I'd rather be watching TV

The rilestar does heart the teevs, and these are a few of his more public rantings lately.
First, in relation to The Age article "All just a little bit tasteless", which states the bleeding and punning obvious by saying: "Despite both being based around food, The Biggest Loser lacks taste and My Kitchen Rules has no flavour", rilestar said:

"I have never watched a single one of these games shows (calling them "Reality TV" I think is giving them more credibility than they deserve), including Big Brother, Survivor, et al, apart from a few episodes of The Amazing Race, which was actually very entertaining. But otherwise I generally stick to quality scripted dramas and comedies...and dramedies...stuff like Entourage, 30 Rock, Deadwood and Community.
I have no great desire to watch boring people being boring. Leave that to other boring people.
Plus I'm not fat."

Speaking of fat people, another contributor, Tara, said "To anyone overweight who is reading this, may you nourish yourself with love and the food that benefits your body." By which I assume she means "Hey fat people: eat a carrot." Harsh! (her words, not mine)
Another article, "Goodbye Daily Show, we hardly knew you", reports that ABC2 no longer has the rights to broadcast Rant faves The Daily Show and The Colbert Report. The rilestar had been wondering what had happened to them, as they were good back-ups in case the old iQ failed to record either or both for whatever reason, and so also contributed to the discussion (swimming against the tide of "Foxtel sucks, I download everything"):

"It seems I'm one of the few (or the only person?) who signed up to Foxtel just to watch The Daily Show and The Colbert Report (about 5 or 6 years ago). Love 'em both - also flew to Washington last year for the Rally to Restore Sanity and/or Fear, so paying for Foxtel is not that big a leap. There's lots of good stuff on Foxtel though, like Louie and the latest episodes of Entourage (just a little late), so I'm happy with it (though was wavering a bit last year when TDS and TCR were on ABC2 and the other networks seemed to be getting their acts together on their alternative channels - not wavering any more). Now my bugbear is Channel Go! not showing Community any more - tempted to jump on Channel BitTorrent for the first time ever, just to get my fix of the funniest show not currently on TV..."

And speaking of Community, rilestar also waded into the debate regarding "Where did all the intelligent TV go?", in particular, the many comments along the lines of "All US shows are crap":

"To the US-haters, a lot of my current favourite TV shows are American: Community, 30 Rock, The Office, Curb Your Enthusiasm, Louie, Entourage, Modern Family, The Daily Show and The Colbert Report, and that's just the comedies. Great dramas include Deadwood, Lost, The Sopranos, Mad Men and Breaking Bad (just to name a few). Not to mention Seinfeld!
Anyone who thinks all American TV is like Two and a Half Men really needs to get out more. By which, I mean, they should stay in more.
But to respond to the point being made by Mike (who also mentioned many of the above shows), I agree that the Australian commercial networks really do seem to think that Australians can't handle quality TV (though maybe their market researchers only interview ignorant people like the US-haters).
Personally, I rely on Foxtel's iQ taping all my faves and watching them at my leisure, supported by iView, etc. I like my TV.
But here's a message for GO!: Start broadcasting Community again! Funniest show not currently on TV."

Yeah. The rilestar's not afraid to re-use the same line, time and time (and time) again*.

PS Continuing the bad news, The White Stripes also announced they were breaking up. The writer in this article talked about the first time he saw them in 2001, and the rilestar responded with an anti-rant:

"I was also blown away by their cover of Jolene the first time I saw them - on the second stage at the Corner Hotel supporting Six Ft Hick (probably 9 or 10 years ago, as well). Much as I like the Hicks, I couldn't believe that this band was supporting them. And obviously the rest of the world (at least, the part that rocks out) went on to love them, too. Vale, White Stripes. Long live the Dead Weather."

Were you at that gig, too**? Let me know!

* A Strangelove song, I think...
* Saying this makes this seem like a professional blog. I realise that the chances of someone both being at that gig AND reading this are infinitesimally small. Actually, just the chances of someone reading this are infinitesimally small...