Tonight my summer viewing schedule officially kicks into overdrive. Not only are summer staples So You Think You Can Dance and Big Brother 10 burning up my screen, it’s the premiere of Project Runway 5!

This is the first time all summer that I’m starting to feel overburndened by the amount of television programmed. I love that summer has become yet another bonafide season but I hate that every show I’m interested in seems to be jam packed onto the same nights. I’m not saying I have a solution or that programming on Friday or Saturday nights in the summer would be any better than what we’re presented with but damn, it makes me anxious to think about the number of shows I need to keep track of.

To give you a rundown, here are the shows I’m interested in and their nights. It’s banoodles I tell you, banoodles!

Mondays: The Closer, The Middleman, Weeds, Secret Diary of a Call Girl (though I’m totes behind)
Tuesdays: Wipeout, Big Brother 10
Wednesdays: So You Think You Can Dance, Big Brother 10, Project Runway, Shear Genius
Thursdays: So You Think You Can Dance, Swingtown, Burn Notice, Fear Itself
Fridays: Doctor Who, Psych
Saturdays: Nothing
Sundays: Generation Kill, Mad Men, Design Star, Next Food Network Star

Surely I’m missing some shows and obviously you can tell I’ve already left some in the dust. My Boys and Kathy Griffin, sorry I’ll catch you in a marathon or on DVD, I don’t have the time. In Plain Sight, you just couldn’t hold my attention no matter how hot some of those leads are… sorry! I get brutal with the cuts in the summer and surely more will come. Just give me time, heat makes me a total raving bitch so I’ll leave a show in the dust without hesitation. Fate and Ducky are two fickle bitches!

Last week I got to participate in a conference call with legendary comedy and horror director John Landis and PSYCH’s Maggie Lawson as they talked about tonight’s episode of FEAR ITSELF called “In Sickness and In Health”.

Tune in to FEAR ITSELF on Thursday nights (10pm NBC) because its a bloody good time! “In Sickness and In Health” should be great because it stars both Maggie Lawson and James Roday from PSYCH - together…again… it’s crazy talk! I love seeing the two of them together but in different roles… too bad it looks like he might be trying to kill her, always an issue.

Let me tell you, John Landis can talk! It was great, don’t get me wrong but seriously if he was on an episode of Coffee Talk with Linda Richman the man would have no problem discussing any topic. I’ve pulled some of the questions for your reading pleasure.

Panel: I know you’ve done some great horror work like American Werewolf and Innocent Blood but are you surprised you’ve become very much a go-to guy for horror when your work has predominantly been in comedy?

John Landis: You know, directors just like actors get typed and I personally, you know, it’s because I’ve made very successful comedies, it’s like oh, he’s a comedy guy. And I enjoy comedy and it’s not hard for me but I like all genres. I mean I’d really like to make a Western. As a schlepper, as a young man, I worked on many Westerns in Spain, mostly Italian Westerns.

But my friend Walter Hill once said to me, “If they knew how much fun it was to make a Western they wouldn’t let us.” Because it’s so fun. I made Three Amigos in this country; I directed that and that was a comedy but it was a Western and since you ride around on horses it’s really fun. But I as a filmmaker, I can do whatever story; I’m the storyteller. So if it’s a drama or a love story, whatever it is I’m perfectly capable of doing it.

However, the executives don’t think that way. They think what was he successful in? We’ll give him that. Just like actresses get typed or, you know, it’s sad but I think it’s kind of amusing that I’m a master of horror now. Although since I did those two shows I’ve actually, I guess, done a bit of horror. I like horror and fantasy and I want to stress that this particular episode, the screenplay by Victor Salva, when I read it, it’s not what you expect.

It’s much more of a throw back. It’s kind of like a woman’s picture, a girl in jeopardy picture. It has really no elements of the supernatural and it’s entirely - sits on Maggie’s shoulders. (more…)

We promised you a SUMMER TV PREVIEW podcast and here it is! Kath and I run through all of the summer premiere dates for the new and returning shows as well as give you our input on our faves and more importantly the ones we would never watch in a million years! It’s great fun…

So You Think You Can Dance, The Closer, Big Brother, My Boys, The Mole, The Next Food Network Star, Design Star, Swingtown, Fear Itself, Army Wives, Ice Road Truckers, America’s Best Dance Crew, Wipeout, Flashpoint, Psych, Monk, Mad Men, The Middleman, Burn Notice and more… there’s no reason to be outside when what’s on TV is this hot!

It’s TV Talk with GMMR & Ducky #24!

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“The Sacrifice” is the story of four guys who are driving in a pickup truck. Two are brothers (including FNL’s Jesse Plemmons), one’s just a douche and the other has some huge unexplained gapping hole in his chest. When they drive over something in the road that so obviously sabotages their ride, they trek across a frozen lake to a walled in turn of the century-esque village for help. Riiiiight!

There they meet a trio of blone siren-like girls who are more than willing to help. I smell all kinds of trouble for these yahoos. How stupid are men? I mean come on, you’re in the middle of M. Night’s The Village with a friend dying in the other room and you’re willing to let these random Children of the Corn help you? And here’s a thought, don’t be a douchebag and go as far as to try and tell some Little House on the Demented Prairie girl that she’s about to have the ride of her life? Dude, you’re so destined to get skinned alive for trying to mack on Laura Ingles. What an asshat! Oh and kids, when they offer you hot stew - it’s destined to be something other than beef, I’m just sayin’.

Rachel Miner (Macaulay Culkin’s ex) is incredibly beautiful in that Sally from Nightmare Before Christmas kinda way. She seems sweet and helpful and warns the boys that the they’ve never set foot outside the village walls. She’s like a war nurse, that is until she started sowing up Navarro’s lips and driving a stake through his chest… hello! Also, girl can swing an axe like no one’s business.

Overall I really dug the vibe that they created in “The Sacrifice” because it not only took some common horror film conventions and made them believable on the small screen but they used some elements of the supernatural and folklore which helped make this more than a straight out slasher/vampirey/twisted village tale. It has a twist ending as all things “horror” must nowadays but I actually found this one to be kinda sad and apropos.

Next week should be incredible as Brad Anderson takes the reigns for his installment “Spooked.”

I have really high hopes for NBC’s new horror anthology FEAR ITSELF. I was so excited when Showtime’s Masters of Horror began but then I felt it just turned to shit (and quickly). I realize that I should expect the same from this series but I’m opting to remain hopeful and now I wait patiently to see some blood, gore and suspense on primetime.

Tonight’s premiere episode is entitled “Sacrifice” and stars FRIDAY NIGHT LIGHTS‘ Jesse Plemmons (Lance Landry) and Rachel Miner (surprisingly clothed).

Check out a video preview of “Sacrifice” which airs at 10pm on NBC

Next week is what I’m most excited for when Brad Anderson (Sessions 9, The Machinist, Transsiberian) directs “Spooked” starring Lost’s Cynthia Watros.

As the series unfolds the following actors will participate: Brandon Routh (”Superman Returns”), Shiri Appleby (”Charlie Wilson’s War”), Jesse Plemons (NBC’s “Friday Night Lights”), Elisabeth Moss (”Mad Men”), Eric Roberts (NBC’s “Heroes”), James Roday and Maggie Lawson (“Psych”), Colin Ferguson (“Eureka”), Briana Evigan (“Step Up 2: The Streets”) and John Billingsley (”Star Trek: Enterprise”)