What was on TV? Fri, Feb 18, 2005

20 years ago, Elon Musk was just a diamond heir who invested in an electric car company. Let's see what was on TV!

8:00 Miracle's Boys on the N

1x01 "New Charlie" and 1x02 "In the Game of Life"

20 years ago, Spike Lee produced a miniseries adaptation of a novel by prizewinning children's writer Jacqueline Woodson. It aired on the N or the Noggin, Nickelodeon's teen-focused programming block. The theme song was written and performed by Nas.

I swear this show is real and you can watch it on YouTube right now. It's a little clunky in the way that literary adaptations often are: sometimes things are explained way too much and then sometimes stuff is barely explained at all (thought this gets better as the show goes along). But even when the show explains itself a little too much, it does not pander to White audiences at all. We are thrown into the lives of three brothers in Harlem. Their mom just died and the middle child is returning from juvie. All three boys are "gifted." Oldest child Ty'ree (Pooch Hall) got into MIT, middle child Charlie (Sean Nelson) has a way with the guitar, and youngest boy Lafayette (Julito McCullum) is a budding baseball star. In a typical movie, they'd work hard and leave the hood behind. But here they're fighting about messy bedrooms, crushes, and trying their best to do right by each other. It's beautiful and utterly unlike anything else on TV in 2004. I wish it wasn't such an anomaly, and I wish it wasn't so forgotten.

9:00 Monk (recorded)

3x13 "Mr. Monk Gets Stick in Traffic"

What an absolute delight. Monk solves a mystery while stuck in traffic. How very California of him. An ambulance chaser played by teen movie icon Larry Miller (the dad in 10 Things I Hate About You, Paolo the makeover maven in The Princess Diaries) follows him everywhere. He gets a truck driver fired and re-hired. He escorts a teenage girl to the bathroom. Except the bathroom is on the tour bus for the nu-metal band Korn, guest starring as themselves. And it all ends with an absolutely killer car chase. (Seriously, this episode deserved an Emmy nomination for stunt coordination). And since this isn't 24, the climactic moment is him unbucking his seatbelt. All that, and the mystery is really fun, and the killer of the week is extra hateable. Cozy mystery television at its finest.

10:00 Battlestar Galactica on Sci-Fi

1x07 "Six Degrees of Separation" (record Monk on USA)

Gaius Baltar is supposed to be a genius scientist who will save us all. In reality, he's a craven worm who has nearly destroyed the entire human race and remains the single greatest threat to the surviving coalition. He has also totally lost his mind and is in the thrall of his supermodel robot girlfriend, who is in turn obsessed with "God's plan," and "God's plan" seems to require the destruction of humanity.

You know how The Social Network posits that Facebook started when an angry nerd got dumped and decided to make a "which girl is hotter" website that made it easy and fun for boys to make girls' lives hell? That might not be strictly true, but it feels true. Well, Mark Zuckerberg is to The Social Network as Elon Musk and today's ruling coalition of plutocrats, Nazis, and the Evangelicals are to Battlestar Galactica, Gaius Baltar, and Number Six. This week on Battlestar, the religious fundamentalist tries to pull one over on the billionaire asshole scientist, and by the end of the episode, the scientist is weaker and more unstable than ever, yet he's more secure in his power, and he and Number Six are still inextricably tied together. This reminds me of a dozen different tussles in the MAGA coalition.

Anyway, Gaius Baltar is a great character. But I hope the next episode focuses on literally anyone else.

Late Night

Rachel Weisz can make anything sound sexy. She went on Letterman tonight and she made FOOD POISONING sound sexy. How?!?!?

What Else Was On

• The news of Star Trek: Enterprise's cancellation broke this week. Enterprise was less than beloved, but Trekkies still mobilized to save it. One man really seized the moment and created a pioneering crowdfunding scam. Anyway, tonight Star Trek superfan Seth MacFarlane guested on the show.
• NBC staged Medical Investigation/Third Watch crossover event. Apparently the hype failed to materialize, both shows were cancelled at the end of the season
• Tonight's Special Sweeps Guest Stars: Ruben Studdard on 8 Simple Rules, Neal Patrick Harris on Numb3rs, and Will.i.am on Joan of Arcadia (he played God).
• Before they were famous: the great Kether Donohue from You're the Worst appeared on Hope and Faith.

TiVo Status

The Masterpiece Theater miniseries The Lost Prince, the Frontline documentary House of Saud, the TV movies Sucker Free City and Lackawanna Blues, and one episode each of Monk and Without a Trace. 12 hours total.

Music, 20 years ago

In honor of Korn's delightful and random guest turn on Monk, here is their slamming 2004 cover of Cameo's 1980s R&B classic "Word Up!"