TV, eh?

From Bill Brioux at TV Feeds My Family:

• House Wins Again on Monday
  “CBC’s Battle of the Blades unusual non-results show scored 1,069,000.” Read more.

From Kyle Carpenter of the McGill Tribune:

• POP RHETORIC: CAN’TCON
  “Canada’s television shows – news and non-fiction programs excluded – are terrible compared to their American counterparts. And it’s not only in one genre: we fail in every category imaginable. In response to American comedies like The Office and 30 Rock, we come back with Little Mosque on the Prairie. For their action dramas NCIS and Prison Break, we come up with Flashpoint. Animated shows like Family Guy and South Park are met with Bob & Doug and Chilly Beach. They created Saturday Night Live, we came up with The Royal Canadian Air Farce. The Daily Show? The Rick Mercer Report. Seriously, we couldn’t even get Sesame Street right – we had to create a monster named Sesame Park.” Read more.

When Yasir shatters Thorne’s Jesus statue, he orders a replacement on the sly and receives a big surprise.

From Sara Liss of CBC:

• Essential viewing: The 10 most important television shows of the 2000s
  “Degrassi: The Next Generation: Yeah, it’s soapy and frequently corny, but this teen angst-fest has become one of the most successful domestic television shows Canada has seen to date.” Read more.

From Bill Brioux at TV Feeds My Family:

• A Week in, CBC’s Big News Stand Falls Flat
  “CBC’s Battle of the Blades results show (1,143,000). … Little Mosque on the Prairie (543,000). Discovery’s Canada’s Worst Driver (479,000).” Read more.

When Thorne (left, Brandon Firla) hints Yasir (right, Carlo Rota) won’t win the church reno because he’s too busy with other work, Yasir lightens his load on episode 306 of LITTLE MOSQUE ON THE PRAIRIE airing Monday, Nov. 2 at 8:30 p.m. on CBC Television.

From Bill Brioux at TV Feeds My Family:

• New CBC News Numbers Show Promise
  “The Battle of the Blades results show topped all CBC offerings with 1,304,000 viewers.” Read more.

When Reverend Thorne installs a vending machine during Amaar’s 30-hour famine fundraiser, Amaar is forced to fight fast food temptation with faith.

From Brian Gorman of the Sudbury Star:

• ‘LITTLE MOSQUE’ brings Hewitt big fame
  “In three short years, Sitara Hewitt has gone through the five phases of fame: wanting fame, getting fame, finding out fame can be creepy, putting fame into perspective, discovering fame can be useful.” Read more.

8:30 p.m.  After Rayyan bans pop in visits, Sarah sneaks into Rayyan’s house to retrieve her emergency key and gets trapped inside.

From Bill Brioux at TV Feeds My Family:

• Big House, Littler Mosque
  “Less festive were the results for Little Mosque on the Prairie, which squandered that big Blades lead-in and dropped down to a season-low 492,000 viewers.” Read more.

From Andrew Ryan of the Globe and Mail:

• Networks have a few shows to be thankful for
  The folks running CBC, meanwhile, are very likely giving profuse thanks, if not doing a jig, for the breakout success of Battle of the Blades (CBC, 8 p.m.).” Read more.

From Bill Brioux at TV Feeds My Family:

• House Still Huge, Blades Breaks a Mill on Mon
  “CBC’s Battle of the Blades drew 1,071,000 for Monday’s first elimination skate off, which saw Bob Probert get knocked out. Little Mosque got no lift, falling down to 534,000 at 8:30.” Read more.

When Amaar invites Rev. Thorne to co-host a party, the minister hijacks the planning, almost tanking the event.

From Raju Mudhar of the Toronto Star:

• Mercy, Sask., gets religious faceoff
  “Let’s just say the irony was not lost on me. When assigned to interview Brandon Firla, the newest addition to Little Mosque on the Prairie, I balked. You see, I’m not sure if you can tell from the accent of my writing (or my name or the accompanying logo), but being of South Asian ancestry – or brown as I usually put it – I found it a little weird to be profiling the new white guy on Canada’s most successful mainstream brown show ever.” Read more.

From Eric Volmers of the Calgary Herald:

• Holy Terror: Calgary actor heats up Little Mosque on the Prairie
  “Actor Brandon Firla is fairly certain that a world of trouble is about to hit Mercy, Sask. Trouble in both the real and make-believe worlds. Home to the comedy Little Mosque on the Prairie, the fictional town will get a new villain in the form of the appropriately named Rev. Thorne, a right-leaning, possibly racist and certainly religiously intolerant Anglican priest intent on bullying the beloved Muslims of CBC’s high-rated sitcom out of town.” Read more.

From Andrew Ryan of the Globe and Mail:

• Thank heavens for those tried-and-true favourites
  “By now, Little Mosque is part of Canadian culture, for which we should probably be grateful. And the fourth-season opener is a delight. A stuffy new Anglican priest, Reverend Thorne, comes to the sleepy town of Mercy, to replace the departed Reverend Magee. His arrival causes earnest Amaar (Zaib Shaikh) to fret that the mosque’s days in the town are numbered. None of the other Muslim townsfolk seem too concerned; they know they belong.” Read more.

In the season premiere, Rev. Magee’s replacement wants Amaar and the Muslims out until he realizes his congregants like having the Mosque around.

From Bill Harris of the Toronto Sun:

• Holy war starting on the prairie
  “Brandon Firla has an interesting theory about comedy and religion. ‘I actually was thinking comedy and religion are kind of the same, because you can say outrageous things and have an instant defence for it,’ Firla said. ‘Either, ‘I’m just joking’, or, ‘It’s in the Bible.”” Read more.

From a media release:

MERCY, THERE’S SOMEONE NEW IN TOWN AS LITTLE MOSQUE ON THE PRAIRIE RETURNS FOR ITS FOURTH SEASON ON CBC TELEVISION, SEPT. 28

This year, there’s a fresh arrival in Mercy. A new man of the cloth is about to take over Mercy Anglican and he’s not interested in treating Mercy’s resident Iman as an equal. The friendly relationship between the Muslims and the Christians will be put to the test as CBC Television’s internationally-acclaimed comedy series LITTLE MOSQUE ON THE PRAIRIE returns for its fourth season on Monday, September 28 at 8:30 p.m. It’s the same funny and heart-warming show it has always been …with a little more edge.

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From Bill Brioux at TV Feeds My Family:

• CBC Sets Stage for Fall With Classy Launch
  “Next up was Rick Mercer. ‘I’m the one guy in Canada who wants an election,’ he joked. The Rick Mercer Report was CBC’s highest-rated entertainment show last season, averaging just under a million viewers a week. For the seventh season, which begins Tues., Sept. 29, Mercer will plunge off a cliff bungee jumping with Man in Motion Rick Hansen. ‘You haven’t lived until you’ve seen a man in a wheelchair plunge 160 feet,’ says Mercer.” Read more.

From a media release:

CBC-TV SERVES UP GREAT ENTERTAINMENT THIS FALL: NEW COMEDY, RETURNING HITS AND THE HOTTEST COMPETITION ON ICE

CBC Television today showcases highlights from its Fall 2009 Entertainment schedule, including two new series. The Ron James Show (pictured) features the uniquely funny insights into modern life from one of Canada’s favourite comedians, taped before a live audience at the Canadian Broadcasting Centre in Toronto. Two worlds collide in Battle of the Blades when eight hockey legends and eight figure skating stars compete live in front of fans at the historic Maple Leaf Gardens.

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