We watch... so you don't have to.
I Hate Push, Nevada
I, too, hate Push, Nevada, but for entirely different reasons than my wise friend Phil. While, sure, the program may have the subtlety of a head-on collision, the pacing of a Tijuana hooker and a determined inability to stop nudging you in the side while saying, "Get it? Get it?," none of that bothered me. Because, of course, I didn't actually watch the show.
I hate Push, Nevada because it murdered my TiVo. Two minutes into the first episode and the hard drive made a stuttering little noise -- like two double-A battering being knocked together -- and the picture froze and not even whacking the remote against the side of the box while shouting "C'mon, dammit! C'mon!" helped. Yes, you could take that as a sign that Push, Nevada is so bad that it causes inanimate objects to commit suicide.
So rather than damn Push, Nevada to the blackest pit of hell for killing the closest thing I have to a friend in the world -- I still love you baby, even if you're cold -- I'm just going to review it on the merits of the two minutes I did manage to see:
I hate Push, Nevada.
Its smug, self-satisfaction was on display in the first thirty seconds, where Ben Affleck and someone who doesn't get to sleep with whomever he chooses greeted the viewers and told them they were about to experience something that had never been done before. Except "fail completely" is something that viewers experience all the time.
Push's problem is that it misunderstands the basic purpose of television, which is to let our brains die slowly inside our heads. TV isn't supposed to require that you pay attention, and if it does, then it's doing something wrong. Hitching your half-assed mystery show to a million dollar prize is the rough equivalent of offering a sugar cube to every mouse who can figure out which switch on the wall is wired into the pain centers of his brain. Sure, you can win a prize, but at what price?
The hyper-attentive geek demographic didn't manage to make a hit out of "A.I.," and it sure won't do it for Push, especially given that they're all already over at CBS, nit-picking C.S.I.
So, yes, I hate Push, Nevada. Not because of what its creators have actually managed to air, but because of a mistake they made long before a single frame was shot. Screw you for trying to make TV something that involves my brain. Screw you for trying to make TV something that requires attention. You may get to have sex with Jennifer Lopez and Gwynneth Paltrow and Matt Damon, Affleck, but I get to... Um...
Y'know, I don't really have a good come-back to that.
