Category: Television

I first heard about close captioning when I was living in Canada back in the early 90s since practically every station had it. Close captioning was created for the deaf community or hard of hearing individuals to help them understand what’s going on on TV. It’s a button on the remote you press to turn on and off and when on you can see subtitles on the screen along with sound descriptions. Turns out the system isn’t used here and so someone just started a campaign to try and push OSN to implement it. This is their aim taken from their Facebook page:

To urge OSN (Orbit Showtime Network) in speeding up the process of incorporating English subtitles in all OSN channels (whether the broadcasts are in English or Arabic) so that everyone – deaf, hard of hearing and hearing people – can have a better experience.

I’m surprised OSN don’t already have close captioning since they’re on the cutting edge of technology so I hope they listen and implement it soon. To support this campaign and for information on how you can help check out their Facebook page [Here]

On a side note they have a pretty cool campaign page with pre-written emails you can send with a click of a button and lots of information among other things. All campaign pages should be like this.

Loving
Parks and Recreation
The Office
Boardwalk Empire
Breaking Bad
Modern Family
The Walking Dead
American Dad
Homeland
Boss
Party Down

Enjoying
American Horror Story
The Ultimate Fighter
American Chopper Senior vs Junior
House (barely on this list)
Family Guy
Chasing Classic Cars
Up All Night

Watching when I have nothing else to watch
Pan Am
90210
Terra Nova
Dexter
The Simpsons
Cleavland Show
Falling Skies
Kitchen Nightmares

Bored of and hating
Grey’s Anatomy
Desperate Housewives
Persons of Interest
How I met your mother
Hawaii Five-O
CSI (all of them)
Rules of Engagement

Still need to watch or get back into
Bored to Death
Wilfred
It’s always sunny in Philadelphia
How to make it in America
Friday Night Lights

Not a fan of
Fringe
The Big Bang Theory
Two and a half men
Supernatural
Community

Note: This is a list of current shows I’m watching or are running which is why you won’t find Louie, Entourage, Mad Men, Weeds, True Blood, Game of Thrones, Eastbound And Down, Suits etc..

A documentary on Dr. Naif Al-Mutawa, the Kuwaiti psychologist who created The 99 comic books is going to premier in the States on PBS next Thursday October 13th. This is the description of the documentary taken from the Wham! Bam! Islam! website:

WHAM! BAM! ISLAM! tells the story of Naif Al-Mutawa and his venture to create the first team of superheroes from the Muslim world called THE 99. Following the tumultuous journey of THE 99 from concept to reality, from acclaim to censure by Islam’s cultural gatekeepers, from the edge of bankruptcy to plans for theme parks and an animation series, Al-Mutawa dodges cultural minefields and tries to tackle the harsh realities of the global marketplace while doggedly pursuing his vision to bring new heroes to Muslim children while re-introducing Islam to the West.

I’m not sure if the documentary will be available to download after the release or if it will even be available as a stream online. Once I find out how we can watch it I’ll update this post with more information. For now, here is the link to the Wham! Bam! Islam! website [Link]

If you don’t watch Mad Men you won’t get this. [YouTube]

There are a bunch of new shows starting this season and so far from the ones I’ve watched I found Pan Am to be the most interesting. The show is about the airline Pan Am during it’s prime back in the 60’s and it’s starring Christina Ricci as one of the airlines glamorous flight attendants.

To me the show is very similar to Mad Men but instead of it dealing with advertising its about the airline industry and like Mad Men, watching it makes me want to go back in time and live in the 60s.

The other new shows I’ve watched so far and haven’t liked are Person of Interest and Up All Night. If you want to watch Pan Am you can do so directly on the ABC website and for free. Just make sure you’re using a VPN so it thinks you’re living in the US. [Link]

I’ve got a bunch of shows I’m currently enjoying but my favorite has to be Suits. If you read the description it won’t sound exciting but it’s really a great show about two lawyers but it’s nothing like regular lawyer shows. Check out the trailer below.

[YouTube]

Not sure if it’s being aired on Showtime but it’s available in the iTunes Store and on Hulu.

This Friday Discovery Channel will be airing an episode of Building the Impossible that will feature Sabah Al-Ahmad Sea City. I don’t recall ever hearing about Sea City and looking at the aerial shot above, it seems like a pretty humongous project. No idea what time they’ll be airing the episode but you can watch the trailers on the Masahati blog [Here]

Update: Here is the project on Google Maps [Link]

Update2: Here are the timings for Discovery Channel. The show was shot in HD but the below schedule is for SD.

Remember back in May I posted about how Paris HIlton’s show My New BFF was being filmed in Dubai? Well the show ended a couple of days back and the contestant that won the competition is Kuwait’s very own Reem Al Alnezi (pictured above). She’s now Paris Hilton’s new best friend which I have no idea what that means. I guess they’ll go shopping together and partying together every time Paris comes to the Middle East? Not really sure… [Link]

Thanks Fatemah

Paris Hilton has a reality show called My New BFF which I’ve watched once before by mistake. The show is about Paris Hilton looking for a new best friend and it involves a bunch of guys and girls all trying out for that position. Well the show has now moved to Dubai and one of the contestants is a Kuwaiti girl called Reem Al Alnezi (pictured above). The Dubai version of the show doesn’t have any male contestants which means I am not in the running to be Paris Hilton’s best friend. That’s ok though since the only thing we had in common anyway was our love for Hardees.

Here is a link to photos from My New BFF Dubai [Link]

Thanks Fatemah

On yesterday nights episode of Arabs Got Talent on MBC4, a Kuwaiti opera singer and the Kuwaiti PK Jaguars made it to the next round. I couldn’t find a video of the Kuwaiti opera singer but the video above is of the PK Jaguars. [YouTube]

Update: To watch the Kuwaiti opera singer click [Here]. He kicks ass!

Those of you who’ve been reading my blog for over 5 years might remember about the issues I previously faced with Showtime and how much I disliked them (Don’t try looking for the posts I deleted most of my hate posts after Virgin wanted to sue me back then). So yesterday I was in a good mood I guess since I ended up passing by their stand at The Avenues and signing up to one of their packages… and I don’t feel guilty about it.

Why? Mostly due to the fact that my experience with them since I signed up yesterday has been very positive. I originally wanted to sign up to their cheap KD15 Movies Plus package but then their salesman convinced me to go with the Premier Plus package which had everything Movie Plus had in addition to the sports and HD channels. He then managed to convince me to pay a bit extra and go with the Showbox receiver which had the hard drive built in so I could record stuff. I was told someone would be over within 48 hours to set up my subscription.

To my surprise Showtime actually came and installed my subscription this morning. I thought that was pretty impressive since I signed up last night and it was New Years day and yet this morning they came over and installed it for me. The HD channels are pretty cool and the receiver isn’t that annoying to use (much faster than the laggy one I had 8 years ago). The only odd thing is the fact for some reason they don’t broadcast the UFC in HD.

I hope I don’t run into any problems with them, so far they seem like a much better company since the last time I dealt with them.

Update: According to a reader they actually DO broadcast the UFC in HD but only the live showing. The reruns are not in HD. Great!

Update2: Already ran into my first problem with OSN. I am supposed to pay $65 (KD18.5) a month for my subscription and according to the salesman at The Avenues if I wanted the Showbox I pay a one time fee of KD7 extra. Today while checking my credit card balance I found out they charged me $158. When I called customer support they told me the first time setup fee is KD26. I was upset because no one told me there was a setup fee, I don’t mind paying it but I don’t like being surprised by hidden fees. Turns out it’s at KD19 setup fee if you want the regular receiver and KD26 if you have the Showbox.

The post below reminded me I should actually post about the Funoon store. For everyone that’s grown up in Kuwait during the 80’s, this store is a gold mine. They have all the famous Abed Al Hussein Abd Al Rida plays and shows available… on DVD! I picked up the Bye Bye London DVD for just KD3. Quality isn’t DVD quality but it’s better than the VHS tape I had. Only problem I actually had with the DVD is that sound comes out of one speaker only because they took the mono track and assigned it to one side. I would have taken the mono track and repeated on the left and right instead. But anyway that’s a small complaint. They also had Seif Al 3arab (2 DVDs), Bye Bye 3arab, Dars Khoosoosee, Darb Al Zalag and a lot more… all on DVD and all priced at KD3 per DVD.

Not sure how many branches they have but I went to the one off the 5th Ring Road in Salmiya. If Turkish Grill is on your right hand side it’s around 200 meters right after it, on the corner of Amman street.

Road Runner is coming back an with an updated new look. Too soon to tell if it’s a look that will grow on me but judging by the short preview clip it might. [Link]

One of my favorite shows before getting canceled was the HBO series Lucky Louie. It was an extremely funny adult targeted comedy that was dirty, vulgar, and just extremely hilarious. I loved it. Sadly the show got canceled for some odd reason but Louie is now back on a different network called FX with his own show again. This time the show is just called Louie and it’s even funnier than Lucky Louie. There are a lot of comedian guest stars on the show including in one episode Ricky Gervais who plays his doctor friend. He’s even got Seinfeld style stand up at the start of the show plus at different points through out the episodes. It’s very cool and it’s now one of my favorite shows easily. You can get a glimpse of the style of Louie by watching the Ricky Gervais scene in HD on YouTube by clicking [Here]

I heard about this reality show this morning on BBC and thought it was extremely creative. Young Imam is a popular reality TV show in Malaysia where the winner of the show wins a car, a scholarship to study in Saudi Arabia, some cash, a pilgrimage to Mecca and gets to be an Imam of a mosque. It’s such a smart idea and it seems to be working really well in attracting younger people back into religion. I found a good article about the show on the Wall Street Journal which is where I got the video above from. You can check out the article by clicking [Here]