Hollywood Sign Expected to Read 'Save the Peak' on Thursday
Hugo's Introduces Vegan Mac & Cheese
![_Bye, Bye Hollywood Sign... at Least Temporarily [Updated]](http://laist.com/assets_c/2009/12/view_behind_hwdsign-thumb-110x110-464762.jpg)
Bye, Bye Hollywood Sign... at Least Temporarily [Updated]
Photos: Laundry Day in L.A.
One Way to Take Care of Business
"Anthony Bourdain: No Reservations" season finale tonight at 10pm on Travel Channel
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For example: Last week's "Anthony Bourdain: No Reservations" visit to Montana was pure crap. We love Bourdain but the attempt to spice up this collection of old farts with shots of slow-moving freight trains flopped. Let's hope tonight's episode, based upon viewer questions, gets him back in our good graces.
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The Daytime Emmys were doled out last night - ABC came out on top followed by PBS in difficult-to-distinguish and unnecessary categories like "most informative talk show" and "most entertaining talk show". Check out the tally over at Variety. The CW broadcast of the awards flopped to it's lowest ratings ever.
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Fire on the Mountain (not the Grateful Dead song): With the LA fires again making national and international news, we recall our recent interview with The Weather Channel's Jim Cantore who specifically talked about the built up areas of the Angeles National Forest. You heard it here first.
The TV Junkie Plan: "Top Gear", "History Detectives", "Anthony Bourdain", Conan, Fallon.
8:00pm Top Gear BBC America - Jeremy, Richard and James drive three supercars through France; then beat the crap out of a Ford Focus.
8:00pm Greek ABC Family - Season Premiere
9:00pm History Detectives PBS/KCET - A sketch of a man while he was a prisoner in a German war camp; the Seadrome, a floating airport anchored to the ocean floor.
10:00pm Anthony Bourdain: No Reservations Travel - Season Finale
10:00pm Weeds Showtime - Season Finale
10:00pm Dance Your Ass Off Oxygen - Season Finale
10:00pm The Rachel Zoe Project Bravo - Rachel and Brad race against the clock to find the perfect gown for actress Anne Hathaway
10:30pm The Soup Presents: The Best Clips of '09 So Far E! - If you missed this last week, here's your chance to watch this hilarious summary!
11:35pm Late Show With David Letterman CBS - Game show host Howie Mandel; actress Rumer Willis; Dirty Projectors perform.
11:35pm The Tonight Show With Conan O'Brien NBC - Comic Norm MacDonald; actor Thomas Haden Church; Pitbull performs.
12:35am The Late Late Show With Craig Ferguson CBS - Actress Emily Deschanel; actor Terry Crews.
12:35am Late Night With Jimmy Fallon NBC - Political commentator Rachel Maddow; comic Tommy Davidson; Jet performs.
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One of the ‘old farts’ in Bourdain's Montana episode you so easily dismissed is, in my opinion, an icon of contemporary American literature. Jim Harrison is one of my favorite living writers, a poet and quite a connoisseur of cooking & great food. In fact, for a while he wrote a very entertaining food column for Esquire. I salute Bourdain, also a writer, for scoring this rare interview with Harrison that was a true delight to his fiction/poetry fans. Alas young Tom, one day too, you will be an old fart.
Thanks for your comment Elise. We know who Jim Harrison is but unfortunately he was not presented as anything other than a rambling old fart in this show. This episode, from its heavy-handed and pedantic opening to its limp conclusion, failed to impress anyone other than Harrison's current devotees, a membership that includes both you and Bourdain obviously.
What would've been interesting, for example, would have been to learn what particular brand of rotgut Harrison was swilling throughout his scenes. Or would this be invading the privacy of one of your favorite alcoholics?
The opening sentences from Harrison evoking the memory of a "7th grade girl, who was not a virgin" getting gored to death by a bull while taking a shortcut home from school were laughable and the show faced an uphill battle from that moment on.
This was not a good departure for "No Reservations". I'm all for Bourdain doing a "Dinners With Writers" show where he could have in-depth conversations about the writing process and inspiration, etc. - not a half-baked effort like this one, but even this episode was better than anything else on at that hour last week.
"No Reservations" had another great season, we look forward to seeing a lot more from Anthony Bourdain, one of the best things that has happened to TV in recent years.