Monsters of Television

“It has been a while since my bottom half smiled.”

I haven’t seen this much dread in critics’ reviews of a show since Whitney was telling us about marriages and sweatpants

And rightfully so. Much like the maligned Whitney, Are You There, Chelsea?, one of several female-led series this cycle to have a ridiculous name change to save our children (usually from bad words they probably already know), offered very little content for me to look forward to. In fact, it offered more fodder to fuel the flames of war. Nerdy TV war. Where using a gambit like “quality TV” will derail a conversation faster than saying “relative” to philosophy student climbing up the walls to use his degree for something.

I’ll admit upfront that I’ve never read the book or paid much attention to the life of Chelsea Handler beyond the occasional episode of Chelsea Lately and whatever vitriol Ralph Garman erupted during his tirades on Hollywood Babble-On before Kevin Smith self-promoted himself into a full network unsubscribe (if interested, I committed my thoughts on finally abandoning Kevin Smith to the interweb). So anything outside of Handler hosting a show on E! and considering the rumors of her sleeping her way onto the airwaves is news to me. Oh, and I think she dated 50 Cent.

What this means is that I come to a show presumably based on Chelsea Handler’s life relatively fresh. I know her style of comedy and I know this show can’t possibly be worse than Whitney. Ha. Right? … right? Read more »