LUCIDMEDIA

Celebrating Pop Culture Turkeys

Written by Nadine Bachan, Andrew Skinner and Adam A. Donaldson Friday, 09 October 2009 08:46

In celebration of Thanksgiving (for our Canadian readers anyway), we salute our favourite pop culture turkeys listed below in no particular order.

Kim Kardashian

Say what you want about Paris Hilton, but at least she’s shown ambitions beyond simply masquerading down red carpets and going to Hollywood parties acting like she’s owed something. She was also astute enough to see the benefit of a bit of self-deprecation with a guest role on The OC and by being part of the eclectic ensemble of Repo The Genetic Opera. Kim Kardashian, meanwhile, is a walking spoof. I’m not sure what’s more laughable: the fact that she said in advanced that she wouldn’t be taking interviews on the Emmy Awards red carpet, or the fact that she was a guest at the so-called awards for television excellence in the first place. Oh forget it, it’s all laughable.

So what does Kim have to her credit? Well, she has her reality show which is paradoxically called “Keeping Up with the Kardashians.” Considering that between Kim and her sister Khloe (also spelled with a ‘K’, how whimsically counter-intuitive), there isn’t enough material for a Sweet Valley High Book. “Keeping Up with the Kardashians?” Why bother. Then she had a small part in Disaster Movie, which, if nothing else, was appropriately named. At least when Paris tried to burn the really horrible movie that marked her first starring role, the awful ***, she really tried to burn it, bury the ashes and salt the earth. Not Kim though, maybe that’s because Disaster Movie is her sole cinematic credit. Chances are she won’t be making another soon though. She’s too broken hearted over the break-up with her boyfriend to even do her share of the heavy lifting on her reality show. Wait, no one said “cold turkey” for this article.

Aqua

Everything about the Danish dance-pop band Aqua was in tacky Technicolor. Their look, their music, and their personas were rife with vibrant zaniness. Dreadful songs like “Barbie Girl”, “My Oh My,” “Doctor Jones” and “Lollipop (Candyman)” soared up the charts. Of course, the highly-campy music videos that accompanied the band’s too-sweet bubblegum pop songs were played on heavy rotation.  Even their names seem too clichéd to be real – Lene, René, Søren, and Claus … Come on! The “ø” is almost enough to make your head explode.

With the inhaled-helium vocals of Lene and the techno-baritone chops of René, nothing could be closer to a hackneyed depiction of women and men. Usually, Lene would play the damsel-in-distress while René portrayed the brawny hero in their awful music videos. The dynamic of Aqua apparently worked, These non-threatening, one-dimensional expressions of gender appealed to children aged tot-to-tween, resulting in the band’s first and second album gaining multi-platinum status in Canada, the US, Australia, Europe, and the UK. I guess when it comes to cheese, the fans couldn’t get enough.

Sure, Aqua was always aware of how corny they were, but the line that separates being ironic from simply being a joke is a very fine line indeed.

[Blank] Movie

Filmmakers Jason Friedberg and Aaron Seltzer not only define bad taste in comedy, but utter laziness in screenwriting. I sometimes imagine what one of their pitches must sound like; let’s use the aforementioned Disaster Movie as an example. “We’ll start in 10,000 BC, right? And then we flash-forward to Cloverfield where the party guests include the boys from Superbad, Dr. Phil, Anton Chigurh and Hannah Montana end up fighting meteor showers, global warming and the Sex and the City girls, including a she-male Carrie Bradshaw. And you know Kung Fu Panda? We can even get a little bit of that in there too.” I don’t know what’s worst: the fact that this got made or that three other movies using the exact same formula got made too. Either way, it seems that Hollywood learned its lesson as these guys have got nothing new in development right now.

Stephen Harper

Well Arts & Entertainment writers can now officially write about Stephan Harper because he recently sat down at a grand piano at a National Arts Centre fundraiser, and sang “With A Little Help From My Friends”.

Is it even necessary to point out that the original Beatles’ version, written by Paul McCartney and John Lennon, is far better; as are the slower Joe Cocker and the Canadian hair band Kick Axe renditions. Harper’s was passable karaoke but because this was a gala event and not “The Gong Show” he got a standing ovation. So, the turkeys may turn out to be Canadian voters who may be clapping, more or less, because they have discovered for the first time that the Prime Minister is a human being. But more disturbing though, is that this particular audience is seen as Canada’s powerful intelligentsia, who help shape opinion on the arts.

Harper spokesman Andrew MacDougall, says, that his boss is only “high on adrenaline” and not stoned all the time. So in this instance a ‘little help from his friends’ refers to other members of Parliament, including some clapping Liberals, whose help is needed with a minority government, and not to friends who help you to get high on recreational drugs.

Some are also speculating that Harper’s dreadful singing could in fact help his government in Quebec where the electorate is passionate and notoriously protective of Arts monies. Although Harper will not be quitting his day job any time soon the real turkey may be Micheal Ignatieff if he doesn’t get his act together and sing something.

The Jonas Brothers/Miley Cyrus

There was once a time when The Jonas Brothers would never have been given the rights and responsibilities of hosting the Much Music Video Awards. Could you imagine if in 2000, the channel gave that same honour to the poppin’ fresh guys from *N Sync? I mean, sure, Much Music did its part to make something of that boy band, but the MMVAs carried a certain weight of hipness to it that was evasive to a group like *N Sync, then the epitome of Florida-grown pop music. Of course, that was when Much Music was still cool and musically relevant; before Videoflow and Ed the Sock were replaced with hours of reality shows and teen drama reruns. Now it seems these teen turkeys are elevated to the status of mini-Beethovens, a bright light in an industry looking to latch on to any shred of success no matter how lame the music coming out of them is.

And Miley Cyrus? Well, I could have lived with Jem the Next Generation, but then this week she cancelled her Twitter page after her apparent boyfriend ordered her to delete it. Nice message for all the young women out there that admire you Miley: Do as you boyfriend says and don’t argue. Remember when Hilary Duff got “too sexy?” I guess the Powers that Be are trying to pre-empt a similar fall with Hannah Montana. Either that, or Miley’s planning a run as a Republican vice-presidential nominee, it could go both ways.