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Pig Girls Don't Cry The Muppets
InTelevision Reviews

The Muppets S01E01 – “Pig Girls Don’t Cry”

September 25, 2015By

Pig Girls Don't Cry The Muppets
The Muppets – “Pig Girls Don’t Cry”
written by Bill Prady & Bob Kushell
Directed by Randall Einhorn

I am a huuuuuuuuuuuuuuge Muppets fan, so of course this will be the series I’ll be reviewing as it airs from now on, as Sleepy Hollow decided to go on a sophomore slump that cratered deep into the ground, along with my interest in the show. After a successful movie and a less than successful movie, the Muppets return to tv with their new series, The Muppets. It’s done in a pseudo-documentary format in the same vein of The Office, except instead of Jim and Pam (or Tim and Dawn), we got Frog and Pig!
Pig Girls Don't Cry The Muppets
Miss Piggy is hosting a late night talk show (which means as of this show airing, only female late night talk show host is a pig Muppet played by a guy, as Samantha Bee’s show doesn’t premiere for a little while longer!), Fozzie is her sidekick/announcer/insult target, Kermit is the executive producer, Gonzo is the head writer (with Pepe and Rizzo), The Electric Mayhem is the house band, Sam the Eagle is working for ABC’s standards and practices, Scooter is a talent coordinator, Bobo is a stage manager, Swedish Chef does the catering, other Muppets do background work on the show, and Rowlf is supposed to own the bar they all hang out at after work (not show in this episode!)

The show gained a bunch of viral buzz due to the announcement of Miss Piggy and Kermit’s breakup, and Kermit subsequently dating a new pig named Denise. The fallout was hilarious, even if we are totally Team Miss Piggy here at TarsTarkas.NET. The breakup is the worst part of the series, even if I understand that they did it in order to have an actual romantic plot with the main characters. It lead to a huge group of people upset because the Muppets are being given actual romantic plot lines, and the plot lines aren’t the ones that are classically associated with the characters. But as a fan of Kermit and Piggy together, it is sad, and will take some getting used to. (And we all know they will be back together by season 2!)
Pig Girls Don't Cry The Muppets

Hit List William Lustig
InMovie Reviews, Ugly

Hit List (Review)

August 20, 2014By

Hit List

Hit List William Lustig
1989
Story by Aubrey K. Rattan
Screenplay by John F. Goff, Peter Brosnan, Josh Becker, and Scott Spiegel
Directed by William Lustig
Hit List William Lustig
Hit List takes the vague premise of Vigilante, but heavily rewrites it for late-80s/early-90s direct to video action. It’s less dirty and gritty, with more wise guy quips and an optimistic tone. But shades of Lustig’s themes are there. The system is still broken, criminals are running free and they can’t be contained by the courts, and our heroes will have to step in and do what the system won’t. Hit List was made for Cinetel Films, best known here for their constant stream of SyFy flicks. Lustig had previously made Relentless for them, which had become one of the top-grossing DTV films of 1989 and even had a limited theatrical run.

Hit List has another amazing cast – Lance Henricksen, Rip Torn, Jere Burns, Charles Napier, Harold Sylvester. Weirdly, the success of the film being funded rested entirely on getting Jan-Michael Vincent to play the lead. Also weirdly, according to William Lustig, Jan-Michael Vincent was often drunk on set, Lustig joking that Vincent could barely stand up straight for many shots. The script was rewritten several times, including reworkings by uncredited writers Josh Becker and Scott Spiegel.
Hit List William Lustig
I saw Hit List at the Yerba Buena Center for the Arts in their Bay Area Now 7 program, under the Invasion of the Cinemaniacs! heading, specifically the part curated by Jesse Hawthorne Ficks of Midnite for Maniacs, who hosted two William Lustig triple features (a sextuple feature?) spread across two days. Hit List screened after Maniac and Vigilante, while the next night was all three Maniac Cop films. William Lustig himself was in attendance, and did some entertaining Q and As. Lustig is very charismatic and shared stories about filming and some of the actors/producers of his films. I’ve included some of what he mentioned in the reviews.

The supporting cast and the stunts are the things to focus on for Hit List, because everything else just doesn’t work right. Lance Henriksen is just amazing as the crazed hired assassin Chris Caleek, who also is a women’s shoe salesman (a deadly Al Bundy?) That tidbit makes Harold Sylvester’s appearance more fun, as he was a regular in later seasons on Married With Children as Al’s coworker Griff. Henriksen spends his undercover time wearing gigantic glasses and flirting with old ladies, but quickly switches gears to firing guns and having a mean look on his face. He also sports a huge tattoo across his back.
Hit List William Lustig