10 Things Worse Than ‘Twilight’

For the millions of women who loved Twilight but just wish Edward had tied Bella up and whipped her more, Fifty Shades of Grey has you covered. For the millions of women who felt the writing in Twilight was just too over their head, Grey has you covered as well. To everyone else out there, Fifty Shades of Grey looks like a cultural accident on a nearly cosmic scale, the kind of thing that should drive average citizens into the streets screaming about the apocalypse.

This porno trilogy for lonely housewives may not be the end of the world, but it's definitely worse than Twilight. The inevitable film adaptations might be better, though. Actually, they'll probably be PG-13 snoozefests.

Honey Boo Boo stumbled into our hearts with a two-liter of Mountain Dew in one hand a fried stick of butter in the next and has been playing up that image ever since. That such a being could exist shocked us into letting her jump from a one-off appearance on Toddlers & Tiaras to a show all her own, a program featuring redneck mud Olympics, a pet pig, and a kid born with eleven fingers. Look for several simultaneous heart attacks during next year's sweeps, and at least one case of rickets.

Ignore the ignoble history of Ayn Rand's dependable first date litmus test. I'm talking about the 2011 film adaptation so horrific no one saw it, and yet so awful, they somehow shoved through a sequel anyway. Both movies are atrocious, but Atlas Shrugged: Part II represents a sequel so awful it doesn't even feature the same cast. Luckily, most people don't even know the Atlas Shrugged films exist. But that doesn't mean they are not out there waiting to spring up on Showtime when you're at your most vulnerable.

Insufferably lame cultural artifacts are nothing new. For years and years, newspaper readers have had to contend with this crappy one panel comic strip. Following a family of fatheaded children, The Family Circus offers readers one panel arguments for why procreation ruins the integrity of everything. You could always tell the cool teachers from bad ones by which comic strip they chose to decorate their filing cabinet with: This, or The Far Side.

Despite a couple decent films here and there (I'm partial to their Friday the 13th film, though its kills sucked), Platinum Dunes seems primed and determined to take your favorite childhood horror film and just dump all over it. With a focus more on gritty textures and diarrhea inspired color pallets than story, scares, character, or imagination, you can almost bet on a Platinum Dunes project being a waste of both time and money but most of all remake rights. The Nightmare on Elm Street remake could have been awesome, for instance. Instead it was awful, and now we'll have to wait a whole generation before someone has the guts to try it again.

I love Tyler Perry. But at least I can admit that something is wrong with me. I don't know what's keeping the rest of his fan base from facing facts. The guys is a bizarre, erroneous filmmaker with toxic views on nearly everything he touches. Even when he manages to be funny, he does so while dressed as a gigantic old lady. Tyler Perry may have fallen flat on his face with his recent attempt at crossing over into the mainstream, Alex Cross, but that doesn't mean he'll be bowing out of the film scene any time soon.

Imagine Twilight, but with the power to influence public policy. These guys (some of them are technically women) took a big hit with the recent 2012 election, but that only means their rebound will be all the more vicious. As their base of white, male Americans continues to shrink, their toxicity and bellies will likely only grow. You can watch them briefly if you'd like a frustrating laugh. But linger not! With too much exposure you will find yourself either agreeing with their rhetoric or destroying your television.

Jay Leno is the Twilight of talk show hosts, and he wouldn't have it any other way. The only thing Leno cares about is making as many people laugh as humanly possible. This means telling jokes broad enough they can be appreciated by both twelve year old girls and ninety year old World War II veterans at the same time. That leaves less room for nuance or intelligence, and more real estate given to funny newspaper headlines and "Who Let the Dogs Out?" references. Jay Leno apparently owns a over a million pristine antique cars, which is fitting since he drives me absolutely bonkers.

Armond White has developed a niche as the Internet's most militantly contrarian movie reviewer. It really doesn't matter a film's quality or lack thereof. Armond White will assess the general critical consensus and drive in the polar opposite direction, usually with vocabulary comparable to, let's say, a Rolls Royce propelled by feet like on The Flintstones. There's not much more you can get from a guy once he argues Paul W.S. Anderson's filmmaking superiority over Paul Thomas Anderson. Fun to have a parties, though!

I really wanted to like 'Glee' when it first started. A weekly dose of high school drama amid highly cheesy musical segments seemed like just the perfect thing. But it wasn't the perfect thing at all. It was the thing that didn't make sense and didn't care and wouldn't go away.

I don't even understand what's happening on Glee these days, but I'm willing to bet it still involves heavy doses of characters betrayed by narrative inconsistencies and show runner amnesia. Also, Autotune. Oh God, the Autotune on that show.