The Remote Island : 90210

90210: [SPOILER] is Getting The Axe

"90210": Donna and Diablo

Lindy Parker — Wed, 15 Apr 2009 18:00:00 GMT

It's spring break in Beverly Hills, kids. Get psyched. Here's your ups and downs...

Happy: Diagnosing Silver's bipolar disorder seems to have erased the awkwardness between she and Dixon.

Sad: Kelly's hovering around Silver weilding "mood charts" like a crazy person.

Happy: Dixon's suggestion that he and Annie need more "one-on-one time," puts us us vaguely in mind of the Brenda/Brandon sexual tension of yore. The subsequent road trip just confirms this throwback.

Sad: The original plan of hitting every waterpark in the greater Phoenix area is actually a smokescreen for finding Dixon's birth mother, and we never actually get a waterpark scene.

Happy: Donna flies to Beverly Hills from Japan to comfort Kelly and Silver in their time of need.

Sad: Gasp! Donna and David are separated. Noooooo!

Happy: Strangely, we're starting to actually like Ethan now that he's getting kicked off the show.

Sad: Liam and Ethan's pseudo-peyote trip makes us feel weird. Poor Ethan is humiliated, Liam's a jackass -- It's a mess.

Happy: Annie's reunion with Dixon's birth mother is oddly touching.

Sad: Dixon spends the whole reunion in the car.

Happy: Silver finally gets a little excitement in her life when Donna shows up at the door with Diablo Cody and her hamburger phone.

Sad: The Diablo Cody cameo feels a bit like the CW trotting out a showpony, as opposed to actually contributing to the plot flow.

Bonus sad: Where are Navid and DDG?

Previously:

Top Five Things We'd Like To See When 90210 Returns

Is Shannen Doherty the Most Successful Beverly Hills, 90210 Cast Member?

90210: Paparazzi Stalks Kelly and Donna in Beverly Hills

Tori Spelling Returns to "90210" Tonight!

Lindy Parker — Tue, 14 Apr 2009 14:30:00 GMT

Okay, so originally we weren't all that psyched on the idea of Tori Spelling returning to 90210, but then the show actually aired and spent most of the first season sucking, so our standards for what is and is not acceptable have changed somewhat and we've revised our original opinion. Now, we're stoked to see her because really, what have we got to lose?

Here's a little glimpse at what we can expect from our evening with Donna Martin Silver...

Our suspicion: once they let Tori Spelling on the set, they won't be able to get her to leave -- they'll have to write her into the show permanently, which would be okay with us considering that the show's a bit of a mess anyway, and a Tori Spelling residency would pretty much guarantee us at least one or two episodes with Brian Austin Green. Can we just keep killing off new characters and replacing them with the old ones until the reboot is exactly the same as the original?

Previously:

Tori Spelling Caves To The Pressure of Her Dwindling Fame

90210 Re-Boot: Donna Martin Evacuates

Does "90210" Star Jessica Stroup Want to Jump to "Gossip Girl"?

Lindy Parker — Thu, 09 Apr 2009 20:30:00 GMT

With the first season of the 90210 reboot coming to a close, are certain cast members getting the one season itch? It seems Jessica Stroup wouldn't mind movin' on up to the East Side...

While there has been a few whispers that some of the "90210" stars may "cross-over" into Melrose Place, starlet Jessica Stroup has high-hopes of moving into another of CW’s hit television shows.

"I want to be on 'Gossip Girl,' I said from the start that maybe my character could take a Spring break to New York or something," she told Tarts on Thursday. (Fox News)

Hmmmm. Maybe Silver's bipolar-rehab could take place in a swank NYC spa? We're okay with Silver taking a little East Coast vacay, but we need Silver to stick around Beverly Hills if the second season is going to have a prayer of being good.

Previously:

90210: "Kids in Kansas Have Sex Too."

90210: Is That a Banana in Your Pocket?

90210: [SPOILER] Is Getting The Axe

Top Five Things We'd Like To See When 90210 Returns

Is Shannen Doherty the Most Successful Beverly Hills, 90210 Cast Member?

"90210": "Kids In Kansas Have Sex Too" -- Principal Wilson

Lindy Parker — Wed, 08 Apr 2009 15:00:00 GMT

Big news, folks. We actually liked this episode. Sort of. No lie. Here's this week's ups and downs..

Happy: The opening ten minutes prior to the title sequence was decently edited for once -- to the point where when the opening bars of the theme song came we yelled out, "Yeah! Let's do this!"

Sad: Ryan's sporting a newly slicked 'do which makes us feel weird in the same way that Zac Efron's does.

Happy: Thank you God, Silver's crazy is clinical and we haven't been watching all this bat shit malarkey in vain. We knew it. We so knew it. However, we're amused by the implication that her condition is a big mystery up until the last thirty seconds of the episode. Is it drugs? Is she just really manipulative? What's wrong with Silver? Please. Also, why do her eyes look like she got beat up? And, how can someone so crazy be wearing such a fierce outfit?

Sad: Jackie Taylor uses the phrase "slutting it up" to describe Kelly's high school career and then "boy toy" to describe Ryan. She's come a long way from the days of being David Silver's stepmom.

Happy: Navid and DDG babysit Kelly's son, and find they're better equipped for parenthood than they originally guessed.

Sad: After pouring out her tale of woe to a complete stranger (who may or may not be a sexual predator) Silver decides to take the crazy show on the road and fly to Kansas. WTF?

Happy: Turns out the guy's not a sexual predator, but rather a kind stranger looking to lend a hand. Those creepy Clark Kent glasses were a red herring.

Sad: We would've thought any kid produced by Kelly and Dylan would be cuter.

Happy: We're starting to think Lori Laughlin possesses a certain peculiar genius.

Sad: Ethan has got to be the most boring character to ever darken a camera lens.

Happy: Naomi's eye roll during the final Ethan/Annie breakup is some of her best work to date.

Sad: Annie thoughts on their breakup boil down to "I thought we were the ones!"

Happy: Dixon talks Silver off the train tracks with an anecdote about his birth mom's manic depression. VERY old school 90210. Loving it.

Previously:

90210: Is That a Banana in Your Pocket?

90210: [SPOILER] Is Getting The Axe

Top Five Things We'd Like To See When 90210 Returns

Is Shannen Doherty the Most Successful Beverly Hills, 90210 Cast Member?

90210: [SPOILER] Is Getting The Axe

"90210": Is That A Banana in Your Pocket?

Lindy Parker — Wed, 01 Apr 2009 15:00:00 GMT

Well, it's back. And it's not miraculously better like we sort of hoped it would be. That said, there was drag racing...

Sad: Silver's manic libido makes us feel weird. Are we spiraling toward a bipolar plotline?

Happy: Naomi is so going to get some action. We can feel it coming. Ha.

Sad: Silver's crazy is turning Dixon into a ninteresting prude.

Happy: We're starting to feel like Mr. and Mrs. Wilson are the best actors on this show.

Sad: If the adults are the most compelling characters, we can pretty much all agree that the whole show is a failure, no?

Happy: Ethan's wearing flannel. Is flannel coming back to prime time? Because we don't hate it.

Sad: Silver might need an exorcist.

Happy: Annie's locker throwdown with Rhonda was more awesome than we would've thought.

Sad: Our version still would've been better.

Previously:

Top Five Things We'd Like To See When 90210 Returns

Is Shannen Doherty the Most Successful Beverly Hills, 90210 Cast Member?

Top Five Things We'd Like To See When 90210 Returns

"90210": [SPOILER] Is Getting The Axe

Lindy Parker — Tue, 31 Mar 2009 20:00:00 GMT

OK, here's the problem with this piece of news: We don't care. Not even a little bit, which may be the very reason the producers are kicking Dustin Milligan (aka Ethan) to the curb...

Sources confirm to me exclusively that Dustin Milligan, who plays affable jock (and one half of 90210's central super couple) Ethan, won't be returning to the show in the fall -- at least not full time.
Reps for The CW and producer Paramount declined comment, but a 90210 insider confirms that Milligan's contract option is not being picked up for next season. The source adds that the door is being left open for the actor to briefly appear in the fall to wrap up Ethan's story. (Entertainment Weekly)

See this just proves our original point which is, if Ethan and Annie are really the "central super couple" shouldn't they have at least a modicum of chemistry? Further, shouldn't we be at least mildly interested in what happens to them? We're on board with this decision. Way on board.

Previously:

Is Shannen Doherty the Most Successful Beverly Hills, 90210 Cast Member?

Is Shannen Doherty the Most Successful Beverly Hills, 90210 Cast Member?

Top Five Things We'd Like To See When "90210" Returns

Lindy Parker — Tue, 17 Mar 2009 18:00:00 GMT

Since there's still two weeks in 90210's hiatus, we have a few suggestions that the writers might want to take into account...

1. An Annie-Rhonda brawl outside the lockers in which, ideally, Annie would grab Rhonda by the hair and yell, "Welcome to Tuesday night fights, bitch!"

2. Naomi gets laid. Seriously, we're weirdly excited about the high school dropout bartender, and Naomi needs a little love in her life. Sidenote: what happened to Ozzie?

3. Dylan. Please? We know this is a long shot, but really, we need a little excitement in our lives. DDG's baby troubles just aren't getting it done.

4. The return of Kim the undercover cop. We liked her, and being with her made us like Ryan more. Everybody wins! Which, now that we think about it, is probbably why they cut her semi-interesting plotline.

5. Silver's "Dixon" tattoo scene was actually just a dream. Dixon wakes up, shakes it off, and we breathe a sigh of relief that it wasn't real.

Previously:

Is Shannen Doherty The Most Successful "Beverly Hills, 90210" Cast Member?

Lindy Parker — Fri, 13 Mar 2009 16:00:00 GMT

It's official. Brenda will be back for the upcoming season finale of 90210, and all we can say is, thank god. Truly, we've spent the whole season making a concerted effort to like these new kids, but, in the end, we really just care about the old cast. Which raises an interesting question: who's the most successful cast member from the original Beverly Hills, 90210? Obviously, there's a lot of things to consider (overall notoriety, acting career post-show, best fashion sense, and who you still consistently want to see naked).

We can pretty much rule out the adults (Joe E. Trata, James Eckhouse and Carol Potter) right away. As far as we're concerned, this is the only gig any of them have ever had -- we choose to forget the time Jim Walsh showed up as a teacher in a Hilary Duff movie.

Here's our breakdown:

Shannen Doherty -- While there was a fall off the radar period directly following her 90210 departure, her starring role on Charmed did put a second successful series under her belt. Sadly, her fashion sense and naked appeal have declined significantly since the days of her Rolling Stone cover shoot.

Jennie Garth -- Her post-90210 success with What I Like About You managed to eclipse the shame of her Lifetime movie appearances (can't say the same for Tiffani Thiessen). Also, her stint on Dancing With the Stars actually enhanced her already successful career rather marking her as a pathetic has-been (can't say the same for Ian Ziering).

Tori Spelling -- Arguably, the cast member with the most notoriety, however, two self-indulgent reality shows do not a successful acting career make, and we're not factoring in her autobiography no matter how much she begs us. Also, raise your hand if you want to see Tori Spelling naked. We rest our case.

Brian Austin Green -- Both fashion sense and naked appeal enhanced by his succession of impossibly hot girlfriends (Vanessa Marcil, Megan Fox). While he gets credit for still working consistently, we're not sure his time as Freddie Prinze Jr.'s sidekick or the low ratings of Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles give us much hope that he can win this one.

Luke Perry -- Granted, he'll probably always be high on the naked meter, but fashion sense is largely not applicable, and overall notoriety is really just residual fame from his decade on 90210. Any momentum gained from a brief run on HBO's John from Cincinnati is negated by the half season that Windfall was on before getting cancelled.

Ian Ziering -- The last half of the 90210 run were good to Ian Ziering -- He lost the fuzzy hair, filled out nicely and gave us not one, but two of our all time favorite Beverly Hills couples (Steve and Hilary Swank; Steve and Janet). That said, the Dancing With The Stars appearance didn't quite catapult him back into the limelight, and his acting resume is a little sparse despite lending his voice to the animated version of Biker Mice From Mars.

Gabrielle Carteris -- No. Just, no.

Tiffani Amber Theissen -- Despite dropkicking the "Amber" in her stage name, Tiffani Theissen is certainly in the running for overall notoriety thanks to the Saved By the Bell years. And, even though we've never been big fans of her fashion sense, we can pretty much all agree that she'll always be hot. That said, her post-90210 string of B-list shows (Fastlane, Good Morning Miami, What About Brian) leave her in solid, but lackluster standing.

Lindsey Price -- Surprisingly, thanks to the high profile nature of Lipstick Jungle, La Price has jumped forward in the ranks in both fashion sense and legitimate acting gigs. If we factor in naked appeal (we wish we looked just like her) and the potential success of future television endeavors (i.e. Eastwick), Miss Lindsey is a contender. She came to play.

And the winner is....

Jennie Garth. Added to the above, she managed to return to the 90210 reboot without making it seem like she had to, and she's got the celebrity husband with a blockbuster movie franchise to sweeten the deal.

Honorable mention to Vincent Young and Vanessa Marcil for being simultaneously the hottest and most annoying cast members ever.

Previously:

Photo of the Week: 90210-pen Wide

Lindy Parker — Wed, 04 Mar 2009 22:00:00 GMT

While we're waitng for 90210 to return from hiatus, we thought we'd check in and see what the cast is up to during the break. Instead, we ran smack into a photo just screaming for a caption. Careful Annalynne McCord, we know a girl in college who got hurt that way.

Feel free to give us your caption suggestions below...

"Freaks and Geeks" Writers Bail on "90210"?

Lindy Parker — Fri, 27 Feb 2009 18:00:00 GMT

Now that the 90210 reboot has been picked up for a second season, it seems the CW is doing some housecleaning to try and get the show's chaotic writing under control....

Rebecca Rand Kirshner Sinclair has signed a seven-figure deal with CBS Paramount to serve as executive producer/showrunner on the high school drama remake for 2010-2011, according to The Hollywood Reporter. Sinclair joined as an executive producer in September and was to run the writers room, work alongside current executive producers/showrunners Gabe Sachs and Jeff Judah, and serve as a consultant if the show was picked up for a second season.
Now that Sinclair will be taking charge, Sachs and Judah are likely to leave at the end of this season. (Yahoo TV)

We feel pretty good about this decision actually. We think the writing talent of the dynamic Sachs-Judah duo that brought us so much joy on Freaks and Geeks is better suited for a less high-profile show where they are given more free reign. Also, Rebecca Rand Kirshner Sinclair (we like to call her "Double RKS") worked on both Buffy and Gilmore Girls, so we have high hopes that she can turn this ship around.

CW Renews Six Shows: "Everybody Hates Chris" Is Not One of Them

Lindy Parker — Wed, 25 Feb 2009 19:00:00 GMT

This week, The CW is getting their new lineup all ship shape, cutting and renewing left and right. Incredibly, Smallville and One Tree Hill are still with us (OTH is on its seventh season! Who knew?), while Everybody Hates Chris breathed its last unfunny breath...

Here's a complete list of shows that were given the CW thumbs up, as well as our thoughts on their renewal:

1. Supernatural -- We have nothing against this show particularly and, you know, we like hot brothers as much as the next girl. Live long and prosper, Supernatural.

2. Smallville -- We've never been able to get into this show, even though we gave it a concerted effort during season 3 when our mom was into it. The fact that it's staring down the barrel of a ninth season just goes to show you, we don't always swim with the current when it comes to our television watching preferences.

3. One Tree Hill -- We're shocked this show has lasted this long. Mind you, we're not saying we hate it. In fact, once when we'd just quit our job, our roommates came home to find us bundled up in our bed covers with a pint of ice cream, a bottle of wine and a marathon of the second season of One Tree Hill on the Soap Network. OTH has been there for us in our time of need, and for that we will always be grateful, but it doesn't make us any less surprised that its still on the air. Interesting note: The CW picked up the show, but OTH leading man, Chad Michael Murray may or may not be on board.

4. 90210 -- We feel weirdly torn about this one. One on hand, we're OVER IT, and don't want to throw good after bad. But, on the other hand, we've invested so much emotional energy already that we don't want to give up and throw in the towel without getting something out of it. We're pretty sure the CW shares our feelings here.

5. Gossip Girl -- Not a big surprise, but we fiind ourselves less excited about this news than we feel we should be given our level of anticipation over the premiere of season 2. We feel like the CW has their work cut out for them to steer Gossip Girl away from the lame (Jenny whining; Dan and Serena's constant break ups) and back toward the awesome (Blair and Chuck doing pretty much anything).

6. America's Next Top Model -- We wonder what will happen to the earth on the day that there is no more Top Model. Maybe that can be our question from the audience when we go to The Tyra Banks Show.

Also on the CW roster: The Melrose Place reboot, and the Gossip Girl prequel, Lily. (TV Guide)

"90210": The Most Anticlimactic Teen Sex Ever

Lindy Parker — Wed, 11 Feb 2009 18:00:00 GMT

Yeah, the expressions of these faces are pretty much exactly the same as the one we wore through most of last night's episode. Here's the breakdown...

Sad: Ethan and Rhonda's friendship which, last week we found almost enjoyable, has taken a turn for the awkward and forced like every other relationship on this show. Oh, Aimee Teegarden, why must we always have this tortured love-hate relationship? Except this time we don't have the endearing, and perpetually calming presence of Zach Gilford to put things to right.

Happy: Navid and DDG are back to bonding over candy -- a full reconciliation is totally in the stars.

Sad: A large portion of this week's plot revolves around the telling and re-telling of an anecdote that we're meant to pretend wasn't lifted directly from the second act of Carrie. Or at least Never Been Kissed.

Happy: "It's the love, man!" -- Silver and Naomi join forces to pull off a Valentine surprise for Dixon and we're pleasantly surprised to discover that they have significantly more chemistry than any of Naomi's romantic interests have delivered. Clearly, the lesson here is: Jessica Stroup is going to single-handedly save this show for us.

Sad: Naomi's right back to overactor's anonymous as soon as Silver leaves the room.

Happy: Dixon and Silver had sex! We think.

Sad: If sex was had, it was ANTICLIMACTIC sex. No post-coital freak out, no knowing looks in the hallway, no uncomfortable shot of Silver looking at her bod in the mirror -- in short, none of the necessary de-virginization debrief handed down from it's Beverly Hills predecessor.

Happy: We're strangely intrigued by Naomi's relationship with rogue-high-schooler-turned-bartender.

Sad: What happened to Ozzie?

Bonus sad: We're consistently more interested in the "next week" promos than we are in the actual episodes...

Previously:

"90210" Star Bemoans Her Druggie Make-Up and Pregnancy Belly

Lindy Parker — Tue, 10 Feb 2009 20:45:00 GMT

Oh, Druggie Drama Girl. Our relationship has gone through some ups and downs, but you've been pulling it together lately, and that's more than we can say for co-star Annalynne "hairstyle as emotion" McCord so well done you. We have to say, we're not sorry to see the last of the crazy drug addict make-up -- how about you?

TVGuide.com: Adrianna started off looking kind of rough. Are you relieved to get rid of the red eyes?
Lowndes: It was an hour of intense white makeup on my face and red and gray under my eyes to create broken capillaries. It looked much worse in person than on camera. And then, right when I thought I could start wearing some pretty makeup, I have this huge pregnancy belly I have to put on. It's heavy and makes you feel like you're wearing 10 layers of clothes because it's hot. By the end of the day my back and feet are killing, so I feel like a real pregnant lady...

Check out the full Q&A with Jessica Lowndes at TVGuide.com

She must be doing something right, because we find ourselves marginally excited about tonight's Valentine episode...

Previously: