for a serial killer / stalker role in a Lifetime movie. How quickly it can go from wiener jokes to the cringiest movie alive. Lisa hates Christmas and Tom is so obsessed with it that he should be on a watchlist. Then she discovers he genuinely still believes in Santa and judging by her sticking with him in the end, they probably both could benefit from therapy. As much as this movie gave me the uncomfies every time Tom’s face graced the screen, what really jammed my glock was the way Netflix was trying to hide deeper lessons about religion, race, and humanity into arguments about Santa. That was more than I was willing to learn from a low budge Christmas flick. Not trying to contemplate the existence of God in my pjs while I wrap Barbie’s on a Saturday morning, guys, so let’s cool our jets here. I do suggest taking this one for a spin if you’d like to have nightmares that feature Tom’s terrifying face for the foreseeable future.

Standard
Movies, Pop Culture, Television

Best of the Worst Hallmark Holiday Movies, 2021 Edition

We’ve reached the point of no return. I am no longer even giving a “Watch” or “Skip” rating to these made-for-TV (or streaming) holiday flicks. This is my 7th annual blog recapping the art that is an awesomely bad cliche holiday movie and if you’re reading this I’m assuming you know that it’s a real love/hate relationship that I have with these hot garbage flicks. And by that I mean, every time I finish one, I hate myself a little bit more for having sat through it at all. So rather than slap a “must-watch” stamp of approval on anything this year, I’m going to get my jokes in, tell it like it is and let you decide for yourself if you’re willing to put yourself through it mentally and emotionally. If you enjoy torture and one lame dry as hell kiss at the end of a movie, stick to Hallmark…if you want to get a little saucy and see more sexual tension and tongue action? May I suggest a peruse of Lifetime or Netflix, even Peacock snuck in this year! Here we go…

a-castle-for-christmas

I got straight duped with this one. Netflix hit me with the “this is a 98% match for you, WATCH IT NOW!” And I was like aggressive, but ok let’s see what this is all about. I gave it 25 minutes before I turned it off. Between the HEAVY Irish accents and the fact that the target age demographic was my mom (seriously, how old does Netflix think I am?!) and the lead actor who probably wasn’t even sexy 20 years ago aka the last time he was an age appropriate male lead for me…I’m sorry but for all of those reasons and so many more, I’m out.

acaliforniachristmas2

The most unwarranted sequel I’ve ever heard of but isn’t that the name of the game for Netflix? People watched something so they crank out 5 more. If you missed my review last year of the OG, peep that here before getting the lowdown on *city lights.* I said it last year and I’ll say it again for the people in the back, Manny is the only star of this movie. I don’t even care about the lead couple, I’m only sticking around to see Manny’s goofy one-liners and funny faces. The good news is Netflix realized what a gem he was in the first and upped the ante for his role in the second. The third installment of this franchise better be all about Manny’s life or we riot. Right out the gate I’d like to let everyone know that there’s a PG-13 rating on this flick and boy do they earn it with a sensual sex scene in the first fifteen minutes. My sister and I had to cover her baby’s eyes as this was far too mature for a six month old to take in. If you’ve ever seen a sequel one time in your life, you’ll know that once the couple has gotten together, part 2 is all about how maybe they rushed into things and they’re not right for each other. Nothing screamed that harder than the rich boy doucher outfit Joseph dons to show off his life back in the city to his farm girl fiance Callie. The dude was wearing a white overcoat, white flare dress pants and loafers. We get it buddy, you grew up going to the country club for golf with the boys. For the rest of the movie we watch Callie’s younger sister who has no living parents left and is in the custody of Callie get straight up neglected and basically raise herself, sustaining a serious injury that no one gives a flying F about because big sis is preoccupied planning a fancy San Fran wedding. All the while, our villain (Joseph’s ex and co-worker) Victoria is out to ruin the wedding. Seriously, there’s not one scene where this hooch isn’t just peeping Tom’ing all over their lives while in bright red evening-wear. Hey guys, before you get caught up in making out, maybe notice the devil 4 ft away from you glaring at you…But all’s well that ends well when Manny tries to ask out Callie’s BFF while she has her arm directly inserted into a cow’s vagina. Thank God for Manny, his cow-spotted nightgown wearin’ ass deserved to find love.

Bonus Points: One of Joseph’s “city friends” (skankwads) greets him for the first time in a year by doing a two-handed slide and scoop on his butt while he’s bent over cleaning something up in a public hotel lobby. WHAT THE HELL IS THAT?! Is this the new era credit card swipe? IS THIS HOW FRIENDS GREET EACH OTHER IN SAN FRANCISCO?! Doing the ole 10 finger wiggle near someone else’s butthole…in white pants no less..seems like pretty dangerous territory, especially while the receiving end is bent over at a 90 degree angle letting it all hang out. We gotta get on the same page about how we catch up with old friends in different states because I really feel like I’m missing something here.

love-hard-poster

I’m a little bit cheating with this one because I feel like it came out FOREVER ago but it IS a Christmas movie and it WAS terrible so I feel like it’s important to include it. I had high hopes because Christmas movies can have raunchier humor over in the no rules land of Netflix. Also, Darren Barnet has proven to be quite a babe in Never Have I Ever (great show.) Natalie writes a dating column about her online dating mishaps. She meets Tag on an app and even though he lives across the country, they have such a good long distance connection that she thinks he’s the one. She flies out to surprise him for Christmas and realizes she’s been catfished by Josh–who as you can see looks drastically different from Tag. It’s one of those movies that is supposed to point out that we’re all shallow assholes and it’s more about falling in love with the person & all of their inner beauty than their 6 pack abs. Yeah, yeah, yeah we get it. Leave that shit for the real world. None of us are marrying someone with washboard abs so in all of my movies I WANT TO SEE THE QUIRKY GIRL END UP WITH THE SEXY BEAST. Is that really too much to ask? Regardless, this movie was painfully unfunny and it seemed as though Natalie’s only joke (and an overplayed one at that) was that her favorite Christmas movie is Die Hard. #CoolGirlNat

Bonus Points: Ever the feminist (who loves Die Hard, don’t forget) Natalie CANNOT STAND “Baby It’s Cold Outside”–how original I know–and so when they’re asked to sing a carol on the spot in front of the family, Josh and Natalie break into an impromptu 2021 version of the classic. Not only do they completely butcher a wonderful song, but I almost had to call the uncomfortable police from watching this scene. No words will do it justice but please PLEASE for the love of God, CAN WE BAN DRAWN OUT SINGING SCENES FROM HOLIDAY MOVIES?! It downright ruins my Christmas and NO I’M NOT BEING DRAMATIC, OK?!

averymerrybridesmaid

My first Hally of this year and what a joyous occasion it was. I forced my ex boyf to watch it with me just like I forced him to carry my Christmas tree up my apt stairs and therefore the cutting commentary was UNLEASHED upon these poor unfortunate souls. It also happened to be chock full of ridiculousness & worth every snarky observation we made. Leah is about to turn 30 on Christmas Eve and also her brother decided to plan his wedding for that same night (TOTAL asshole move, if one of my siblings did this I’d get trashed at their wedding and make a scene while wearing a 30 crown.) Her childhood crush, Drew is back from his world travels to fix up his dead grandma’s house where he lived (next door to Leah) and wants to make sure the big 3-0 isn’t forgotten amongst the wedding kerfuffle. (Spoiler alert: it most definitely is.) The best part about this movie is the lead who plays Drew is fresh meat. He’s not a tired old recycled Hallmark actor who has been in 1900 holiday flicks, looking more weathered than Santa. He’s young and rocking that rugged burly man hotness. Total eye candy. And everything else pretty much goes downhill from there. Leah’s family is WEIRD. Her brother looks like he’s on coke 24/7 with the most expressive eyes I’ve ever seen and the parents are also vying for our attention with over-acting anonymous. They all interact as if they’ve never met each other. The brother’s fiance is named Julia and oh boy does that suck because she plays the bratty bride cliche the entire movie. Bitch flew to London 3 times in one year for a wedding dress from a specific designer. Obviously the dress got lost in a flight. We have a big build-up to the wedding dress she finally wears and it’s a short sleeve paper bag. Outside. On Christmas Eve. With snow on the ground. Hot tip: if you want to get lit up like a Christmas tree, may I suggest taking a drink every time any character references that they are in fact in Rose Lake. Nothing hits harder than a fictional town being forced into every single scripted sentence. Oh Christmas in Rose Lake? Nothings beats Rose Lake. I remember when we were growing up here in Rose Lake…

Bonus Points: Creepy brother has his bach party at their parent’s house and it’s ugly sweater themed. When Drew offers the groom-to-be a beer he replies, “Uh is there a mineral water, gotta fit into my tux.” God I want to punch this guy right in the face. Also, the girl who couldn’t possibly leave *Rose Lake* to travel the world because her local store needs her (yet she’s never once seen working at this store during the busy Christmas season) is gifted everyone else’s frequent flier miles for her 30th birthday. Wanna know how you’re the black sheep of the family? Your brother plans his wedding on your 30th birthday then gifts you with his leftover frequent flier miles and probably a used set of United ear buds. GOD WHAT AN AWFUL GIFT. Buy this girl a trip somewhere or just hand over cash. She probably can’t even use your miles to get a free magazine subscription, you cheap animals.

holidayinsantafe

I had this on in the background while I was wrapping presents one night and even as background noise it was offensive to my soul. I’ll tell you the exact moment I had to turn it off because it still haunts me to this day. These two clowns pictured above are spending some quality time with a niece doing Christmas shopping (played by Mario’s actual daughter) and she pulls them over in a little town square and sets up her phone on a tripod and goes we’re gonna do this TikTok dance. They do one run through of a solid 30 second dance with intricate choreography. The little shit goes, “got it? ok let’s go” and then they just do the TikTok. One take. Full choreography. I’m not often overcome by a deep jealousy and outrage of something so unrealistic but as someone who has tried the simplest of TikTok dances meant for geriatric F*cks and can’t get through 3 seconds without screwing up royally, I CALL BULLSHIT. Get out of my face.

Bonus Points: Mario never ages and if anyone is going to nail a TikTok, it’s the guy who invented sitting backward in a chair and doing a smooth split to Barbara Ann

slater

realhousewives

I appreciate Peacock making a name for itself right out the gate. Between Paris Hilton’s show featuring the QUEEN Kathy Hilton and a Real World-esque show taking the OG Housewives and sticking them on an island together for a week, this app is already worth the $0 I pay for it because I stole it from my ex-boyf, alimony style. Really all it comes down to is that the world needs more Housewives and Andy Cohen giveth freely (behind a paywall.) At first I was worried we were in for a holiday flick centered completely on two women in their forties bickering but the good news is this movie has LAYERS. And the layers are their children falling in love in a town where reindeer freely walk down the street. That’s something I can get down with. The boy (he’s 29, so it’s legal) is one of those classic pretty boy babes that Netflix keeps trucking out as high school movie leads as if anyone in your high school ever looked like that.

Anyway, there’s some great backstabbing hijinks, a gossipy town, a badd bitch troop of girl scouts and young love at Christmas. What more could you ask for? Oh yeah that’s right, a cameo from the fabulous Sonja Morgan and Santa drilling Kyle Richards with a snowball. (Basically only watch this if you’re a Bravo-holic.)

Bonus Points: The two kids smash face for the first time and mid-tonguing the girl goes our mom’s won’t like this very much and the guy goes can you not bring up our mom’s right now? #BONERKILL

royalqueenschristmas

I sure do LOVE Canadians, Brits and Californian’s putting on a New Yorker accent that is over the top and makes me want to rip my ears clean off my head. NAHT. “Capisce” complete with 🤌 was used unironically in the first five minutes of this movie. But anyway, we can’t have Christmas without a royal pretending to be a commoner and falling in love with a street rat only for it to be revealed at an incredibly inconvenient time that he could buy the entire country if he so pleased. DD is part of a zany working class fam in Queens who has a number of incredibly weird Christmas traditions that they try to pass off as normal American. No one is having a snowman building competition in their neighborhood or a Christmas Wishing Tree festival, let’s not give Colin the wrong impression on what America’s all about during the holidays (shopping, drinking and eating cookies.) Colin’s trying to dodge an arranged marriage and stepping up to be King of his fictional country and pursue his passion of “music.” I put music in quotes here because when he gets recruited as the pianist for DD’s charity children’s concert, he plays jazzy cool upbeat piano jams while kids scream sing at the top of their lungs. Hot combo. Obviously the wishing tree brings them together in the end with lingering eye contact and a piano ornament.

Bonus Points: Coming in at number one for MOST cringeworthy moment of the 2021 movie season, the children are singing “Joy to the World” at a normal slow speed and Colin is playing the piano at twice the speed…and everyone is smiling and loving it. It sounds like absolute trash and that’s saying a lot considering every children’s concert sounds like forks in a garbage disposal. This fast/slow tornado in my ears took it to a whole new level and people in the audience were genuinely like wow this is amazing, real raw talent here, this guy should go on tour and not listen to anyone else on stage and just play whatever tempo and song he wants!

Single-All-the-Way

Last year we broke down the first lesbian Christmas flick and this year we’ve got some man on man action. Heavy hitters Jennifer Coolidge and Kathy Najimy essentially carried this movie for me. As the overbearing mom who just wants to be accepting and understanding of her son (she’s read books about loving your gay son) Carol demands to be called Christmas Carol for all of December and greets Peter and his roomie Nick with a “Sleigh Queen” sign in the driveway. I immediately love her. Then we’ve got Jennifer Coolidge as zany Aunt Sandy who jacked ornaments off her sister’s tree and was wearing them as earrings. Even though Nick and Peter have been roommates for life, Peter’s whole family wants them to end up together and boy oh boy is this family FULL of pushers as it pertains to his dating life. If they were my family I would jump off a cliff. Except Aunt Sandy. She can hang.

Bonus Points: A family dance party to Britney’s original Christmas classic My Only Wish (This Year) – suck on that Mariah. Honestly, a cheesy Guncle dance montage for #FreeBritney is way better than a try-hard tiktok hoochie dance…Lifetime and Mario Lopez, I’m lookin’ at you.

theholidayfixup

Sam’s a famous HGTV wannabe who is back home for Christmas for the first time since her and her high school sweetie broke up.  And ope would you look at that, Coop and Sam have to work together to restore the inn and make Harborfest happen in honor of dead Rita (RIP Rita.) Here’s a new fun thing that Hallmark was hammering down our throats this year: the female lead is an “influencer” and super into social media and the small town aw shucks guy HAMMERS her for it until he sees by the end that social media isn’t the DEVIL. Coop openly mocking Sam for her IG story updates on their renovation progress and then loving the camera and being on her show with her by the end was LAUGH OUT LOUD hypocrisy. Here’s a tip, why don’t all you turds who are off the grid not come so hard at Instagram cause whatever homemade shit you’re peddling needs some sort of digital platform (in this case, it was wood-burned signs that looked like a kindergartner made them.) Also important to note that Jana Kramer got a very public boob job after her husband cheated on her for the zillionth time (and she spilled the tea on their joint podcast before finally kicking his sorry ass to the curb) and RIGHT off the bat in this movie that rack is prominently displayed in a lacy lingerie set. My exact note when my eyes popped out of my head seeing it was: “BOOB JOB IN RED LINGERIE.” It was so obvious that my sister also texted me about it too. Well played, Jana.

Bonus Points: The most unrealistic snowball fight scene I’ve ever laid eyes on. Even Twilight’s CGI vampire and werewolf battle scene was more believable than this. Is it Lifetime or are they trying to film the latest Marvel movie loaded with ex-lover sexual tension? Woof. The slow motion and intense music was cringe. Add all the gladiator music you’d like but it doesn’t cover up bad acting.

tistheseasontobemerry

Bold of Hallmark to still be trotting out Rachel Leigh Cook as if she’s not at the age where she plays a mom to a teenager in most movies. I also laughed out loud at the fact that her name is Merry. Simple tropes for simple folks. Merry wrote a dating expert book about a fictional relationship that she “snagged” by following her strict rules of love. Obviously her boss finds out she’s not engaged and she’s actually single AF, so she takes a trip home with her bestie to figure shit out/fall in love with her bestie’s hot brother. And oOoh baby is this guy quite the Christmas ham. They meet (again) via a tasty naked run-in when he lays his chiseled bod on top of her as she’s taking a nap on his bed 🤤 Not only does Adam clearly work out, but he also drives a red pickup truck, adding all of the bonus points to his sex appeal. As someone who has fully embraced the red pickup truck with a Christmas tree in the back decoration style, covering my home in it, DAS MY TYPE. He can’t be PERFECT though, ladies, amirite?! He’s another one who clowns Merry for her social media usage. She takes a photo of her pie for the gram and he snarks, “Does that taste better digitally?” Sick burn, bruh. I liked her comeback better when she told him that picture would be seen by 3.2 million people with just one click. SO HA, BIRD BRAIN IN A SMALL TOWN DRIVING A DUSTY OLD TRUCK. TAKE THAT.

Bonus Points: (Seems to be a trend where my bonus points is actually the most cringeworthy scene of the movie) The most dramatic DON’T GO airport scene where Merry screamed at the top of her lungs and honestly I had the most secondhand embarrassment for someone who screams that loud without letting the other person speak. Yikes on bikes. Turns out, he wasn’t even going anywhere, so her blood curdling whiny “don’t leave me” was even MORE mortifying. Move to a different country and change your name immediately, Merry. Honestly, change your name anyway because 11 months of the year it just doesn’t work.

unexpectedchristmas

Normally a big fan of any holiday movie Joy stars in, this one was kinda lukewarm for me. I think it’s because the guy was such a wiener. They usually match Joy up with a hottie with a sense of humor and this guy was a little too whiny for me. Jamie and Emily dated for a few years and then he dumped her but decided to not tell his family because they all loved her so much. They’ve been broken up for 2 1/2 months, but they COINCIDENTALLY arrive in the same town at the same time for Christmas and the family assumes they’re still together. Rooooigghhtttt. Totally. Jamie continues to be a coward and not tell anyone the truth but obviously a couple that fakes it USUALLY MAKES IT! Except that I can’t get on board with Emily downgrading this hard. She’s cool and funny and well-traveled and while they’re playing family charades, Jamie guesses “you after you’ve had a few drinks” 15 times. He also broke up with her over the phone while she was in a meeting. Yikes, dude. When she roasts him for that I wanted to whoop it up from my couch. #TeamEmily

Bonus Points: A Christmas play where the wiener has to play a unicorn and a sassy grandma who tells it like it is when her grandson is being stupid.

Standard
JUice

Weekly JUice

Week of 6/21/2021

  1. #FreeBritney

IN case you didn’t hear, Britney finally piped up at trial this week, begging to end her conservatorship. If I HAD to guess, I’d say she’s pretty sick of everyone else in the world speaking for her and decided it was TIME. I don’t want to credit her bravery directly to myself, but I *DID* wear my Britney graphic on Wednesday to send the positive vibes her way and I definitely think she felt them. She admitted on the stand that she has been miserable and depressed and has been pretending for social media that she’s loving life (uh, yeah, you and the rest of us Brit…that’s what Instagram is for.) JK, in all seriousness, her dad has been controlling every aspect of her life including FORCING HER TO KEEP HER IUD IN SO SHE CAN’T HAVE KIDS. Woof times a billion. Obviously now that she’s spoken out, the #FreeBritney crew is multiplying, bringing in celebrities left and right. Ya girl Brit has been controlled by her creepy dad for 15 years (and heavily medicated), but now it’s trendy to declare FREE BRITNEY so everyone is piping in now as if clout will free her. AND WHO IS THE BIGGEST CULPRIT BUT NONE OTHER THAN JT. After his LAAAAAAAME apology (see me NOT accepting said apology here) where fedora in hand he tried to apologize for trampling Britney to get famous, he decided to pop back out again and pretend to be her advocate:

Total classy move bringing Jess into the mix to look like a united front but PEOPLE DON’T FORGET, JT. Seems a little too convenient and thirsty to be making a public statement like this to hop right on the Free Britney movement. I don’t accept x2 now. Sorry not sorry JT remains on my shit list. (Again, can be quickly solved with a hot new bop.) ANYWHO, the details Britney revealed were ALARMING and the fact that she literally compared her living situation to a sex trafficking situation and that her father LOVES control, CAN WE SERIOUSLY JUST END THIS SHIT NOW?! Even if it turns out that Britney has severe mental health issues and does need assistance, THIS AIN’T IT. Give the lady her life back for Pete’s sake. Here was her post-trial statement, which is depressing as hell. Girl needs to pretend everything is ok because if she doesn’t, she’s dealing with a soul-crushing reality.

2. Bad Habits

Ed hasn’t released music in several years, went off the grid, got married and had a baby and now HE BACK. And WHAAAT a weird way to come back. Sure, the song is catchy and a nice little summer bop, but this isn’t the Ed we’ve come to know and love. That Ed gives us swoonworthy love songs or Irish jigs full of fast catchy lyrics and raps accompanied by him busting his ass on a loop pedal. This Ed gives us club beats and a terrifying music video. Is Ed pandering to the youths now? If so, I OBJECT. I appreciate the full cinematic effort for the music video because I love being taken on a visual musical adventure EXCEPT when it involves vampires and hordes of people just deflating in front of our very eyes. YOIKES. I remain hopeful that he did this just to make a splash and whatever follows will be more OG Ed. In the meantime, I’ll be looking up tutorials on how to get those glitter eyes for post-covid nights out this summer. 

3. Deuces, Conan

After a 28 year run, Conan is retiring from the late-night game. I accidentally stumbled upon his last show last night and it was a delight. I’ve never really been a late-night regular viewer but I’ve enjoyed clips and bits on the ole internet after the fact. Conan had a nice farewell speech about how when you find the intersection between stupid and smart, that’s when the real magic happens. I like to think that’s exactly what I’m aiming for on this blog and with my various idiotic videos or self-deprecating stories so it’s always comforting to see when someone can make an entire living off of being a goofy moron. (TBS, call me, boo.) Regardless of my future as a celebrity, Conan had Jack Black on as his final guest and we were treated to an original ditty. The night prior, he smoked weed with Seth Rogen. Just kings doing king shit. God it must be nice to get paid to do whatever you want on cable. Not sure why he’s retiring, TBH, but proud of him for going out with a bang, once he realized which way the joint should face (are Conan and I the same person?!)

4. That’s Enough, Netflix.

Ok, we’ve officially given Netflix WAY too much leeway in original content. We all binged Love is Blind & Joe Exotic and once they saw the straight trash that we would eat right up, they REALLY LET IT RIP. Introducing, SEXY BEASTS. Netflix took Love is Blind and added BESTIALITY. And for that reason, I’m out. SINCE WHEN DID WE NORMALIZE WEARING PROSTHETICS TO SPICE UP GAME SHOWS?! That dolphin will straight up haunt my nightmares until the end of time. At one point in my life, it was a dream of mine to swim with Dolphins. I am now aggressively blacking that off of my bucket list as I look at this cross-eyed porpoise trying to find love with HORROR. I get the concept that they’re trying to push here ad nauseam via dating shows…find love based on WHO the person is not WHAT they look like. And here’s what I have to say to that…if I’m not attracted to you, I’M NEVER GOING TO LOVE YOU. Like cut the shit, get off of your high horse and stop pushing this unrealistic narrative. ESPECIALLY because they cast this show with ALL ATTRACTIVE people. You cannot possibly rant and rave about how love should be about the person when you’re ONLY hiring hot people for this show and then covering them in creepy ass masks to make the other hot person in a creepy ass mask FEAR that they’re possibly dating an uggo. The worst part about this is Twitter LIT up with commentary on this trailer, which means they’ll all tune into the show because you no longer need to make GOOD content, it just needs to be compelling enough for us to trash talk it on Twitter. Therefore, the ratings for this beast will be top notch which will then perpetuate it into infinity season on Netflix. God I hate Hollywood.

PS, if you willingly kiss someone in a furry prosthetic mask, you should go to jail. I don’t make the rules but I did just make that one because watching two creatures attempt to kiss made me want to rip my eyeballs out of my G-D skull.

5. November 19th.

I think we all needed a week to process the fact that the much discussed but never heard 10 minute long All Too Well will be in our hands November 19th. I think it’s also incredibly important to note that although I stan All Too Well as the best breakup song of AWL time and Red was my FAVORITE Taylor album…I do not support this re-release garbage she’s been peddling. I stand by the fact that this is a tacky thing to do. Taylor most certainly DOES NOT need anymore money and to re-release each one of her albums with all of this fanfare and associated merchandise is highway robbery. I totes understand the sentiment of making a statement against Scooter Braun and Scott Borchetta and owning the work that you spent so many years creating. But to profit off of it twice over is bullshit. Sorry, Tay, I gotta keep it real. I did not buy Fearless (Taylor’s Version) because I already own the EXACT same album and guess what, the “new” songs that came from the vault I RIPPED OFF OF YOUTUBE SO, HA. I bought a Taylor Swift Lover tee for 11 bucks at Target so it’ll be a dark day in hell when I ever pay $45 PLUS SHIPPING to get a t-shirt off of her website. And you bet your ass that when this Red (Taylor’s Version) drop hits right before holiday season, I’ll be saving my pennies and acquiring the new All Too Well in frowned-upon ways so that my niece and nephew can get Christmas presents this year. Taylor EASILY could’ve used this moment in her life as an example, re-recorded all of her albums and had all of the proceeds go to a charitable cause because she’s a BAJILLIONAIRE but she made the sound decision to pocket all this dough instead. Whatever, you do you, girl, but I will not be directing my hard-earned cashola toward re-purchasing things I already own. Sorry bout it. I will, however, learn all ten minutes of the new All Too Well and sob-scream it in full though and that’s worth more than any dollar on this earth.

@jordan_sturg

All hail #taylorswift #alltoowell

♬ All Too Well Taylor Swift – TaylorswiftxFolklore
Standard
Movies, Television

Netflix February Round-Up

I never realize exactly how much TV I’ve been binging until I have human contact and realize that 90% of my life updates are just Netflix series and movie recommendations. That happened to me recently and I realized that if I’m going to yap my face off about what I’ve been watching lately, why not recap it in blog form to benefit those of you who may not have all hours of the day to try each and every new addition?! See? Watching hours upon hours of TV has a PURPOSE when you write your own pop culture blog that barely anybody reads. You know how many hours are in a day when you don’t have a full-time job…A LAWT. It’s been a whole ass year of quarantine and I’ve watched more TV in this past year of garbage than in my 29 years leading up to it combined. If you’ll recall, I did a lovely binge recap at the beginning of COVID, and I’m happy to update you now on the latest and greatest in the past month or so on Netflix. *No Spoilers, just my highly regarded opinions*

To All The Boys I’ve Loved Before: Always & Forever

Ok so obviously this is the third installment in squeaky clean teen trilogy following Lara Jean and Peter Kavinsky. I’ve watched all three movies on their Valentines Day premiere weekends and yet I can’t say I’m a superfan of this storyline. Naturally, Peter Kavinsky is dreamy as hell as far as high school boyfriends who look like they’re 28 go, and the story is pretty well-rounded and not just focused on stupid teenage hormones…and YET there’s only so much John Corbett that can save a flick. The first one was okay, the second one was trash and the third one never needed to be made in the first place. I wish Netflix would stop automatically granting every teen story 3 movies upon its first release. NOT ALL STORIES NEED TO BE TOLD IN THREE PARTS. Obviously the first movie is the union of Peter and Lara Jean. The second movie is the childhood crush returns to town presence to ruffle the perfect relationship. And the third? The third was basically useless. These two are going off to college and in the land of high school relationships we all know that’s the kiss of death. We don’t need a movie about it. Was I just bored of this unrealistic storyline or was I personally victimized by the beginning of the movie when one of the high school kids said to another “at least you don’t have to wait for your acceptance letter in the mail like they did in the olden days?” I think we all know the answer here. When I attended college in 2009, I got my acceptance and rejection letters in the mail. On paper. SnAiL mAiL. That was 11 years ago and it is now considered the stone age to teenagers today. Nothing reminds you that you’re too old for watching a particular movie harder than them directly calling you geriatric. Put me in the ground, I’m over you losers. CAUSE APPARENTLY COLLEGES JUST SHOOT YOU A DM NOW IF YOU’RE IN. ***all the eye rolls in the world, I’ll never stop being bitter about this.***

I Care A Lot

I like to keep Netflix on their toes when they recommend shit for me. Oh you think I’ll enjoy the programming for 13 year old girls well BAM check me out watching this flick. I zig when they think I’m gonna zag. I gotta be honest, I saw this movie was up for a Golden Globe and since I try very hard to be that person who watches AT LEAST one critically acclaimed (up for at least one award) movie a year, I decided this should be it…mostly because I actually WANTED to watch Promising Young Woman but I refuse to ever pay for a movie in my own home. Unless I’m in a dark theater with a reclining chair and the greasiest of popcorn, you’re not getting a penny outta me. Anyway, this movie was AWESOME. As soon as I finished it and basically whooped it up at the VERY satisfying ending, I texted everyone I know to add it to their watchlist immediately. It’s twisty, it has crime, it has lots of swearing, it has a VERY tanned and white-toothed Chris Messina acting like a cocky babe soda (drool city, population; me), and most importantly of all, the main character played by Rosamund Pike is the WORST HUMAN ON THIS EARTH with her stupid designer outfits, blunt bob and vape pen that you just hope she chokes on. Plus, she won the globe for this part so you know at least the racist-ass HFPA liked this movie, Ch-ch-check it out!

Biggie: I Got A Story To Tell

As you all know, I’m a real doc nerd. This particular one was getting a lot of hype leading up to its release so I was ALL over it when it dropped. Here’s my background knowledge on Biggie: 1. I knew Biggie and Tupac had beef and Tupac is 100% still alive and in the witness protection program. 2. My roommate in college (also white as wonder bread like me) had her cellphone ringtone set to “Juicy” and every single damn time her phone rang I heard Biggie’s chubster mouth marbling “It was all A DREAM, I used to read WORDUP MAGAZINE.” 3. One time at Target I tried to buy the iconic Biggie with the crown on his head tee and my mom and my sister told me not to and it’s the biggest regret of my life. I would’ve looked cool as shit in that tee. So as you can see, I’m a diehard Biggie fan. Up until I watched this doc and nearly turned it off out of sheer boredom 5 times. This story could’ve been told in suuuuch an interesting way and instead it was an hour and a half of jumping all over the timeline, naming cross streets in Brooklyn and talking to the surviving members of Biggie’s crew who list all the other members by their 10 different nicknames. I never once knew who anyone was talking about. Probably the most shocking part of the doc was when B.i.G./Biggie/Christopher’s mom said she never once listened to his music, had no clue what he was doing 90% of the time and the only time she listened to his album was after he died. If my parents don’t read one of my blogs I immediately ask them why they hate me. How did she have a rapper son and never once heard him spit bars? Anyway, final rating: IT WAS ALL A SNOOZE.

Ginny & Georgia

In the words of my sister, better catch this one quick before that snowflake Taylor Swift cancels it. You might have heard about this show because they had a ONE LINER about “going through guys like Taylor Swift” and then Taylor decided to mount her white horse and try to take down the show and Netflix in one fell swoop. But here’s the real truth from the horse’s mouth. This show is actually one of those 2021 “woke” shows. It’s female-focused, it’s written by females and it tackles race, LGBTQ, self-harm, bullying, sex, relationships, crime AND MORE. It has a WHOLE lot going on for it to be shunned for a dumb throwaway joke. For those of you who might feel self-conscious about watching a teen-centric show, there is equal parts adult storylines that I actually really enjoyed. There’s a little intrigue and mystery of what the hell is going on with Georgia’s past to keep you going, plus she’s a mom with two kids from different dads, a VERY shady background and she has THREE babe sodas chasing after her. Basically Georgia is my hero. Get past the VERY cringeworthy virginity losing scene in the beginning between two fifteen year olds (seriously, one of the worst) and you’ll be off to the races. Also important to note: teenagers these days are basically the WERST. If I had to go through high school again, I’d KMS.

Eye candy for days though:

Moxie

This is 100% a teen feminist movie and naturally that’s the OPPOSITE of anything I’d be interested in and yet Amy Poehler created it and starred in it and I just love her so much that I gave it a go. Not an overwhelming recommend but also not the worst thing I’ve ever watched either. So basically I should be a film critic with that sentence. I was a little bitter when the girls all put their hands in a circle and chanted, “SI SE PUEDE” because that is a direct rip from classic DCOM “Gotta Kick It Up”, but otherwise there was a pretty adorbs first teen boyf storyline and Amy played *most obviously* the cool mom. I also feel that it is my duty to add that although I called the teen boyf storyline adorbs, their first date which led to their first kiss was the two of them laying in a LITERAL coffin together in a funeral home sharing ear buds. And that is not at all adorbs, that is a nightmare machine. Sry, girl. He can be the dreamiest feminist supporting your cause and telling you he wants to wait until the moment is right but if he snuggles with you INSIDE OF A COFFIN, it’s curtains on your relationship.

Pieces of A Woman

This was also nominated for a Golden Globe and I was really treating last weekend like I was screening the nominees before the big show…I also sensed it was going to be depressing AF and needed a good cry. It was real dark and real uncomfortable to watch. Not a recommend from me. The movie kicks off with the LONGEST home birth scene where I got a very realistic peek into what to expect when you’re expecting and I DON’T WANT IT. The lead was feeling nauseous while also having contractions and the amount of times that she burped or gagged, folks, we almost had a clean-up on aisle living room situation on our hands. I was feeling second hand retches just from watching. Unfortunately you watch this whole scene just to learn that the baby dies upon birth and the movie unravels the entire aftermath of that and follows the couple closely as they’re dealing with it. Hence: much discomfort. Shia LaBeouf plays a total scumbucket and although it’s not one of those artsy movies without a resolution, it reeealllyy didn’t feel resolved at the end.

Behind Her Eyes

The catalyst for writing this blog, I saw someone post a Facebook status about how the ending for this series was buh-nan-UHS and when I watched the trailer and got a little creeped out, I waited until daylight the following day to watch it so I wouldn’t crap my pants. AND BOY DID I WATCH IT. I watched all six episodes back to back in one sitting like the giant unemployed loser that I am. I just wanted to get to that ending. It was W I L D. I want to talk to everyone who will listen to me about it. The show starts out predictable and cheesy as hell with a guy sleeping with his secretary and the wife sneakily befriending her. Ho hum, Lifetime does this every weekend. Then all the sudden it was like invasion of the body-snatchers up in this B and I was all:

The ending blew my mind. Also SUUUUUPER dark. Not a happy ending in the slightest. Watch the following suggestion after this one to lighten things back up again. Also if you do watch this, get @ me so we can talk about that plot twist.

Nate Bargatze: The Tennessee Kid

So full disclosure, this is old but I just watched it for the first time the other night and I want to recommend it because in just a few short weeks, you’ll be able to watch a new special from Nate called The Greatest Average American. So basically I’m setting you up for a double feature of funny. I was strapping my lolerskates on to take a lap around my apartment after watching this special. At one point I repeated one of his jokes out loud TO MYSELF. I was watching by myself and acting like I was in a room full of people. Is that sad or is Nate just that funny? Don’t answer that. It’s the combination of his deep southern drawl and deadpan delivery for me. Looking forward to the next special. (Also if you’re into standup, 10/10 would also recommend Taylor Tomlinson’s special which came out about a year ago and kicked ass.)

BONUS:

This isn’t Netflix but I’ve also been all in on it (weekly, episodic) HBO Max has a documentary Allen V. Farrow featuring Mia Farrow and her 9000 children telling the story of their childhood and Dylan Farrow’s abuse from Woody as a kid. It’s obviously sanctioned by the Farrow family, not so much by Woody Allen. Mia filmed her children’s every moves so there’s a TON of original footage including the actual taping of Dylan first detailing the sexual abuse from Woody, which is incredibly disturbing. New episodes drop on Sunday nights. I want to make a zinger here but there’s really nothing funny about child abuse, especially when it’s one of the biggest filmmakers and he denies it still to this day. It’s pretty deplorable and credit to Dylan for making this documentary and telling her story.

Standard
JUice

Weekly JUice

Week of 1/4/2021

We made it to 2021. Are you one of those people who thinks when the clock strikes midnight on January 1st the world resets and everything changes… or are you rational? New year, same everything baybay, which of COURSE includes me razzing celebrities for their life choices…don’t matter what the numbers on the cal say. LET’S GET TO IT.

1. When Harry Met Wilde.

Olivia-Wilde-Harry-Styles

My friend scooped me on this new Hollywood item. I always feel like I need to be honest with my readers when I’ve gotten got. Mostly because I rub it directly in everyone’s faces when I scoop them. It’s only fair to play both sides. At first when she broke the news I was thinking it was Olivia Culpo and I was like oh yeah duh. Hot young twenty-something’s dating, checks out. Then I stopped myself and said WILDE. As in freshly broken up with Baby Daddy Jason Sudeikis with two kiddies running around at home. And this does not check out. I mean obviously Harry has always had a thing for older women but here’s where I have a bone to pick. Harry is livin the damn dream. He’s got a wildly successful solo career, he’s become somewhat of a fashion icon (controversially so, plz reference the Vogue cover where he cross-dressed and everyone lost their G-D minds), and he’s known for having a solid sense of humor. Basically he’s the whole package and now is NOT the time for him to be playing daddy to someone else’s kids in a messy entanglement. It’s obviously a rebound–one that I’m sure Jason wants to drill his eyes out seeing unfold as he is 45 years old and his baby momma is smooching with a 26 year old. Most importantly, I wanted to drill my eyes out at the sight of this new fling’s debut. They’re attending a wedding together, so before I even opened the picture I expected to see a real outlandish getup from Mr. Styles. What I saw instead was him in a plain bagel black tux and Olivia wearing a turban and a nightgown to someone’s formal affair. Coming from someone who rotates through an impressive collection of loungewear and sweats on a weekly basis, I get that I have no leg to stand on judging fashion HOWEVER if I were invited to a wedding (especially now) you bet your ass I’d be showing up the bride or I wouldn’t be attending at all. What a wasted opportunity for Olivia to get red carpet ready. Seems like SOMEONE has been listening to a little too much folklore/evermore. Here’s some more gratuitous shots of the new coups gallivanting around town, masked. As I imagine this will be short-lived, get it while it’s hot. I’m gonna toss it out there these two won’t make it to Spring. Sorry not sorry.

harry-styles-olivia-wildeharry-olivia

Also here’s Harry’s latest music video that’s real weird but he does a lot of dancing, if you’re into that sort of thing. I thought I was going to be but apparently my boner for Harry Styles went away in 2016 when everyone in my family made fun of me for having a crush on him.

2. The Wests Go South.

2016 MTV Video Music Awards - Arrivals

Shocking to absolutely no one and yet everyone at once, the two biggest narcissistic a-holes on this earth might actually officially end things. WHAT?! A perfect pairing! WHY 2021…WHYYYYYYYYYY?! COULD THIS YEAR GET ANY WORSE?! Gawd, cue the CANCEL MY SUBSCRIPTION TO 2021 MEMES. After Kanye ran for president, publicly declared he wanted to abort their firstborn because he was still banging other chicks at the time, going on manic raves on Twitter comparing Kris Jenner to a dictator…I think we pretty much all called curtains on this relashe. But even a tone deaf Kardashian knew that post-mental health breakdown was not an approps time to serve someone divorce papers. So I assume they went on living their lives separately in the 900 mansions that they own and honestly I thought they might carry on like that forever. Why get a messy divorce when you’ve got a mastermind like Kris Jenner in the mix? Bitch could probably snap her fingers and hide this whole thing, banishing Kanye to Wyoming and Kim could be free to live her life and fly her closest 100 friends out to a private island for her 40th birthday party. It seemed like the perfect agreement. Except not anymore! Apparently now it’s time to cut the ties officially, which probably means there’s a scandal waiting to come out and I’m salivating at the prospect. LET KANYE BACK ON TWITTER AND OPEN THE FLOODGATES, YO! Give us the dirt. And speaking of Kim’s #ThisIs40 douchebaggery, apparently Kanye only showed up for one day of it to drop that WEIRD hologram bomb and then peace tf out. I find that hilarious. Probably the creepiest gift of all time to bring back someone’s dead dad as a hologram to overly compliment your husband but even more hilarious to do it on the verge of divorce and then roll out. Clearly it worked as Kim shared that moment with the world to rave about her AMAHZING husband and the perfect gift. Which leads me to my favorite tweet of this whole scandal:

Rumors have surfaced that Kanye was cheating on Kim with Jeffree Star, a Youtube makeup guy…but like 5 mins after that one started swirling, the girl who started it on Tiktok admitted to doing it for clout and is now being sued by Kim Kardashian and using it to get more followers. The deeeeeeepest of eye rolls. Either way, I’ll keep my ear to the ground (Twitter) in anticipation of the guaranteed scandal that will come of this divorce. By the end of 2021 the I don’t need no stinkin man for world domination Kardashians will be on THE PROWL. Can’t hold no mans down when you’re running an empire. 

3. New Binge Alert.

If you know ANYTHING about me, you know that I suffer from the most severe form of FOMO. If people are talking about something, I need to consume it as well. I had heard about Bridgerton coming to Netflix from my book club (yeah that’s right, I’m now a middle class divorcee) based on a series of books that are equal parts red hot read and historical. I checked out the trailer and my sister and I both decided that this show wasn’t for us. We love a good sexy book or show (and unfortunately even delved into 365 days long enough to learn that stealing a woman and forcing her to have sex with you is what the kids are into these days) but we’ve never been much into the historical colonial times. And for that reason we were out. Then I spent roughly 3 more days on Twitter with everyone popping off about Bridgerton before I finally caved. Last weekend I took the deep dive. 8 episodes of “the season” in Regency England, which essentially is a Gossip Girl of the 1800’s. It was interesting enough for me to commit to it but also as I warned my sister when I told her she probably wouldn’t tolerate it–the sex doesn’t really start to happen until about halfway through. It’s a real snoozy lead-up to be honest. In addition to being a slow build to climax, there’s also the super weird factor that girls (yes, girls, I’m guessing 16 was the marrying age) didn’t know what sex was until they were married. That was a BIT of a turnoff for me while watching scandalous romps. I mean the main character didn’t understand how babies were made. And that’s VERY CONCERNING to me. Other than that… the music slapped, everyone was hot (minus the unfortunate bangs) and there was enough juicy gossip intrigue to keep me hooked. So in conclusion, if you have a short attention span–this is a skip. If you have a little time on your hands like myself, give it a watch because you KNOW there will be a season 2. It’s Shonda Rhimes. That bitch don’t know how to NOT make a hit TV show. (Last pro tip: put the subtitles on…you’re going to need it with the 1,2 punch of British accents AND old English phrases.)

4. Bean Dad.

A Twitter treasure occurred this week and so I must report on it for all of my followers (my family) who are not on Twitter. A guy who probably isn’t really famous but has a podcast with Jeopardy great Ken Jennings decided to hop on the ole Twitter machine and tell a funny story. Well, a story he thought was funny. And NO ONE ELSE AGREED. This 1 million tweet thread in summary is: his 9 year old was hungry, she wanted beans, she didn’t know how to open the can, so he used it as a teaching moment and wouldn’t let her eat until she learned how to use a can opener. He obviously drew it out and was clearly exaggerating several parts of the story. None of it made me laugh. Everyone PILED on him and told him he was a terrible dad and made fun of him and then eventually dug up old racist tweets of his until he deleted his account and went into hiding. An undoing of BEANS. I have SO many thoughts on this and probably the most prominent one is BEANS. WHAT HUMAN BEING EATS BEANS FROM A CAN FOR LUNCH? ARE YOU A 105 YEAR OLD HOMELESS PERSON? Like just the word BEANS grosses me out and makes me immediately think of farts. So sucks to be this guy who now will forever be known as Bean Dad. Bet he wishes it was a can of chicken noodle soup now. Second of all, it is well known within my family and a close trusted circle of friends that I physically cannot operate a can opener. So right off the bat this story hit home with me. If I grew up with Bean dad, I’d probably have starved to death. Instead, I grew up with bougie enablers who raised me on an electric can opener. You know what you do with an electric can opener? You plug it in and stick the can to the magnetic top and push down on the button. BOOM. Can opened. I wrongfully assumed that this was the time period we were living in and that *manual* can openers were extinct. I found out through living in a townhouse with a bunch of girls in college, this was not the case. I broke so many can openers in college attempting to learn how to use one that I finally had to admit my fault and purchase my own electric can opener. I also had a very jarring incident where I hacked at a can of olives one day, broke the can opener and then broke skin on my finger on the jagged half open can edge trying to strong arm it the rest of the way open. I almost had to go get a tetanus shot BECAUSE I AM A CAN OPENING MORON. Don’t show Bean Dad this. He’ll beat me to death with a can. Now that I have all of this off my chest I can say my life has been much more free owning the fact that I am an electric can opener gal and would NEVER survive in the wild. But also, let it be known that even with my fancy doodad that magically opens the cans, never under any circumstances would that can be BAKED BEANS. Also, obviously Bean Dad came back with an apology because that’s how the world works. Nowhere in there did he apologize for feeding his child beans. Shout out to my parents for never feeding me beans and also coddling me with an electric can opener since birth. YOU DA REAL ONES.

5. Is JB Hot?

Justin Bieber dropped a new song and a very theatrical music video based on him as a fighter and since it occurred in an era where men didn’t cover their bodies in tats, he airbrushed over all of his bod art. And seeing Biebs not covered head to toe in ink I had to take a long hard look at myself and ask, do I think Justin Bieber is HOT?! The jury’s still out on if I’d date a makeup covered Biebz, but regardless, this song is good and you KNOW I love a dramatic music video.

BONUS:

This picture was taken on New Years Eve and it gave me a deep belly chuckle. Of course everyone was like HOW 2020 OF BEN AFFLECK juggling packages and his Dunks order while wearing loungewear. And yeah, that’s true. But what’s more hilarious is how we have paparazzi who are hired to take pictures of Ben Affleck with his coffee. There are 9 zillion photos of Ben Affleck with a Dunks icey at your disposal at any moment’s notice. At what point do the paparazzi say you know what? I think we’re good on that type of content. The answer is obviously never. Honestly at this point I’m just surprised as to why Ben and Casey Affleck aren’t the TOP spokespeople for Dunks. Between their artfully crafted Boston accents, affinity for all Boston sports, constant Dunks in their hand and of course, the critically acclaimed Dunkin SNL sketch…WHAT IS CORPORATE DUNKS WAITING FOR?! Since I’m a creative mastermind and I am unemployed (get @ me Dunks Marketing) I’ll set the scene for you…Dunks sent out a branded TANDEM bike as part of their pre-holiday merch line and I was salivating at the thought of owning it.

Now I’m salivating at the thought of Ben and Casey Affleck riding this hot rod through downtown Boston, handing out glazed donuts and iced coffees. Make it happen Dunks or you’ll get a Vanilla Nut Tap.

Standard
Movies, Television

Best of the Worst Hallmark Holiday Movies, 2020 Edition

Hallmark and Lifetime (mostly Hallmark) have been in the crosshairs in recent years as society has become more “woke” that they’re not really all about equal Christmas love representation. It’s funny that everyone has an issue with representation yet no one feels the need to question how two individuals can get interrupted right as their lips are about to touch MULTIPLE times in a two hour timeframe. Seriously WHERE DO THESE PEOPLE COME FROM?! At this point I wouldn’t be surprised if small town folk started popping out of the bushes to interrupt these dry ass kisses. Putting my almost-kiss outrage aside (for now), you’ll notice that the networks are really trying to branch out so they don’t get cancelled. This year we had our first gay Christmas love stories AND our first wheelchair badass rollin on up to the party. Really keeping things spicy here and despite the fact that I am the MOST unemployed, I can only stomach so many of these movies without alcohol and people to roast them with so I did not up my quota of movies consumed this year. I’m trying to live by the theory that you’re not an alcoholic if you wait until after dinner to start drinking by yourself, so that was the only time I could get down with these flicks. (If you’d like my Hallmark drinking game, inquire within.)

Also important to note: though they’re concerned with representation now, that does not include youths. This was the first time I’ve ever felt too young for these movies with the leads they’ve been trotting out from the grave. Or in my sister’s words “Hallmark really dipped into the olds this year.” There comes a point in time where it’s no longer believable that 44 year old Candace Cameron Bure is single, childless, never been married and looking for love at Christmas. And that was every movie this year. These movies should not exclusively be a reunion tour of 90’s child actors. If they don’t sprinkle in some younger leads next year I’ll be forced to permanently move my attention to Disney +. DON’T MAKE ME DO THAT. Anyway, let’s GET READY TO RUMBLE, AWFUL CHRISTMAS MOVIE STYLE.

SKIP

A Very Charming Christmas Town – Lifetime (Natalie Hall, Jon Prescott)

A Very Charming Christmas Town

This is your classic modern tale of Influencer or ASSHOLE?! Aubrey is an LA blogger and content creator who visits a charming town known for their Christmas tourism so she can review it for her blog. Obviously the second she gets there she’s out to shit on their “tourist trap schtick” and act like the kind of turd who stops in the middle of the street to take a picture for the gram and then gets mad when someone tells her to get out of the way. I hate Aubrey right from the start of this movie but what I hate even more is how creepy the male lead, Sawyer is. I’m not sure if I’ve ever seen this gent in rotation before but he IMMEDIATELY gave me the cringies and there was no going back. In fact, if not for him, this movie would’ve been fine. Apparently in addition to Aubrey being a blogger, she also used to write country music hits. The fact that she’s recognized as a songwriter is laugh out loud funny because songwriters are like the least recognized people on this earth. Anyway, there’s an incorporation of her “original” Christmas song that makes me want to saw my ears off. Obviously the movie ends with a musical because that’s the trend of TV holiday movies now. SO MUCH GROUP SINGING.

Bonus Points: Sawyer holds Aubrey close to a candle, which is a weird enough thing to do on its own–are you going to light her on fire, sir? BUT THEN he makes it 6 trillion times worse by quoting her own lyrics back to her. RAPE ALERT. I crawled out of my G-D skin during this scene.

Operation Christmas Drop – Netflix (Kat Graham, Alexander Ludwig)

Operation Christmas Drop

Erica is a tightwad workaholic who has been avoiding going home for Christmas since her mom died. She’s sent to this air force base to basically defund the military doing nice things at the holidays. Obviously it takes about 20 minutes for Erica to get on island time, swept up in Andrew’s beach bod and love for helping those in need. She’s got a raging charity lady boner for him. This was one of the first Christmas movies I watched this season and yet I declared in my notes that I’ve had enough of the impromptu Christmas music performances…followed by simply “STOP SINGING.” If only I had known that EVERY movie would feature all characters joining in song. Blow my brains out. There’s also a particularly outrageous CGI lizard that makes an appearance (really upping the production budget on these flicks) and the climax of the film is just people literally dropping shit in the ocean on Christmas Day. That’s it. 

Bonus Points: A holiday party on the beach where “Clause” AKA Andrew tries to loosen up that tight ass Erica and tells her to just let go and dance. She lets go a little too far and turns into Elaine from Seinfeld. Everyone is embarrassed on her behalf. Maybe go back to being lame, Erica. 

elaine

Happiest Season – Hulu (Kristen Stewart, Mackenzie Davis, Dan Levy)

Happiest Season

This movie was a HUGE deal and was getting a lot of press leading up to its release for being the first gay relationship holiday movie with legit actors. Once I knew Dan Levy was in it, I was jazzed as hell to see what kind of snarky sarcasm we would be treated to. I had high hopes and they were obviously all dashed because we as humans should never have high hopes. Whoops did that get too dark for Christmastime? I’ll save it for New Years. Another night of ridiculous expectations that are never met. ANYWAY, if you’re wondering why I took a sharp left turn into the candy cane forest of heavy emotional trauma, it’s because that’s exactly what this movie did. What started out with a little casj reindeer cosplay with whips suddenly morphed into Harper bringing her live-in girlfriend Abby (who just bought an engagement ring) home for Christmas but telling her in the car ride there that she’s not out to her family yet and told them she was bringing her roomie home for the holidays. OUCH city. The remainder of the movie is basically just Harper being a total closeted doucheroni and treating Abby like she has gay cooties except for when she wanted to sneak into her room at night for a little scissoring of course. I hated Harper in this movie and it was obviously much more emotional and deep about secrets and coming out to your family than I was really expecting. Shouts to Dan Levy and Mary Holland for much-needed comic relief, and Mary Steenburgen for being an asshole mom who shoves her iPad in everyone’s face for Instagram photos. Who takes Insta photos with an iPad?

Bonus Points: Everyone blatantly asking Abby what it’s like to be an orphan. Also John killing a bunch of pets.

Candy Cane Christmas – Lifetime (Beverly Mitchell, Mark Ghanimé)

Candy Cane Christmas

Beverly lazy eye Mitchell is Phoebe and guy who can’t figure out if he has an accent or not is Eric (I’m guessing by that very foreign name he has an accent IRL and sucks at an American one.) These two drive me f*cking bonkers the entire movie. In fact, I had it on in the background more than once and still found myself getting fired up the few times I paid attention. After right off the bat declaring they were both single, they kept running into each other as only characters of a rom-com can do and still jumping to conclusions that the other one wasn’t interested or was with someone else. Just cut the shit, you MF’ers and go on a date. After they FINALLY start dating and are happy as clams, Phoebe overhears a conversation and still assumes Eric’s getting back together with his ex and overreacts her face off, crying and avoiding talking to him. Are you five?

Bonus Points: Phoebe’s friend thinks her and Eric aren’t happening so she forces her to date a bald lamewad who hates Christmas. Instead of just being like no thanks, Phoebe keeps giving this guy a chance FURTHER CONFUSING ERIC WHO ALREADY ASKED HER ON A DATE AND ALSO THIS FRIEND SUCKS FOR SETTING HER BFF UP ON A TERRIBLE DATE TO BEGIN WITh. Ok. I’m done being triggered by this movie.

Christmas By Starlight – Hallmark (Kimberley Sustad, Paul Campbell)

Christmas By Starlight

Annie is kind of a loser but Hallmark makes her into a cute & lovable loser because that’s what they do best. She wears pajamas a LOT, is suuuuper obsessed with her Terrier and lives in like a basement apartment at her parent’s house. Obviously greedy lawyers are trying to shut down her family’s diner and she takes it into her own hands to demand that the law office knocks it off. This turns into Annie and cute but maybe gay lawyer William working together so they each get something that they want out of the deal. My family watched this flick together which meant that we sat there pointing and laughing for the full two hours. The very first thing I noticed and couldn’t unsee was that Annie’s mom’s face doesn’t move ONE SINGLE time. It turned into a fun drinking game. Drink every time ole plastic ass face is on the screen! My dad also was NOT a fan of this female lead and was basically openly boo’ing her. Tough crowd. There were a lot of similarities that I saw between this flick and Two Week’s Notice..obviously a poor man’s version because that movie is top notch. But the comparison got me thinking, it would REALLY spice things up if they had a poop your pants scene in a Hally. Try to work that in next year, guys. Totally more relatable than these two eye banging the shit out of each other to Silent Night. Just saying. In the end, SPOILER ALERT, both of these jabronis were fat in high school so they’re meant to be. 

Bonus Points: Annie showing that she’s just SO down to earth because she eats a power bar at a fancy French restaurant after a Passport to Paris level spit take. She also wears ugly Christmas sweaters *unironically.*

Christmas Carousel – Hallmark (Rachel Boston, Neal Bledsoe)

Christmas Carousel

A royal storyline because princes celebrate Christmas too, I have to be honest my sister recommended this one because she had her DVR set up for it and the minute I saw the male lead I texted her “this guy is beat, you cannot watch this movie.” And I’m sorry to be the bearer of bad news but sometimes a guy turns you off so aggressively that you cannot possibly get into the storyline. I “watched” this whole movie as in it was on my TV as I wrote this blog but all I retained from it was that he was royal and there was a weird singing scene with a creepy song and child. Age was apparent in both leads and as much as I’ve had enough with the singing I had even more of enough with the cryptkeepers’ Christmas tales. If my journey includes me looking for love at Christmas when I’m middle-aged, end that journey right now. I’m sorry. I support anyone dating at any age if that’s what they want. Love that for you. What I don’t love is watching it. It’s not hopeful. I’d MUCH rather watch people in their young twenties fall in love in 5 minutes and get engaged so I can cackle and say WAIT UNTIL YOU TWO MOVE IN TOGETHER THEN WE’LL SEE HOW IN LOVE YOU ARE. That’s my happy place. My sweet spot. Not being the last standing single amongst friends and family and having to settle for the first guy who wishes you a Merry Christmas. And that’s my unwelcome rant on Hallmark only gearing toward the middle aged market this year. 

WATCH

Midnight at the Magnolia – Netflix (Natalie Hall, Evan Williams)

Midnight-at-the-Magnolia-

 

 

We’ve got a double feature from Natalie Hall this szn. And she really upgraded her mancandy for Netflix. At least this guy didn’t give me the heebie jeebies. Maggie and Jack are the kind of besties that everyone knows are going to end up together because they’re WAY TOO close to ever have other significant relationships and yet they’re the only two that can’t seem to figure it the F out. They host a radio show together and decide to fake date and plan a big reveal at New Years Eve because both of their sig oth’s dump them before meeting their families. As a former promotions coordinator in radio, this seems like an HR nightmare to manipulate a personal relationship for promo and marketing. But it really seemed to work out for these two personally and professionally because this is a movie and not real life. It’s totally one of those movies where there’s WAY too much family involvement (and an unwelcome fam group hug.) And of course, per this year’s trend, ends with an original song. Barf all over me.

Bonus Points: Maggie looks cute and normal the whole movie with long locks and then all the sudden shows up to the big party at the end with helmet head. Whoever did that updo/whatever we call this hack job should be sued for character defamation. In fact it was so bad that my sister texted me when she finally viewed it (with no prompting from me first) “wtf is up with this chick’s hair at the nye party?” It’s almost as if we’re related or something.

Five Star Christmas – Hallmark (Bethany Joy Lenz, Victor Webster)

Five Star Christmas

I’m a diehard stan for Bethany Joy Lenz. I think she’s a total babe and typically her holiday movies are far more tolerable than others. This one features her family acting like they’re running a B&B with the home she grew up in because someone is coming to review it. So they all pretend they’re staff or guests which just turns into SO many hijinks. If by hijinks we mean them calling each other the wrong names a lot. SO SILLY. Anyway, there’s a grandma with a German accent that is ALMOST intolerable and lots of side stories happening with each member of the family. Even the dad is getting some lovin. Why? Cause it’s Christmas of course. Turns out the guy that Lucy is hot and heavy for is the reviewer that they were expecting. Classic mix-up. He wins her back after the family snafu by doing a weird Elvis impression in front of strangers. If someone breaks into song at the end of any movie I see for the rest of my life it will still be TOO SOON. 

Bonus Points: In the first five minutes when Lucy says she stopped dating someone because he chewed with his mouth open. YAS GURL. SAME. Also when the “B&B guests” aka Lucy’s entire family decorates the tree together and her sister-in-law overreacts when the tree is brought in with “IT’s BEEEEAAAAUUUUTIFFUUULLLL” and a dramatic hand flourish. I wonder if the people in Hally’s go to a specific over-acting class before they book the role.

Once Upon A Main Street – Lifetime (Vanessa Lachey, Ryan McPartlin)

Once Upon A Main Street

Amelia and Vic have both put an offer in on a storefront in the “perfect” spot on Main St so obviously they will battle to the death and try to bribe the owner of the shop to sell it to each of them. But the owner of the shop is Patrick Duffy and you can’t play him, he’s been around the block a time or two in the TV movie landscape. So instead these two will just fall in love and split the shop in the end, naturally. What lands this movie on the watch list is 1000% the side character of Rowena, aka “sassy pottery bitch” in my notes, who Amelia and Vic have to work with to win some Christmas award or something. In Rowena’s first scene, she refers to the local contest sourly and goes, “it’s not Jimmy Fallon or anything” and Vic says “what is?” and she replies dry as hell, “True, True.” It’s the first time I’ve genuinely laughed out loud at joke delivery in one of these movies and not at the person for their poor acting skills and cheesy dialogue. Sassy Pottery Bitch deserves an Emmy AND an Oscar for this role. The rest of the cast is just eh. If I had to venture a guess, Vanessa Lachey is pretty much playing herself.

Bonus Points: Amelia was a real annoying and over the top twat-asaurus in the first few minutes of this movie because she was overconfident about getting the building and pulled a sharpie out of her purse and WROTE SOLD ON THE BUILDING SIGN as IF THAT’S HOW THAT WORKS. To make matters worse she drew the O as a heart. Can you imagine if I put an offer in on a house and then just walked by and WROTE SOLD ON THE WINDOW? Then took a selfie?! 

A California Christmas – Netflix (Lauren & Josh Swickard)

A California Christmas

I started this movie and immediately texted my sister saying I feel like I’m in deja vu. Although this movie was brand new on Netflix, I felt like I had seen it before. Was I going crazy? Have I started to dream in shitty Christmas love stories? Have I just seen an ALMOST identical movie with these two “stars” somewhere else? As it turns out, yes. These two starred in “Roped” together which was another garbo movie on Amazon Prime about a rodeo coming to town and this bitch’s family trying to get it banned but plot twist she fell in love with the cowboy so that really threw a wrench in the horse shit. It was bad. Like embarrassingly bad. So bad I blocked it from my memory and leave it to my sister to make the connection and prove that we’re not going crazy, we’re just addicted to trash movies. ANYWAY, another fun fact is that these two probably met on that set, fell in love and got married because they weren’t married when that movie was made but they are now. Cue *we found love in a hopeless place*. Good for them.

Back to this movie, Joseph is Zac Efron Lite (give it a few minutes, but you’ll see it) who needs to prove his worth as a corporate hot shot in the family biz and goes to buy out a small family farm but pretends to be a ranch hand named Manny instead. This creates a whole side story of the real Manny who goes into hiding to teach Joseph how to do farm shit but also starts a bromance with Joseph’s driver. The real Manny is hilarious and I guess what I’m trying to say is the way to win my heart over with one of these movies is to put a silly side character in for comedic relief from all the sob stories. There are a lot of sob stories in this movie. It’ll go from the real Manny saying ““If you take a squat on a stump and take a dump does that make it a toilet-tree?” (Poop humor kills every time) to sad music and a graveyard. Real rollercoaster. But the most important factors are that both of the leads are babe sodas, plus it’s Netflix so there’s LOTS of kissing and none are interrupted. In fact we even get a S-E-X scene GASP. In a field! Netflix, we need more of your PG-13 activities each holiday season. 

Bonus Points: Within five mins we’ve got a whole ass calf being pulled out of a cow. I saw April the giraffe give birth and honestly that was enough firsthand nature to last a whole lifetime. No more fluids for me. 

The Christmas Listing – Lifetime (Lexi Giovagnoli, Travis Burns)

The Christmas Listing

I gotta be real up front with you here, one Sunday I planted myself on the couch and watched FIVE (5) Lifetime movies back to back to back to back to back. In fact, I got a work call during one of them and I was legitimately T’O’ed that I had to mute it and do something productive. It was truly what Sunday’s are for. Especially at Christmas time. I started out with a cheerful vigor that I was about to just watch one and move onto something with more substance. And then they just kept rolling on and I became one with the almost kiss. Jk it still enrages me to no end.

Spoiler alert: I definitely got dumber. This one was lucky number 5 and it was 11pm by the time it was in rotation. I watched about 10 minutes of it. Here’s what I wrote in my notes: Babe soda Aussie, the girl is named Julia, is this a sign?! It WAS a sign. A sign that it was time for me to go to bed because there was nothing good about this movie other than the fact that the guy was of an appropriate age for me and handsome as hell. Take your W’s where you can.

Bonus Points: There was probably some sort of zany explanation for this but they were clearly at a house they didn’t plan on being at for a long period of time so they had to borrow clothes from guests left behind. All of their clothes were matching couples outfits. Nothing brings two people closer together than wearing his and hers Christmas sets.

Dash & Lily – Netflix (Austin Abrams, Midori Francis)

Dash & Lily

CURVEBALL! I figured since I tossed in a YA flick last year to keep things interesting, I’d add another newbie to this year’s list. It’s actually a series so it was 8 episodes, 30 mins. If you’re as much of a loser as I am, you banged this series out in an afternoon. Dash has a super messy family life which has turned him into a Grinch and he’s not even out of high school yet. Lily loves Christmas and also is JUST weird enough that she only hangs out with her family and has 0.0 friends. The two of them “meet” through a notebook and a scavenger hunt in a book store then basically become pen pals through said notebook because they’re in high school and they’re too insecure to meet in person. As someone who is still just as insecure now as she was in high school, I vibed with this. It was SUPER unrealistic of course, but after my obnoxious rant about Lifetime and Hallmark barking up the olds trees, I was happy to have some youthful spirit injected into my viewing szn. These two will probably break up by college but at least they’ll always have FALLING IN LOVE THROUGH A BOOK AT CHRISTMAS. Heartwarming.

Bonus Points: The Jonas Brothers. Not only did they make a cameo in concert form performing a Christmas banger, but Nick Jonas plays himself trying to give love advice to a bunch of high schoolers. It is perfection.

Cross Country Christmas – Hallmark (Rachel Leigh Cook, Greyston Holt)

crosscountrychristmas

Lena and Max are both heading home for Christmas and wouldn’t you know they’re from the same town and went to high school together and just bump into each other on the plane! But WHOOPS there’s a storm coming in and the plan has to land in Ohio and all of the buses are booked and the rental cars are gone and no planes are flying out so I GUESS THEY’LL JUST HAVE TO MAKE THEIR OWN WAY! What I liked about this movie immediately is that they didn’t give these characters the tried and true hate each other but are stuck traveling together energy. Of course, as soon as I made this note they started fighting after their truck broke down. But that was like halfway through. Lena has one of those made up jobs you see on the bachelor “creative solutions consultant” or something and she just wants to help everyone wherever they go. So they adventure across the country and stop and make new friends in each town. It’s not overly cheesy and I’ve digged Rachel Leigh Cook all the way since She’s All That HOWEVER…out of all the songbird scenes I consumed this year…this movie’s version was the most horrific trainwreck to watch. They’re asked to sing a carol together and unfortunately for all of us they don’t say “no thanks, we’re not really singers.” Instead, they tackle We Three Kings. They’re asked to sing a carol and instead of Jingle Bells or something equally as singalong worthy–these MF’ers pick WE THREE KINGS. And they butcher it loud and strong right up until the last line which they whisper. WHY NOT JUST WHISPER THE WHOLE THING YOU TONEDEAF BUTTHOLES? DO YOU WANT TO PUNISH US AS VIEWERS?! The answer is an obvious yes. UGH. Other than that scene, everything else was good. (You know, good for Hallmark.)

Bonus Points: They run into each other on the plane for the first time in what I would assume is 15 years and Lena goes the extra mile to bribe a flight attendant to get an eye mask for the flight. When Max asks if he can get one too Lena goes, oh I got these for you, I remember you being a big napper back in high school. CREEP CITY, POPULATION: LENA! Also when she plays Mary in the nativity play and comes onstage flailing her arms all over the joint was pretty cringe-licious.

Christmas Ever After – Lifetime (Ali Stroker, Daniel di Tomasso)

Christmas-Ever-After

I mean this in the most sincere way possible, this was my favorite movie this season. This was the one that was interrupted for a work call that I was FURIOUS about and I circled back to finish it so you KNOW I was committed. It’s no secret that one of my favorite episodes of the Saved by the Bell is the one where Zack dates a girl in a wheelchair and spends the entire episode drawing attention to the fact that she’s handicapped. Since this was the first time a movie had a wheelchair-bound lead, I assumed it would be the same sort of mildly offensive travesty. Lucky for girls on wheelz everywhere, it wasn’t. However, that didn’t stop them from making Izzie the most awkward bird of a human on this earth. And that’s where I thrive. Not only that, she is a trashy romance novelist and the lead man in her books is called Desmond. She goes to her favorite lodge that she spends the holidays at each year and lo and behold, she sees a guy who looks JUST LIKE the lead character in her erotica. Obviously she takes this as a sign to live out her books IRL and get inspiration for her re-write. About 30 seconds after laying eyes on Matt for the first time, she pants over him to each member of his family separately, including Matt’s daughter. Put it on ice, girl, his kid doesn’t want to hear that she has a DILF. She even gets caught trying to snap sneaky pics of him to send to her editor. What an embarrassing human and also relatable as hell. We’ve all been there. Izzy continues to be thirsty AF for Matt and at one point we see her waking up with a start and honest to God my first thought was oh she just had a wet dream. If this wasn’t a PG network, I would’ve really appreciated some red hot read scenes in this movie. It would’ve been a perfect match. Instead, when I googled the movie I was met with this image:

plexiglass

And boy do I love the internet. I NEVER would’ve known watching this movie that their kisses were plexiglass style due to COVID. Now that I can’t unsee this, I remember that they obstructed both of their smooches in the movie so we couldn’t see that there was a WHOLE ASS PIECE OF GLASS in between those lips. Jeeze these networks really take prude to the next level. Netflix would’ve been tongues out AWL day. 

Bonus Points: Izzy has quite the bond with Matt’s dad and I didn’t know how weird it was until he turns to her in a crowded room and goes “Izzy, what do you think?” And she replies, “Yeah, let’s do it, let’s sing” and slowly spins her wheelchair around and breaks into solo song as people are sitting and eating their dinner. Also anytime she calls going for a walk “a push” and when Matt kneels down in front of her so they’re eye to eye and she goes what are you proposing? And he says no, the view’s just better down here. SMOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOTH. 

 

 

Standard
JUice

Weekly JUice

Week of 11/23/2020

 

1. Clifford the Big Red NIGHTMARE.

As if everything isn’t terrible enough, Paramount lays THIS SHIT ON US?! ARE YOU KIDDING ME?! I’ll say this until I’m underground NOT EVERYTHING CARTOON WORKS AS LIVE ACTION (insert clap emojis between each word, obv.) Cartoons are adorable and in this case nostalgic. As I write this right now, I’m watching a Mickey Mouse Christmas movie with my niece, who has blessed me with a spontaneous snuggle this morning. Would I EVER want to watch a literal dirty little mouse crawl around and yap about Christmas and Santa? No, that would be disgusting, mice are meant to live in the forest where I pretend they don’t exist and if they ever come near me I’ll kill them. (I’ll run away screaming and get someone else to kill them.) This is why Mickey Mouse and the gang are great. They’re adorable and they have silly voices AND THEY DON’T EXIST IN REAL LIFE. Is there a dog that is bright red and giant-sized in real life? No there is not because that dog would immediately be shot for being a terrifying mutation monster that could kill us all if we pissed him off. I mean look at this thing.

Even the red looks ridiculous. Has this giant dog been rolling in the blood of all the people it has trampled? This is a HORROR MOVIE. Paramount would be wise to pretend this never happened and go back to the drawing boards on this one. I’d love a Pixar-type Clifford. I can get down with an updated animated Clifford but this? This is a hard no for me. And to everyone who thinks live versions of every childhood classic are necessary–knock it off. Stop ruining our lives. To cleanse your palette, here’s a picture of an adorable normal-sized dog with natural coloring frolicking in real life snow with a wet schnoodle. Let it erase real life Clifford from your mind’s eye.

C3A2F7CC-B0FB-4355-A457-DC9C29B11E00_1_201_a5B4AF14A-AE1B-4CFC-92F9-7AE535C2493C_1_201_a

2. JLO. WHOA.

Most people are embarrassed when a nude is leaked and try to hide it or deny it, not JLo though. The Queen of all Queens was like hey I’ve got a new single, check out my rockin hot bod IN THE BUFF. And honestly? Yes, ok. I could stare at this photo until the end of time and constantly find something new to drool over. I mean, Holy Christmas. The muscle alone is enough to make me up my at-home YouTube workouts. Maybe tomorrow morning I’ll do more than a 10 minute stretch sesh that I’m sore from for 3 days after. Also, gentle reminder to anyone who might’ve forgotten: JLo is FIFTY ONE YEARS OLD. Ok, now that we’ve established that, and the fact that I don’t even care what this song sounds like because nothing will top this cover art, I DO have a little bone to pick (not to be confused with a boner, which I’m sure this photo stirred up in males & females alike.) Although I love when my girl JLo texts me–probably a little too much–I feel like I could use a little warning before I get an unsolicited nude. I really have to be in the right mindset to receive a naked pic of someone and that includes this babe soda. The last time JLo texted me was July 26th about her own birthday. That in itself is a little self-serving, but whatever, every girl should have the right to demand a HBD text. But that was 5 months ago. We’ve had a 5 month hiatus from “Hi Baby” texts and then you lay this nudity on me? KINDA JARRING. At least be like “Hi Baby, I’m about to send you a nude, so get READY!” Instead of just going full force after several months of radio silence. Idk, just a tip from one marketing professional to another. Take it or leave it. Also I felt like I was really in the trust tree there because I was the “first to see the cover” and then five minutes later it was blasted all over social. I feel cheap, bb.

3. The Grammys Are Corrupt, Apparently.

Nominations for the Grammys came out this week as well as the host announcement–Trevor Noah because obviously we need more politics tied into awards shows. It seems like not everyone is pleased. In particular, the Weeknd who I just yapped about a couple weeks ago for buying the Super Bowl halftime show. Apparently he can’t buy a Grammy, ZING. But seriously, apparently the Grammys have always been kind of a shitshow but they really didn’t do a great job of covering that up this year. Beyonce didn’t drop an album, she did a Lion King song and I guess hopped on someone else’s track and yet she’s walking away with the most noms. Something doesn’t add up here. So The Weeknd, who was slated to perform at the awards didn’t receive any noms, and therefore he’s like I’m OUT.

Peace out, homeslice! If anyone cares the rest of the nominations are HERE, if you’re like me you’ll either not recognize the songs or recognize them from TikTok dances. #OldPeopleProbs. The awards are airing January 31st and great news my family had enough about reading my no cable sob stories for red carpets and I’ll be getting a hand-me-down antenna this weekend so I can hook the ole bunny ears up just in time for awards szn.

4. Boycott Chapelle Show.

I expect 0% of my readers to watch this 18 min video of Dave Chapelle but it’s there as a reference if you’d like it. Otherwise, here’s the poop: Dave Chapelle was young and broke and signed a deal with Comedy Central for The Chapelle Show. It was a lame deal and he didn’t know any better and the network probs took advantage of the fact that he was poor and didn’t know how Hollywood worked. He realized that after a couple seasons of his show and peaced out, breaking his contract. Since he broke his contract, he doesn’t own his show or make any money off of it. Now streaming services have added his show into the mix and he’s mad that he doesn’t see any money from his body of work. He talked to Netflix and they took it down because they have a working relationship with Dave that I’m sure they don’t want to ruin. He talked to HBOMax and they were like nah, we good. So now Dave is asking his fans to boycott watching his own show until he starts making money off of it. So basically, this is EXACTLY what happened to Taylor Swift minus a doucheroni named Scooter. Here’s the deal, don’t sign a contract that hasn’t been vetted by a lawyer and also don’t get mad if you breach that contract and screw yourself over. HOWEVER, every creator should have the right to their own shit. Whether they buy that back later on in life when they’ve made the dough or they cut a new deal to get some residuals. If my INCREDIBLY well-written Weekly JUices were snatched up by a big biz blog and they were making money off of it but I wasn’t, I’d riot my face off. BUT ALSO, I’d ask someone smarter than me to look over a contract before signing it because I’m just a poor person who writes blogs and if anyone offered me pennies for my blog I’d be like yes sounds great where do I sign? Moral of the story here, I have significantly less money than both Taylor Swift AND Dave Chapelle and I’m very open to negotiations for my talents (of which there are so many, obviously.) Then maybe I could go to brunch and actually get food rather than just showing up to stunt an outfit on all of my haters and order a water. Also, let Dave buy his show and let Taylor buy her music. The end.

@thesaltyju

When you have a brunch wardrobe but not a brunch budget. 💁🏽‍♀️ #basicbitch #alittlebitalexis #poorpeopleproblems

♬ Therefore I Am – Billie Eilish

5. Are You Ok?

The Duke And Duchess Of Sussex Visit Australia - Day 3

Meghan Markle contributed this very well-written piece to the NY Times, where she reveals that her and Harry suffered a miscarriage. Of course, in addition to being this worldly and charitable creature, she’s a phenomenal writer as well. (I’m jelly as hell.) It’s a quick read and a nice reminder to ask people if they’re ok because they’re probably not. Especially this year. But then if you ask someone if they’re ok and they say no, don’t tell them to just get over it. That’s my own pro tip from the trenches of anti-ok.

BONUS: If you are not OK, here’s some Thanksgiving highlights that will hopefully bring you some holiday cheer. Cause nothing slaps harder than shoving your head into a turkey b-hole.

I hope that you were able to cram lots of snacks into your snackhole, bathe in gravy & boom roast Christmas Hallmark movies with your family like I did. If not, please enjoy my commentary on some Thanksgiving classics. I had a lame tweet get A LOT of action and a GREAT tweet about a new Goo Goo Doll face go under-appreciated. Also, my brother in law and dad turned off the dog show for football so they’re both dead to me. Countdown to Christmas begins MEoW!

I’m thankful for my family, who didn’t murder me when I took 16,000 boomerangs of the food that they were killing themselves to prepare for a business Instagram story that got 30ish views. LIFE OF A CONTENT CREATOR, YO. I’m also thankful that I belong to a crew that doesn’t believe in serving sizes. This was just a light snack 45 mins before the feast. Portion control is for wieners. You’re not doing Thanksgiving right if you don’t feel like you’re going to blow. Thank you for coming to my Ted Talk on being a lard.

Standard
JUice

Weekly JUice

Week of 11/9/2020

juice header

1. Who Bought Halftime This Year?

The Weeknd, that’s who. I’m certainly not the first to say this but allow me to be the loudest, WHAT?! We just had a record day for new cases of the ‘vid (I feel like if we give it a street name it’ll stop killing people) and we’re making plans for a football game in February?! LOLOLOL. Get the hell out of here with that garbage! Unless he’s performing remotely like all of these ratchet awards shows, I feel like it’s a scooch premature to be locking in the Super Bowl this year. Let’s take a beat and see how the end of 2020 shakes out first. Even the CMA’s that went full force the other night had people dropping like flies because of positive tests. Just because Pfizer has a promising lead on the vaccine sitch doesn’t mean we’ll be partying like it’s 1999 mask free for Super Bowl Sunday. (Related note: all of this can also apply to LiveNation who thinks they’re going to reboot the concert industry through an app to verify if you’ve been vaccinated.) Everyone needs to slow their roll. I get that the world is crumbling and people just want reasons to celebrate and act like shit’s normal but this has a real dad just hit mom at the dinner table and everyone be quiet vibe to it. Address the elephant in the room, the elephant that I’m referring to is of course the fact that just anyone can purchase their spot at the Super Bowl now and a stage that large should be exclusively reserved for iconic singers–of which the Weeknd is not. Sorry, that’s the way the cookie crumbles. JLo? Icon. Gaga? Icon. The Weeknd? He’s been around for like 2 years and I still have to google how to spell his name. Relax. That being said, should the halftime show go off without a hitch, my sister and I are one hundo percent available as backup dancers. Just need a couple of Bud Lattes, a cheese-based dip and 2 hours of practice to shuffle through 14 seconds of dance moves like we’re uncoordinated paralyzed zombies. Please contact our agent if you’re interested. Who am I kidding, we’d never give up a night of unlimited dips just to perform at the Super Bowl no matter HOW talented we are. Rescinding the offer in favor of the best apps night of the year.

@thesaltyju

When your sister gets drunk & says she’ll learn a tiktok dance but doesn’t realize that means 2 hours of practice…#fyp #blindinglights #sundayfunday

♬ Blinding Lights – MACDADDYZ

2. Another Legend Gone.

Lifelong Jeopardy host Alex Trebek lost his battle with cancer this past weekend. Whether you were an old who can’t miss Jeopardy or not, everyone is mourning this iconic host. He was Canadian cool and Jeopardy will be lost without him. I’m not personally an avid viewer of the Jeop/WOF early bird special but I was an avid viewer of “The Best of Will Ferrell on SNL” and his skits as Trebek were easily my favorite. It’s unfortunate that my first thought when I hear his name is “Suck It, Trebek” or “Rough, just the way your mother likes it, Trebek” but that’s what happens when you’re so calm & collected that they make a whole SNL running sketch with Sean Connery (also RIP, God everyone’s dropping like flies) insulting you. Hope he’s up there kickin it with Reg, doing TV legend shit. (Enjoy my favorite clip below even though the only surviving celeb that they’re mocking is French Stewart…yoikes.)

And also an actual tribute to the real Alex Trebek and not the parody.

3. New Tuneage.

Thomas Rhett previewed this song about a week ago and I was READY FOR IT. I figured he’d incorporate his cute ass family into the music video as he’s been known to do, plus they spent a significant amount of time in Montana looking like an LL Bean catalog during quarantine. Curveball: he decided to go for the angle that makes me feel old AF. Watching a bunch of high school football games and kids singing in the car driving home from school was enough to make me wither away in my wrinkles and grey hair (YES I HAVE GREY HAIR, NO I AM NOT OVER IT) while watching. Regardless of my age insecurities, this song is a bop and the video had some wholesome fall vibes to it. Maybe one day I’ll get to see his concert I bought tickets for last June and not have to prove via an app that I’m Covid-Free. Also good news:

These two cherubs will be hosting the holidays. Since there’s a high possibility that Thanksgiving and Christmas are cancelled, we need them now more than ever. Now who is going to give me a cable login so I can watch?

4. Flex on Flex.

Rolling Stone did a feature called “Musicians on Musicians” where Taylor Swift and Paul McCartney kicked it in London and talked about the process behind their latest albums, both done in quarantine. In summary, it was a buttload of words about why they’re both bosses. Paul played all the instruments on his album, Taylor talked about how she’s been beefing up on classic literature and showed up without hair and makeup for a photoshoot. It’s essentially a contest to see who can be more intelligent and humble. They both win. I imagine they conducted this interview in a castle library straight out of Beauty and the Beast, smoking cigars. The whole article just smelled of rich leather and mahogany. Obviously I’m jealous as hell. And as two top-tier songwriters who have earned their success, why wouldn’t you humble-brag about it in Rolling Stone if given the opportunity? For those of you who like a long read and are genuinely interested in the art of music (Dad), find the article HERE. For anyone with the attention span of a gnat (the rest of my friends and family), you’re not really missing that much. Taylor doesn’t give many tidbits behind folklore other than that Peace is one of the few on the album that is about her personal life (focusing on her lack of privacy and how that messes with her relationship) and she really loves the word epiphany and has a list of big words that she just likes and will toss into songs. My favorite part of the article is the story Paul tells in the end:

Here’s hoping something will happen for me REAL QUICK.

5. CHRISTMAS IS COMING THE GEESE ARE GETTING FAT.

People are really desp for some Christmas cheer this year and I feel like the past few weeks have been chock full of holiday content, so I’m going to do the lazy thing and jam it all together here for your selective consumption. If you feel like it’s too soon, get over it. Hallmark has been airing Christmas movies since March. It’s time to force joy into your lives when it’s pitch black at 5 (Seriously, is there a soul on this earth that LIKES daylight savings? Can we just cancel it like everything else?) and freezing cold. The hot flash that was last week is over and it’s time to come to terms with Mariah season fast-approaching. So here’s some new tunes (I’m purposefully leaving out the Jonas Brothers release because it was the biggest snoozer):

So realistically it’s just the country scene that are ready for some Christmas cheer, which is ironic because the south will never see snow and their holidays probably look like my 80 degree bike ride through the tacky lights on the lake display that they started erecting in Syracuse in July.

If only snow always looked as majestic as the set where Dan + Shay crooned about Christmas and white fedoras like Jessie’s counted as casual wear. Anyway, in addition to new beats, there will also be a Disney singalong. Unfortunately it’s the same night as the country holiday special hosted by TR and Lauren so hopefully y’all have some DVR space. Normally I’d skip this Disney fest but they do have Bubbles and everyone with a brain knows you can’t have Christmas without Michael Buble.

And finally should you be in search of holiday movies that might include a little more action than your regular Hallmark & Lifetime (of which I will try my hardest to do my annual blog of holiday TV movies), might I suggest Holidate on Netflix. TECHNICALLY it’s not a Christmas movie because it features ALL holidays, but we’ll count it for now because I have given it my must-watch stamp of approval. It has humor, it has sex (GASP) and just the right amount of cheese. Also, feel free to turn focusing on the fact that Kristin Chenoweth’s forehead does not move one single time into a drinking game. You’re welcome. My Christmas present to all.

Standard
Movies, Pop Culture, Television

Doc O’Clock

I’ve noticed that I’ve been really watching a buttload of documentaries in “quarantine”—I put it in quotes because I’m pretty sure the rest of the world is no longer quarantined but fun fact: when you’re unemployed, quarantine never ends. I’ve always loved a good true crime doc so I can pretend that my several years of watching cop shows and one semester of a Forensics class have qualified me to solve crimes. Typically immediately after I watch a true crime doc, I speak to everyone I know and even some people that I don’t about the details of this horrific crime sometimes even becoming a truther attempting to exonerate murderers who have been sentenced and are currently sitting in jail like I’m Kim Kardashian or something. (See: Stephen Avery & Scott Peterson) HOWEVER, I found myself really reaching beyond the typical true crime doc these past few months and expanding my doc horizons. And all of this consumption has compelled me to yap my face off about the things that I’ve found and now believe I’m an expert on. If you would like doc recommendations, or just want to feel exponentially smarter from watching hours and hours of TV like I do, feel free to browse the below list of documentaries that I’ve consumed over the past 6 months. And if I might add an overall comment, incorporating actual text messages into many of these docs has really added a whole new layer of invasiveness and enhances my incredibly nosy viewing experience tenfold. BRAVA.

I’ll Be Gone in the Dark – HBO

I was overly-hyped for this. I had heard through Twitterland that this doc focused on Michelle McNamara, a crime writer married to comedian Patton Oswalt, who invested her time focusing on the Golden State Killer and cracked the case on her own. I love Hollywood and I love murders so this seemed like a real match made in heaven. Unfortunately, that was quite a Twitter exaggeration. Michelle was writing a book entitled “I’ll Be Gone in the Dark” about the Golden State Killer and was getting access to the case documents and immersing herself in all of the evidence and details of his murders in the 80’s but there were a lot of other people doing the same thing she was doing as well. Most of the victims, people from the town, law enforcement and others had formed groups and were determined to solve this open case. Tragically, Michelle died before finishing the book or seeing the arrest of the Golden State Killer. The doc is through the lens of Michelle’s work and includes a lot of victim personal accounts. Due to the fact that they did not find the killer until recently and the crimes took place 30+ years ago, there wasn’t a lot to offer by way of video evidence or footage so there was a lot of reenactment, which I have a hard time taking seriously. What I did take seriously was the one recorded phone call they had of the GSK saying “I’ll kill you bitch” which they chose to play 900000 times and I chose to crap my pants each time it was played. As someone who was not familiar with the Golden State Killer, I found the details about his crimes very interesting, especially because he was so prolific for many years, breaking into people’s homes at night, raping and killing. So basically every fear of mine come to life whenever I’m home alone. Even though I found it interesting, I did start to get a little bored after the third episode and therefore this wasn’t an overwhelming home run for me in the doc department. Adding in Michelle’s tragic story created another interesting layer, but I feel like it could’ve been wrapped up a little neater. Also by interesting I mean kind of horrifying because she was terrified and had stopped sleeping because of how much she had immersed herself in this case. And she didn’t even get to see this scumbucket finally get caught. And not for nothing, but how OUTRAGEOUS is it when serial killers have a family and everyone’s like yeah we had no clue dad/my husband/Uncle Joe was raping and murdering 5 nights a week. WUT?!

The Vow – HBO

I cannot stress enough how obsessed I am with this story and documentary. For those looking for a quick and dirty doc, this is not it as it’s episodic and each episode is an hour long. They release a new one each week, so if you’d rather binge I suggest waiting until they’re all up—right now there are 7 episodes out there. This series follows the cult NXIVM, which holds a special place in many of our hearts as it was a hometown cult. Started by Keith Raniere in Clifton Park, NY, anyone from the Cap Region might have heard about this through the years or might even know someone who was involved. As a Saratoga Resident for 10ish years, I gleefully outbursted when Keith described Clifton Park as the “Rome of the modern day” and texted my old co-workers when our radio station banners were hung in the gym where Vanguard invites everyone to watch him play volleyball every night. I even got excited when I saw the Dalai Lama visit The Palace Theatre. So I would say it’s especially a must-watch for people who live in that area because they have TONS of video footage from the former cult members who are the main focus of this doc, plus it’s not often that HBO shines a spotlight on dear old CP also referred to as Albany almost exclusively throughout the series even though they are completely different cities. But anyway, let’s get to the real meat here which is that NXIVM started as self-help classes and preyed on people who were kind of lost in their career or life path and told them to sign up for a couple thousand dollar course and start working the stripe path to get different colored sashes and eventually have the opportunity to bone Keith Raniere, one of the schlubbiest looking men alive. Let me be clear, this is not coming from a judgmental place. Well, the sex with Keith part is. But falling for this cult thing is not and mostly because I know for a fact I would’ve fallen for this. I, too, am a wayward soul looking for happiness. And if someone approached me and was like I know how to guarantee you’ll be happy again, I’d be like yeah bitch let’s do this. Unfortunately once I attended my first volleyball game where Keith is wearing a sweatband in his long grey hair and being treated like a sex symbol, mouth kissing everyone’s faces off I’d be swiftly out. But that’s just me. The details of this cult are not only baffling, but the fact that it went on for 20+ years before law enforcement was involved is nuts beyond belief. Since I’ve already babbled on too long and I could probably talk forever about my fascination with NXIVM, I’ll just say watch it and get back to me. I mean, literally I brought this shit up in therapy and my therapist had to tell me 3-4 times that she’s not an expert on this cult before I finally gave it up. SO JUST WATCH IT, OK?!

The Social Dilemma – Netflix

Screen Shot 2020-10-04 at 7.35.52 PM

This doc interviews executives in some of the largest internet and social media companies and brings to light just HOW MUCH the internet was created to stalk our lives. It’s an eye opening experience for all generations because as much as adults want to say they’re too old for social media, look no further than Facebook to see the olds POPPIN OFF on the daily. So it really applies to all ages here. There are astonishing facts about how the rate of suicide and mental health issues in middle school age children skyrocketed after the invention of social media. There’s explanations as to how people who wrote the actual algorithms to keep you hooked online fall for the same pitfalls we do even though they created it. So basically this is the doc for anyone whose ever had a conversation about getting a new vacuum cleaner and then the next time they open Facebook or Google, there’s ads for vacuum cleaners. It’s crazy and invasive and yet I will never ever ever give up social media and you can’t MAKE ME. But seriously, lots of interesting stuff and then a little bit of “the internet is going to ruin the world” vibes as well. Take that with a grain of salt. It seems like the world is crashing and burning all on its own with minimal interference from the internet but whatevs. 

This is Paris – YouTube

thisisparis

Yes that’s right I’ll even stoop to Youtube if it means getting to pull the curtain back on an infamous celeb. Although I really wanted this to be about Paris’ lavish upbringing and how she came to basically create reality TV and the “famous for nothing” crew (lookin at you, Kimmy K)…what it was really about was much darker than that. When Paris was in her teen years she was sent to a bunch of different behavioral correction schools, escaping them all and finally ending up in one out in Utah where she and the other “students” were mentally, physically & sexually abused. And Paris never even told her parents this until recently, just burying the trauma until she decided to seek justice and reunite with old classmates through this doc. Overall I’d say it was interesting to see a lot of public things that Paris did through the new perspective knowing that she was abused for several years when she was forming her identity. She admits that most of her relationships have been abusive, even showing paparazzi photos where she has bruises all over her body. Obviously she touches on the sex tape and how she was coerced into it by her first real boyfriend who she was trying to impress. And probably the most interesting tidbit of them all, Paris is Keyser Soze. She’s secretly brilliant and has been putting on this dum dum “That’s Hot” act ever since the early 2000’s. In her child slavery schools she was forced to clean so acting like she didn’t know what a sponge was in “The Simple Life” was pure acting talent. Her normal voice octave isn’t breathy and moronic. Bitch has been playing the media for decades and has made billions off of it. Watching this unfold throughout the documentary leading up to the point when one of her former fellow students pointed out that she was a physics brainiac in school was the moment when Keyser Soze loses the limp at the end of the movie (spoiler alert). Glass shattered. Paris is smarter than us all. Also, hands down best scene of the whole thing is when Paris is DJ’ing Tomorrowland, the biggest festival she’s ever played, and her drunk insecure boyf picks a fight with her minutes before she’s supposed to go on and she loses it on him and gets him bounced from the entire festival. If you don’t immediately want to start cheering for her in that moment, you’re not human. The director said she wanted it cut out and I’m glad it didn’t get cut because that was PURE entertainment and suuuuch a SAVAGE Paris moment. 

American Murder – Netflix

american-murder

Nobody loves a deep dive into a murder more than me, but this one just hit different. I felt very icky after watching it and it took me several moments to craft a tweet to sum up why. What it really came down to for me was the fact that not only was this a very recent murder so I was involved in the story from when it broke and not just learning about it through this doc, but it was a murder of 2 children and a pregnant wife. I feel like I can’t remember any other murder that I’ve read/heard about that includes children. And not only that, but this documentary included LOTS of footage of the children and the wife. It turns out Shanann (a name I will NEVER be able to pronounce, it’s Shannon or bust) fancied herself somewhat of an internet influencer. They had an overwhelming amount of videos from her Facebook page just updating her “followers” on her kids and her husband and things she was going through, some of them were very personal about her health or serving as inspirational messages for people who might be watching. She seemed to be the type of person who filmed and/or took pictures of everything. Which is EXACTLY the type of person I would roll my eyes at and block on Facebook, but now, seeing it on a documentary about her untimely death, it just seemed sad and eerie. There were many videos of the kids and their dad, showing them playing together or just being a normal family. Her pregnancy announcement was filmed. And I think it was just especially jarring in the age of social media to have all of this now included in true crime docs. I’m so used to reenactments and old-ass interrogation tapes. This is very much a modern doc, right down to using the police chest cam footage from the days after Shanann and the kids go missing. And don’t get me wrong, I HATE docs that are just talking heads and no action, so I really loved the fact that they incorporated all of this video footage and even personal texts that she had sent leading up to the murder. And yet it’s a catch-22 because Chris Watts is the SCUM of the earth and it just painted a clearer picture of the fact that Shanann and her children were murdered in the most disgusting way, FOR ABSOLUTELY no reason. So now that I’ve ranted about it giving me the uncomfies, let’s talk about the rest. The BIGGEST takeaway that I had from this doc, was the blonde polygraph chick who was RUTHLESS and I LOVED it…for about 5 mins and then immediately after she was done being a sassy B she suggested to Chris that maybe Shanann killed the kids and that’s the story he went with for several months, blaming the murder of his children on his innocent wife until he finally set the story straight. It was a quick high to low situation, I loved the fact that she was calling him out for being a MORON to take a polygraph when he’s clearly lying, but then she enabled him by giving him a story that there’s NO CHANCE he would’ve come up with on his own, and then rubbed his back for “confessing.” I mean this is the guy who pulled his truck into the garage to put his wife’s body in it KNOWING his neighbor camera-stalks the street. That neighbor deserves a badge of honor btw for knowing Chris was a murderer IMMEDIATELY. Regardless, we’re dealing with a real dummy here and this “interrogation” had some Brad Dassey vibes to it and I’m surprised Chris Watts didn’t ask if he’d be out of jail in time for Wrestlemania after confessing to the murder.

Class Action Park – HBO

classaction

I’ve heard about Action Park for years and knew that Johnny Knoxville was in a movie about it yet felt like that was more a boy movie than something I’d be super interested in. Then people started buzzing (specifically my favorite cousin who constantly tells me I’m funny so obviously I trust her opinion the most) about this new doc and you KNOW I have FOMO, so I decided to watch. And yes, Action Park was NUTZ. Just the cannonball loop alone was a covered slide with a loop in it. It looked like someone drew it and then just slapped some materials together to make it, as if the park was a hamster cage and not meant for human beings. The “mastermind” behind Action Park, Gene Mulvihill would give employees cash for testing out the rides. At one point they noticed people coming out with scratches and when they opened the slide up to see what was going on, previous riders TEETH were stuck in the padding and injuring other kids. WOOF TIMES A BILLION. And this was pretty much the case for each ride they described. They had Tarzan rope swings, cliff dives, slides that dropped 50 feet, and motorboats that you could booze up and ride. Basically this place was a walking lawsuit and everyone who went got injured and even a couple died. My personal favorite, the wave pool known as the “grave pool” where they used fresh water and noted that the human sludge and constant waves made it hard to spot if someone was drowning. When a person died in the wave pool, they cleared out the body and let everyone back in to keep body surfing/potentially also dying. These are all the fun facts I learned by watching this doc, but it was also one of those movies that never ended. I checked my phone several times because it felt like it was hours long and I definitely started to nod off. It was like they wanted to show how badass this place was but then felt the moral obligation to include heartfelt remarks from a family whose teenager died there. It was a real moral crossroads for me because at one point I’m laughing hysterically about how Action Park is SO Jersey it hurts and shouting CLASSIC to someone who drove a motorboat up onto a dock over another human being and walked away… and then a second later I feel like a dirtbag for laughing because this family who lost their child is traumatized and thinks Gene is a total money-grubbing heartless dirtbag.  Real waterslide of emotions, pun intended.

Jeffrey Epstein: Filthy Rich – Netflix

jeffrey-epstein-filthy-rich

Again, I may be one of the last people to know what the deal is with Jeffrey Epstein but this doc was a great peek into that world. Sometimes I find that watching a well-made flick about a hot topic that is most definitely a little bit political, is better than learning about it from your Great Uncle on Facebook. This was 4 hour-long episodes and honestly the same message could’ve been delivered in 2 episodes or a feature film. This is one of my favorite things to critique about docs as most of them are THE MOST drawn out for no reason. Unless you have LOADS of compelling footage to show, most of the time you’re interviewing the same people and showing the same 4 photos or clips and that gets old REAL quick. I will also add that this was heavily for the victims and therefore they were really trying to tug at your heartstrings with their personal accounts and the justice they were seeking. Jeffrey Epstein was a very wealthy and well-connected pedo and he used his privilege to get away with it for several years even when the evidence was stacked against him. And his right-hand gal Ghislaine (pronounced in the DOUCHIEST french accent “ghee-lane” or if you’re my dad and have the maturity of a 14 year old, “Jizz-lane.”) who was FINALLY tracked down and arrested recently essentially groomed girls to be raped by Jeffrey and also deserves to rot in prison. If you’re anything like me, you’ll watch this and then immediately dive into the wormhole of conspiracy theories right down to Wayfair trafficking children disguised as expensive cabinets. If this doc taught me anything, it’s that without a doubt there’s a pedo ring in politics and Hollywood and I can’t wait for the day that shit’s blown wide open and these pervs are outed. Also, it taught me that Prince Andrew has a physical condition that prevents him from sweating. LOLOLOLOLOL.

McMillion$ – HBO

mcmillions

I came late to the party for this one, people were telling me to watch it back in February but I’m cheap and didn’t get HBO until recently when I got a free trial JUST to watch I’ll Be Gone in the Dark and then when said free trial expired, I waited until they sent me a cheaper monthly price before I committed again (to obviously cancel when they raise the price after a year.) That’s how you play the game, folks. Anyway, this one covers the classic McDonalds Monopoly game that ran for a decade and it turns out it was completely rigged. I had no previous information about this case so the story was a real rollercoaster. Doug Mathews was the rookie special agent who first pursued this case and he is ELECTRIC on camera. Honestly if it weren’t for Doug I might’ve shut the doc off after episode 1 because it was a bit of a slow start. And thank God I didn’t shut it off because it was one of my fave doc-series. The creatures that were in this criminal Monopoly ring were the type of people that I couldn’t tear my eyes away from. Robin Colombo in particular. I cherished every time she graced the screen with her Kool Aid red hair, 16,000 wrinkles and constant ciggy hanging out of her mouth. I’m honestly not sure what’s more offensive, the cast of characters that won millions of dollars from McDonald’s illegally or the fact that these morons got away with it for SO long. In fact, had there not been an informant, there would still be schmucks buying winning Monopoly tickets like it’s an underground betting ring and not a fast food chain promotional contest.

Fear City – Netflix

fearcity

This is for all my fellow I-talians out there. My dad and I watched this one together in our matching wife-beaters and gold cross chains while we ate sauce and called everyone mamalukes. Just kidding, sort of. Fear City dives into the height of the NYC mafia in the 70’s and 80’s and how a bunch of baby-faced agents took them down. I love a good mafia/mob movie and the best part about this one was that it was real life. The five families were quite literally running the entire city at that time, making money off of the construction of every new skyscraper that was going up, in addition to having their hands in every other revenue-generating business right down to the gas you put in your car. In just three episodes (my favorite kind of doc) you’ll get to see how the FBI managed to assign an agent to each family, bug their homes and build enough evidence to take them all down. The sting operations get my juices flowing (there was a great sting in the McMillions doc where they acted as a film crew Argo style) and watching the bug guy tell us how he put on a mustache and a jumpsuit and dropped by the head of a mafia family’s home to “fix his TV” in the 1970’s when technology literally did not exist was riveting stuff. There wasn’t AS much real time footage as I would’ve liked but again, it was short so it’s not like I was bored to tears.

I Love You, Now Die – HBO

iloveyou

Nothing excites me more than forming an opinion on a crime strictly from the very few headlines that I read. And that’s exactly what everyone did with this case, which is why I truly enjoyed this more balanced look into what might have happened. I guess this doc came out last year, but having just gotten access to HBO, I went a little apeshit last weekend consuming every recent doc they had and this just happened to be one of them and I wanted to recommend it and not just because it took place in Massachusetts and featured some PRIME Ben/Casey Affleck exaggerated movie accents. The case was a big deal a few years back because technically Conrad committed suicide but once they dove a little deeper into his relationship with his girlfriend Michelle, they found text messages from her encouraging him to do it and she was charged with his murder, which is a pretty controversial thing and a unique murder charge. The doc did a great job of covering the back and forth of if you can really charge someone for murder when they texted someone to do it–at the end of the day Michelle didn’t start that car and let it fill up with carbon monoxide to kill Conrad and it seemed like the judge was kind of torn on it too. What was made very clear though was the fact that both Conrad and Michelle were AWL sorts of F’ed up. They were both being treated for depression and on medication, Conrad had attempted suicide before, and the two of them lived in this kind of toxic fantasy world of dating via text and never actually seeing each other. So for anyone who saw Michelle in court with her jet black bushy brows, her bleach blonde hair and a REAL bitchy stank face and though ooooh this teeniebopper ho is guilty AF, I suggest you watch this and it might not be so black and white. I’m not saying you’re going to finish it and think she’s innocent like I did when I watched the Scott Peterson doc and spent every Christmas party bringing up the gruesome murder of Laci Peterson to everyone who got stuck talking to me in order to convince them of his innocence, but you might just see the case from all sides. And that’s really why we watch docs, right? To get a different perspective, learn some new tidbits, and then shove all of that down everyone else’s throats and act like you’re superior to them because you watched an educational movie that was 100% created with an agenda and also a bias. DOCS 4 LIFE.

Standard
JUice

Weekly JUice

Week of 9/21/2020

1. Apology Not Accepted.

This is celeb apology 101. Joke about it, seem human and relatable and get a little vulnerable and say you’re working on it. I CALL BULLSHIT. “I am that person you see on TV, I’m also a real butthole.” I may have paraphrased here but listen, there’s a reason Ellen has had a reputation as a Hollywood douche for as long as she has. One scripted heartfelt apology isn’t going to fix the official investigation into her show and all of the people she’s mistreated for years. And if one more celebrity comes out to publicly say Ellen is amazing and has never treated them poorly I’m going to hulk smash my phone. SHE IS NICE TO OTHER FAMOUS PEOPLE….SHE IS NOT NICE TO COMMONERS. DUH TIMES A THOUSAND. Smooth moves to spin it on over to Twitch and his promotion v. quickly though. PEOPLE DON’T FORGET, ELLEN. 

2. Arrived for Realz this time.

If you’ll recall my friend Kat has to get a face tat (hopefully it’ll just say Kat’s Face Tat like a fun Dr. Seuss permanent rhyme on her cheek…in the shape of a teardrop Lil Wayne style obviously) because she fake scooped me on this baby’s arrival a week ago. When I sent her the evidence that this little nugget is here, she was quick to point out that those look like week old baby hands and she might still be right. I think that’s a solid counterpoint because I do believe this baby’s hands look like that of a small toddler so I guess she’s free to keep her moneymaker free of ink…for now. Obviously my eyes rolled out of my head at the black and white hand holding announcement. GET A NEW FORMULA PEOPLE. And we will wait with the most anticipation for a name announcement. Both Kat and I think it has a large potential to be weird considering both parents names and heritages but maybe they’ll shock us all with a plain bagel name. Celebrities really know how to keep us on our toes.

3. I Love Me (Reprise.)

maxdemi

I hate to say told ya so but…..who am I kidding, I LIVE FOR THIS SHIT. I caaaaallllllleeedddd this. IN fact, just a one day ago I was telling a friend who doesn’t follow Demi that closely about her engagement, recapping how it was a relationship that started at the beginning of quarantine and they were engaged by summer and it’s been just a couple of years since Demi was literally brought back from the dead after a heroin overdose and mark my words I said, yeah this isn’t going to last. AND THEN IT DIDN’T. Am I a psychic? Probably. Or I just know my girl Demi. She needs some time alone to work on herself. She needs to be single for a hot minute. I may be tough on her on this blog a lot but I JUST WANT WHAT’S BEST FOR HER, GAWD!!! Shocking to no one, they spent quarantine in a bubble of honeymoon phase sex all the time, no commitments or real jobs bliss and thought hey this is great let’s do this forever! But not so fast… once they had to go back to work again, things weren’t so peachy anymore. Also turns out Max is a real fame whore and was loving all the newfound publicity and attention. If I find out he took advantage of a fragile, poor Demi to up his ranks in H’wood, I’ll smack that pretty boy face of his back to the Disney channel. Fingers crossed this is a good move for my bestie and she can get back on track now bumping the below beat (or my self confidence playlist) and reminding herself that she’s a badass bitch who don’t need no man and focusing on her sobriety. YOU GOT THIS DEMI.

4. Moore Babies.

View this post on Instagram

Baby Boy Goldsmith coming early 2021 💙

A post shared by Mandy Moore (@mandymooremm) on

What a Mandy Moore announcement. I feel like she’s become this folklore fairy that has Sunday music sessions with her indie band husband so of course her pregnancy news comes via blurry black and white photos. I’m a Mandy stan so I’m thrilled for this news. She got rid of that dirtbag Ryan Adams who not only looked like he needed a shower for the past ten years but also messed with her head throughout their whole marriage and I’m happy that she’s happy and moving forward with her life even though every time she’s interviewed someone inevitably brings Ryan up.

5. Every Party Has a Pooper.

Well this is a total weird move to resurrect a 30 year old movie that already had a sequel. I don’t hate it because I’ll forever sing the classic: every party has a pooper that’s why we invited you GEORGE BAHHHHHHNKKKKS song, and yet this “trailer” leaves much to the imagination as to what we’re really supposed to expect here. Is it another full movie? Is it just a meta reunion via zoom? Who are the extra special appearances? Why is it premiering at dinner time on a Friday? WHAT A TEASER THIS IS. Guess we’ll have to tune in to find out tonight!

BONUS: Ladies Night Special

Channing has been hitting the weights again recently and he wants everyone to see his six pack. Thanks for the update, Chan. Much appreciated. If I was still thirteen and cutting up the Abercrombie & Fitch shopping bags to decorate my textbooks (and hang on the back of my door) you bet your bottom dollar this black and white shot of the Chanster’s naked torso would be front and center.

Standard