Scanner : the wire

Sloppy Seconds: No Bullet-Proof Bras For You

Brian Fairbanks — Thu, 07 May 2009 22:36:00 GMT

Check out this badass panda ripping some guy's jacket right off his back.

The days of pervy conservatives keeping an eye out for Splash Mountain topless photos are over. Flash away!

What do we think of this list of the Top 10 reasons men don't want sex? (We thought all ten would be "They're not attracted to you.")

Heidi Montag says she'll stay married to Spencer Brat forever. We give it six months, or one more season.

Mia Farrow is still going strong with her hunger strike, which is now at Day 11.

NYC teens are furious Bristol Palin, the "hypocrite," is in town promoting abstinence, which she had said was "unrealistic."

Screengrab picked the ten worst movies of all time-- and almost none of them were on MST3K.

"There is no such thing as a bullet-proof bra!"

Don't forget: passport rules for Mexico and Canada go into effect at the end of the month, not that anyone can afford a vacation these days.

And Will Smith wants to play a black James Bond. Great, just what we need-- pass over Idris Elba for a Hollywood action star-- that's just what the franchise needs.

Sloppy Seconds: These Boobs Are Made of Magic

Brian Fairbanks — Thu, 07 May 2009 00:20:00 GMT

You may need to right-click these links to open them in a new tab/window.

Here's your Fark-ready story of the day: the speed camera guy was caught speeding!

As if Michael Jackson doesn't have enough problems, he's being sued by a former publicist for $44 million.

The world just discovered that kids are inspired to have sex after watching TV.

Your headline of the day: "Q: What do you do when your little girl is playing with her brother's penis?"

These boobs can do magical tricks.

Wouldn't it be amazing if Stringer Bell became James Bond after Daniel Craig.

Bristol Palin thinks abstinence works. Just when we were beginning to think she was intelligent.

And Kiefer Sutherland had a fight. Unfortunately, it wasn't for 24.

I Love Myself For Loving You: Amy Ryan

Brian Fairbanks — Fri, 31 Oct 2008 18:13:00 GMT

She deserved an Oscar for Gone Baby Gone. She was on our favorite show of all time, The Wire. And she's a New Yorker who doesn't act like "the quintessential New Yorker" (i.e. impersonal, egotistical, etc.)

For these and many more reasons, we might actually buy the New York Post this Sunday...

These are excerpts from excerpts from this Sunday's Page Six Magazine with one of our favorite working actresses (and thank God for the "working" part of it...)

On NBC's The Office: “I think it’s one of the funniest shows on TV. I felt so lucky to go [to work and] laugh my head off. I’ve been guaranteed to screw up at least three takes a day, ruining my makeup in the process by crying with laughter – that’s how funny the cast is.”
“I guess I should have just done a reality show, gone out in dresses without my panties and skipped the years of hard work- then everyone would know who I am. Being a working actor was always the goal. It wasn’t about fame for me. But now that I’m older, and I’ve been at it a while, I’m ready for the attention. I think I’ve earned it.”

On Gone Baby Gone: “The role was like winning the lottery. I had been playing scratch-offs for years and finally the stars aligned for me. I was up against incredible actresses like Cate Blanchett, Ruby Dee and Tilda Swinton. Are you kidding me? Of course I didn’t expect to win!”
“I grew up in the same house in Queens my dad grew up in. My family keeps me grounded and deeply rooted in New York. There’s no chance of me getting a big head.”
“I never envisioned a white dress with rice being pelted at my head, [but] I do understand the beauty of choosing life with one person." [There's still hope for you and I, Ms. Ryan...]
“I’m a Barack Obama supporter. He has the knowledge, work ethic and charisma needed to make a change. I don’t think anyone should vote based on what a celebrity has to say, but come Election Day, I hope others agree with me.”

Nope... we couldn't love her more. See the full interview in this Sunday's Page Six Magazine. There, we said it: we want you to read the Post.

Image via W Magazine.

Related:

Call Waiting With Bobby Tisdale: Amy Ryan Exclusive

While You Were Sleeping: Drunk Cheerleaders Make Sports Watchable Again

Crush of the Week: Jim Vokac

I Love Myself For Loving You: Patricia Clarkson

True Blood's Anna Paquin In First (True) Nude Scene

Brian Fairbanks — Wed, 15 Oct 2008 17:49:00 GMT

Without The Wire, Sex and the City, and the Sopranos, and with Curb Your Enthusiasm and Flight of the Conchords between seasons, HBO is in a tough spot. How do they replicate their incredible (and well-deserved) success with the newer shows?

Somebody had the right idea: vampires, Anna Paquin, and rampant nudity...

The above is an exclusive still from the video, which is available here for download and here to watch in three bite-size and disappointing parts.

It's better to just peek at the pictures and wish this weren't some Grade-Z softcore porn sex scene, which is way less than what a talented and beautiful Academy Award winner deserves. (We're betting HBO realizes that and they're just getting warmed up... after all, this is still True Blood's first season. Hopefully, we'll have more clips to show you soon...)

Related:

Top 5 Sex Scenes From Bad Movies

New Gemma Arterton Sex Scene Steams Us Up For Bond 22

Top 5 Sex Scenes From the 1980s

Top 5 Sex Scenes Featuring Nicole Kidman

The Wire: We Was Robbed (of an Emmy Nomination)

Brian Fairbanks — Thu, 17 Jul 2008 15:40:00 GMT

The Wire, the HBO series which some critics believe is the closest thing to Shakespeare we've ever come, has failed in its final attempt to capture a Best Drama Emmy nod.

The lucky ones (Damages, 30 Rock) and the losers (Grey's Anatomy, many more), below...

Best comedy series: 30 Rock, Curb Your Enthusiasm, Entourage, The Office, and Two And A Half Men.

Someday (television) historians will look back and say... what, no "Flight of the Conchords?" And Two And A Half Men? What the fuck is that show?

Best drama series: Boston Legal, Damages, Dexter, House, Lost, Mad Men

It's hard to argue with these choices, except for the fact that The Wire would mop the floor with these shows if anyone actually compared them.

Other nominations of note:

1) Alec Baldwin and Tony Shalhoub face off in the Best lead actor in a comedy department.

2) 30 Rock's seventeen Emmy nominations is a record for a comedy series. Yes, it's that damned good.

3) Mad Men received 16 (!) nods... a week ago, you couldn't find sixteen Emmy voters who had heard of the show, let alone seen it. Hype works, people...

4) The nominations of Damages and Mad Men for best drama is unprecedented: never before has any basic cable series competed in this category.

5) The Wire was nominated for best writing, which it may win on the sympathy factor.

6) Grey's Anatomy and Desperate Housewives were virtually shut out. (Grey's Anatomy got Sandra Oh a best supporting actress nod.)

The full list of nominations is here. Commentary here and here.

Can We Give Khandi Alexander A Little Props Here?

Bryan Christian — Tue, 06 May 2008 13:04:00 GMT

Maybe you were an early NewsRadio fan. Maybe you were as floored as we were years ago by The Corner, the HBO Baltimore crack-addict mini-epic that presaged The Wire by a couple seasons. Maybe you've spent every Monday night the last few years watching CBS and waiting for a beautiful woman in scrubs to go "Horatio, this woman was dead before the fire started!" Well, if even one of these are true, then you might know how great Khandi Alexander is.

If so, then pour a little of your coffee out this morning for Ms. Alexander, who left CSI: Miami last night after 6 years of not getting enough dialogue -- y'know, kinda like how she left NewsRadio? Will Khandi manage to find, in her next job, a role that suits her awesome talents and cocky, angular beauty? Who can say. In any event, God bless her nonetheless. We've loved her in everything that we've ever seen her in and we'll probably never stop loving her. In a perfect world, she'd have three Oscars, a rich ex-husband, and us as a boy-toy. See ya soon, Khandi!

Videos of the Day: Bill Maher Attacks The Pope & The Response

Brian Fairbanks — Mon, 21 Apr 2008 18:41:00 GMT

Next to 30 Rock and with the end of The Wire, Real Time with Bill Maher is the funniest and best show on television. But, until this week, few people knew of its existence (Friday nights on HBO)... now, as we've seen several times over the years (note the above Steve Irwin costume), Maher's ratings are jumping due to a controversial moment...

Is he right? We agree with most of the first video, although in his response, Maher says that if the Pope was the CEO of a Daycare Center chain that was found to be corrupt, he would go to jail. We seriously doubt a CEO would ever go to jail because his employees were convicted of crimes. Hell, it's never stopped the Republican Party...

Previously: Next To That Whole Hitler Youth Thing, Pope's Passover Diss No Big Deal

Sloppy Seconds: "I Need Sex"

Brian Fairbanks — Thu, 10 Apr 2008 21:00:00 GMT

A Baltimore teacher was attacked by her student as a classroom full of "Lean On Me" extra wannabes cheered the student on, while another student filmed the assualt on a cell phone. Apparently, the teacher missed Season 4 of "The Wire," with its explicit lesson: "Never move to Baltimore." (See the YouTube video here.)

Hugh Hefner's "The Girls Next Door" makes us believe in Heaven. Check out this totally awesome gif.

A wacky attention-starved Swedish professor thinks wearing a bra can cause saggy boobs. Wait-- he's advocating going braless? Oh, then he's a genius, no question.

Apparently people will get naked for no reason at all these days: somebody in Vienna is going to fill a football field full of 2,008 naked people. Really, you can get away with anything if you mumble long enough about "art" and "having a girlfriend, so I'm not going to look."

And woman on Facebook claims her group "I need sex" got her laid by 50 men. Only fifty men? With a name like that, you'd have to be uglier than Ashlee Simpson (the newly engaged Ashlee Simpson, by the way) not to get double that.

Thanks Tiffany and Paddy for the links!

Seriously Now: Obama, Richard Price, And Race in America

Brian Fairbanks — Wed, 19 Mar 2008 15:41:00 GMT

Barack Obama's speech in Philadelphia yesterday was designed to quell the "firestorm," as he put it, over Reverend Wright's "divisive comments ... in a racially-charged time." Did this bold move doom or revive his candidacy? And what does it say about race relations in America that this speech is, in fact, historic, if only because of the concept of the speech and not necessarily because of its ideals?

Obama's speech was met with an uncomfortable media reaction this morning. Most headlines and stories avoided direct comment on what the speech means for the campaign and, more importantly, for race in this country. “The racial wounds that remain,” boldly trumpeted Metro (New York), a headline accompanied by a picture of a crying black Obama supporter. Other than that, the general feeling among the press is that “It's 1964 all over again,” with Obama as a Martin Luther King figure, clashing against a stubborn past, marching toward a greater understanding that might be merely one landmark speech away.

“This was one of the tasks we set forth,” Obama said, echoing the civil rights era, “To continue the long march of those who came before us.”

Speaking solely for myself, I tend to believe this country has already begun the healing process. Surveys show 98% of the electorate would consider voting for a black Presidential candidate, although many still believe in that whole “but when they get in the voting booth and no one's looking, people are gonna get all racist” theory, which is based on no available evidence. (With that argument in mind, would racist Southern Republicans vote for Hillary Clinton if they entered the booth and saw Condolezza Rice as the VP on the conservative line? Just curious.)

This is not to say there isn't a large degree of racism and bigotry still prevalent today. The point is that perhaps our strongest tactic for quelling racism, for moving on, is to continue to lead by example. If Obama proves to be a great President, that would of course significantly help bring our nation together. However, having thirty minute speeches in Philadelphia about race is not only a bold yet risky political move (since it could be seen as Obama on the defensive, weakening in the eyes of the electorate), it may also be counterproductive: to bring back old dramas.

In other words, maybe the best thing for Obama to do to quash the concerns of undecideds and Hillary supporters who fear racism will doom an Obama For President Democratic ticket is to temporarily act like racism is not an issue in this electoral cycle-- sure, a tough thing to call when that is partly what inspires so many people: the possibility of the First Black President. In any case, he should laugh when the press raises their ignorant questions about an "uncertain electorate." He could take a page from one Governor Eliot Spitzer: "Screw the racists. I'm steamroller and I'm gonna roll all over you!"

That being said, should the speech give Obama momentum again, most of this post's uncertainty about its contents is null and void. After all, it's all about the momentum. That is the true motive, however it appears on the surface, for his remarks yesterday: political maneuvering. No Presidential candidate has any other real motivation, when it gets down to it.

A coda: soon after Obama spoke yesterday, I listened to a Richard Price story from a recent Moth StorySlam. Richard Price, author of “Clockers” and several classic episodes of “The Wire,” is arguably one of the most formidable white writers on race relations in this country. His story, while comic in nature, also sheds some light on how far we've come and how ignorant we still are.

Thanks to Brian Lehrer at WNYC for the Obama speech link.
Thanks to Meg McIntyre at The Moth for the Richard Price link.

Scanner Highs and Lows: Michael McDonald Still Hasn't Called

Emily Farris — Fri, 07 Mar 2008 22:01:00 GMT

Damn, this was a busy week. We fell in and out of love, we traveled, we encountered racism, and as always, we saw some boobs. Oh, and story of our lives: he never called.

Highs:

Susan Sarandon's boobs.

A sandwich that we want to make love to (even if we might throw up a little after).

You can now get a double dildo in Texas!

If you like "The Wire," you'll love "Wire You Laughing?"

Coolio has a cooking show and we want in on that shit.

Michael Musto does Lindsay Lohan's Marilyn Monroe... a little better, if you ask us.

A pro-Barack Obama video not made by Will.I.Am.

Ellen Page might have come out on Saturday Night Live. Or maybe not.

Lows:

As much as we'd like to think otherwise, we learned that Kansas City—Scanner Emily's hometown, which is in Missouri—is still a little racist.

Women running in high heels to prove that "shopping is a sport."

At least we get something out of bad movies: great reviews.

We're not sure if this is actually a good or bad thing, but Italian men are being fined for grabbing their crotches in public.

Outer Space can suck it. So there.

Can we just wrap-up this Democratic primary already?

Michael McDonald never called Scanner Emily. We're still waiting!

We learned that Hooters will survive the apocalypse.

"Hey, Yo, You Need Blue Tops? I Got Fresh, Minty Blue Tops?"

Bryan Christian — Fri, 07 Mar 2008 21:00:00 GMT

Perhaps you've already heard about Icebreakers Pacs, the powdered breath freshener that comes in small colored bags and looks exactly like 5-to-10 for possession and intent to distribute? Well, we hadn't -- until a coworker broke some out in the cube next to us, and holy crap, we were all like "Woah, dude, you got a problem!" Very quickly, he explained that he was only freshening up his breath, and as is customary in situations like these, offered us a sample of the product. Swear to God, when we were examining the packets -- which are designed to dissolve on your tongue -- a bit leaked out of an inadvertently open corner, leaving us with an incriminating little dribble in our mustache like we were Neil Young in The Last Waltz.

Now, far be it from us to condemn Hershey's and the Halitosis Industrial Complex for bringing their tendency to package breath fresheners in increasingly drug-like delivery systems to a crass and distressing new level.

All we're saying is: if you're hosting a "Goodbye, The Wire" party this weekend, we think we've found something for the coffee table.

[img via Reason Magazine]

Video of the Day: Wire You Laughing?

Brian Fairbanks — Wed, 05 Mar 2008 21:45:00 GMT

It's such a good title for this video, we had to steal it from College Humor.

In honor of Sunday night's finale, we present to you a very funny scene from the greatest television show in history since that one with the wacky, wacky roommates. Strangely enough, we don't remember this scene being particularly hilarious when it aired last season, but apparently the audience did.

[Thanks to Nicole for the idea.]

Wanna Know What Real Thugs Think of The Wire?

Nicole Pasulka — Fri, 29 Feb 2008 17:38:00 GMT

Since the beginning of The Wire's fifth season, Sudhir Venkatesh, Columbia University Sociologist and author of Gangleader for a Day, and a group of his "gangland acquaintances" gather round the TV and watch The Wire together. Then, Sudhir publishes their reactions on the New York Times' Freakonomics blog. You already know what Sarah Hepola thinks of The Wire, now find out whether Chicago "respected street figures" Shine, Kool-J, and Flavor cried when Butchie....oops, sorry. No spoilers for those of you waiting on the DVDs.

Painful Link of the Day: Hobosexual.com

Brian Fairbanks — Wed, 20 Feb 2008 17:30:00 GMT

If you've been watching The Wire, you're probably not really that interested in seeing pictures of naked homeless dudes. And if you haven't been watching The Wire, you may not be cool enough to get the humor here anyway. Don't worry, there are no pictures here, thank God, only pure dumb comedy.

Something Awful's Link of the Day is to a site we hoped would never have to exist, but apparently needs to: hobosexual.com. People, we have a strong suspicion that the comedy below is unintentional. Here's a list of their "underwebsites":

Black Eye Saloon: Old drifters, weathered men
Smegmen: Mature hardened men, oldneck
Rough Trade / Fuck or Fight: Street Love, lock up memories

I wish these were jokes, too. From the disclaimer:

The sexual orientation of individuals pictured in and writers for Hobsexual.com should not be assumed.
ARM THE HOMELESS.

And you're welcome for sparing you photos of naked hobos. In fact, we tried to avoid looking at them altogether. But, if you must...