A Today Show piece covering the Saturday, pre-dawn execution of Saddam Hussein was streamed from MSNBC.com a whopping nine million times on Saturday alone, the website Lost Remote reports. The most popular version on YouTube: a mash-up, set to Madonna's "Hung Up," fashioned as a Pam-Jim shipper vid.
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U.S. broadcasters are debating whether to share with viewers the videotaped execution of Saddam Hussein, who is likely to be hung before the Sunday start of a Muslim holiday. Expressing the Eye's inclination to snuff the snuff film, CBS News senior VP Linda Mason tells Reuters, "We're very aware that we're coming into people's living rooms, and that there could be children watching." Sharing ABC News' own take, senior VP Bob Murphy says any footage "would have to be viewed by senior management before we put [it] on the air, and we would make a judgment of taste and propriety of what we would show."
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Arrested Development Disclaimer: It's hard enough to comment on four episodes of a show that requires multiple viewings to catch every subtle joke; then add in the factor that I'm in mourning here. We haven't heard anything about the potential Showtime deal in weeks. Meanwhile, Fox is stabbing me in the heart with all these "season" finale promos. So, yeah, I'm going to miss some stuff, but please write in and maybe I'll add them in by the end of the day.
"Faking It": Honestly, the convoluted details of the case have taxed my short attention span, so I was relieved we'd be treated to the simplicity of the fake trial on "Judge Reinhold." The "My Name Is Judge" talking ads, spoofing on the ubiquitous Earl ads of last fall, marked the night
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Fox may have buried the final (and some of the finest) hours of Arrested Development against Friday's Opening Ceremonies of the (yawn along with me) Winter Olympics, but the show's devoted core fan base got a gold-medal treat.
To the very last moment — an inspired cameo by exec producer (and heretofore never-seen narrator) Ron Howard, saying, "I don't see it as a series. Maybe a movie." — Arrested never compromised its extravagantly peculiar vision, its dense narrative style or its twisted sense of humor. The last four episodes, bundled together and thrown away by a network that had finally given up the good fight, were deliriously funny for those precious few with a taste for such inspired absurdity.
Just a partial list of things you'd never find anywhere else: A ventriloquist puppet wearing a "George Bush Doesn't Care About Black Puppets" T-shirt. A
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