Sunday, August 26, 2007

My Horse Finally Won













Say what you will about On The Lot, production value, host's cleavage, contestant talent or lack of it, or whatever, but for the first time in reality show history, my favorite finished first.

Of course, I don't watch any reality shows except American Idol so that's not saying much.

But don't tell me Will wasn't the best. I don't care. He's a Texan. That right there ought to be enough for me. But his films had charm and heart (does that make him a director with charm and heart or a good writer?) and Will himself is such a cutie patootie with a receding hairline that I was hooked from the beginning. Oh, and my son's name is Will so there ya go.

My biggest complaint about the show? Uh, these contestants are DIRECTORS, not writers. Either judge them SOLELY on directing skills or give them writers next year to help them execute their ideas if your gonna slam them for story development.

Wait. If you give them writers, then one director will, by luck of the draw, be assigned a better writer than another so there's no real way to level the field, is there? But then, do real directors have a level playing field when it comes to working with writers?

8 comments:

Scott Millar said...

Perhaps directing the same script with the same actors could be a way to level the playing field.

ASA said...

I only watched the 1st two episodes -- and I liked this guy's "heart" from the start.

For whatever reason, the show as a whole lost me, though...

Nicklaus Louis said...

I agree. His films were more mainstream than any other contestants, he was more consistent, and he did have the best reality TV story (family, last chance at his dream, etc.).

I will be looking forward to his first film.

Also, I hope "On The Lot" comes back, they really did a better job as the season went on.

Anonymous said...

I gave up on it when they hired that CNN Entertainment chick Adrianna and went to the Am Idol format... I couldn't even watch it with the sound off, eye candy or not heh... but I loved the concept of the show...

Fun Joel said...

2 things:

1. This was not supposed to be a competition between directors. It was supposed to be (and was) a competition between writer-directors. So nothing unfair there.

2. If it were to be just a director's competition, and they were trying to fairly assign other writers to these directors, one way of somewhat leveling the field would be to have the writers rotate each week. Thus, anyone has the chance of getting the "bad" writer each week.

MaryAn Batchellor said...

Agreed, all, that the first couple of episodes with that cheesy AI elimination nonsense were barely tolerable.

Todd, I got tired of her Smurfette poses.

Joel, I missed that they were supposed to be writer-directors. Thought this was just based on directing. That explains a like. Cue Homer Simpson. DOH!

Scott, that could be very deja-vu-ish.

Matt, the first episodes were the worst. There was just nothing to make you watch.

Nick, yeah, it got better as it went on but I don't know about a second season. I just can't see it.

Grubber said...

Let them choose their own writer to bring into the contest, might not level the playing field but would make it realistic :)

The writer can take the shots for poor story and the director can take hits for not demanding better story before he starts.

The final episode can involve a segment with a caged death match between the two remaining writers. Laptops at ten paces.

The last writer left standing gets a free copy of Final Draft.

The last director gets a million dollar development deal.

Seems fair amd realistic :)
cheers
Dave.

Grubber said...

PS: Also one who thought it was for directors, not writer-directors. There you go. I still want to see that death match though.