SO BAD IT'S BAD: I flipped channels a bit last night and happened past ROCK STAR: INXS a few times. I say a few times because it was so painful to watch that I couldn't bring myself to actually stick on it for any period of time. It was really difficult to decide who was more ridiculous: Brooke Burke (the helium-boobed Valerie Bertinelli of our day), Tim Farriss (who is/was apparently a guitarist in INXS at one point but is now something of a fat Elton John wannabe with a Justin Timberlake wig), Dave Navarro (the white Prince, a curious-eyed elf with a pubic goatee and Madonna-fake elocution), or the band of amateur singers who actually give a shit about joining a marginal has-been band like INXS. The show is a MCENROE-calibre trainwreck that's so bad it's bad. Mark Burnett's comet may finally be sputtering.

On a related note, I rather enjoyed the season-opener of the new SURREAL LIFE. That show is saying something about our celebrity-addled culture, and I think it's this: Take a look at these idiots and stop idolizing them. They suck! Seriously, my goal with this season (as with previous seasons) will be to play the needle-in-a-haystack game of discovering which of the cast members doesn't entirely suck. My current front-runner: the BMX guy, whatever his name is.