What was on TV? Fri, Feb 4, 2005

20 years ago, scientists discovered that an asteroid was not going to hit Earth. But apparently, we'll be able to see it pass by in 2029! Something to look forward to, I supposed. Let's see what was on TV back in the day.

8:00 He Knew He Was Right (recorded)

Part 1 of 2

Available on DVD

I watched this when I was a teenager, and it is just as bonkers as I remember. A man marries the most perfect woman in the universe, and becomes convinced she's cheating on him because she...sometimes shares oxygen with other men, basically. It tears their marriage, their children, and their entire social circle, but everyone is willing to give him the benefit of the doubt.

So that's the story. Maybe the original novel by Anthony Trolloppe is better. But this script doesn't exactly handle the material with a lot of nuance. We get lots of direct address to camera, and it is jarring and silly every time. And this device is mostly used with the male characters, which makes everything worse.

But Laura Fraser (Lydia from Breaking Bad) plays the saintly wife, and she makes the whole thing worth watching. She makes this relentlessly good person interesting, and she makes you believe that this woman loves her terrible husband, a herculean feat. Her husband has a puppyish quality that makes his monstrousness more interesting, but he is not delivering in the way that she is. So the text works overtime to make us sympathize with this dipshit, but common sense and the performances make that impossible.

10:00 Battlestar Galactica on Sci-Fi

1x05 "You Can't Go Home Again"

Available on Prime

After spending five days with no sleep, a prison riot, and more, the Battlestar Galactica needed a win. So in this episode, they all work together to resuce heroic fan favorite Starbuck. And it works! Hooray!

Though it's nice to see everyone get a win, I confess that I preferred the more depressing episodes. And I imagine there's a lot more where that came from. So that's a win for me!

Late Night

Sharon Osbourne was on tonight. She boldly declared that she would not be watching the Super Bowl. Not because she was offended by last year's wardrobe malfunction; but rather because she liked it! "No titties, no Super Bowl for me." She further goes on to blast the FCC, since the FCC (or rather networks' fear of offending the FCC) made hosting her talk show a real pain (the was told not to use the word "sausages.") According to Sharon Osbourne, her talk show was ultimately canceled after she has a "pretty boring" actor from New Zealand" on the show and instead of using the "boring" prepared interview, she asked if he was "a sheep shagger." (After some investigation, I have determined that the actor was Martin Henderson, who was about to appear in Bride and Prejudice).

The FCC was newly empowered thanks to the Super Bowl incident and the current administration's support. I read a lot trade magazines like Television Week, Variety, and Broadcasting and Cable for this project, and everyone in the industry was so afraid of and preoccupied with the FCC in this era. Broadcasting and Cable had a weekly "Washington Watch" feature, it had reached that point. And you see that the fear of the FCC led to real changes in television programming: Fox panicked when The OC embarked on a sustained queer romance storyline, CBS and Mark Burnett refused to show women hugging and kissing their girlfriends on a Survivor family visit episode, and on and on and on. So it's nice to see someone mock and criticize them on national television. I can't believe I'm saying this, but I hope people follow Sharon Osbourne's example in the years ahead.

What Else Was On TV?

• Tonight's special sweeps guest stars: Rue McClanahan on Hope & Faith and Paula Abdul on Less than Perfect.
• Want to know how huge Desperate Housewives was i n 2005? James Denton, who essentially plays the concept of a hot guy on that show, had an arc on Reba. And that got more coverage than the many, many actual famous people that appeared on shows all over the dial this February.

TiVo Status

The Masterpiece Theater miniseries He Knew He Was Right and The Lost Prince, plus one episode of Monk. 7 hours total.