WORLD JUNIOR HOCKEY CHAMPIONSHIP

TSN

Thursday, Saturday 4:30 pm

Every year the finest young hockey players from around the world show off in front of scouts, family members and no matter where the tournament is held, several thousand rabid Canadian hockey fans. In 2005/06 the championships are being held in British Columbia which means that the arenas will be packed to the rafters for each and every Canadian game, practice and media call. Pity the poor Norwegians who play Canada Thursday afternoon. The young men from that Nordic nation likely have never seen a crowd of 16,000 at a hockey game and every man, woman and devil-child will be cheering against them with all their might.

While Norway is cruising for a bruising from the host country, which dispatched neighbouring Finland 5-1 in early action, the Canadian team will face a much stiffer test from the United States on New Year’s Eve. The Americans come into this tournament as odds on favourites for gold with a loaded roster full of current and future first-round NHL draft picks.

The Canadian squad can’t be counted out, however. There might be only one returning player from the team that obliterated the field last winter in North Dakota, but with Brent Sutter back behind the bench you can bet that he’ll have his young charges chomping at the bit and playing fast-paced physical hockey from the time the puck drops.

Should Canada, as expected, beat up enough minnows to advance to the medal round, TSN will have all the action. Quarterfinal games are set for January 2 and the gold medal will be handed out sometime in the early evening of January 5.

Friday December 30

Year of the Farce 2005

CBC 8 pm

Here’s a “comedy” program that deserves to be put out to pasture. The Royal Canadian Air Farce was at one point home to biting satire and spot-on impersonations of politicians and celebrities. Ever since John Morgan (RIP) retired from the show, however, the laugh quotient has plunged with each passing year. The Farce lived up to its own name several years back when it hired terminally unfunny comedienne Jessica Holmes. Holmes seems to believe that her awful Celine Dion send-up is a comic gold mine, but in fact, she’s continually giving viewers the shaft.

Still, despite its shortcomings, this hour-long special is at least tongue-in-cheek, if not laugh out loud. With so many earnest year-in-review programs bound to dominate the dial this weekend, a little (and again, I stress a little) comic relief is welcome. Plus, the chicken cannon target of the year is an award ceremony well-worth witnessing.

Sunday, January 1

Commander in Chief

CTV from 2-6 pm and 7-9 pm

Some people who watch television religiously watch shows from the very beginning. They are fully conversant with the story lines and background characters and can appreciate running themes or recurring jokes far better than the casual viewer. Of course, most of us fit into that latter category and television networks know it. As a result they create series that can be dropped in on, like a casual game of basketball in the local park. It helps to know where the show is coming from, but rare are the cases where you watch a mid-season episode and spend most of the time trying to figure out who the people are and why they’re doing that.

Political dramas, almost by definition, are exceptions to this. Any show set in Washington DC is full of intrigue and, in the parlance of the medium, multi-episode story arcs. That’s why a show like Commander in Chief has to be followed from the beginning in order to be properly appreciated. Fortunately, CTV has johnny-come-lately fans in mind on New Year’s Day, running the first six episodes of the show in a Geena Davis (shudder) /Donald Sutherland (hooray) marathon. It’s a wonderful public service, really. That and they totally didn’t have a thing to show all day long.

Any time of any day

The Hippopotamus Commercial

Telus Advertisement

Well, I didn’t get a hippopotamus for Christmas, although only a hippopotamus would do. I wanted no crocodiles, nor rhinoceroses. If you have no idea what I’m writing about, consider yourself indeed blessed. Telus, whose mildly abusive animal ads have been on air for several years, have struck a chord with young and old alike in Western Canada this holiday season. Their pre-Christmas spot featuring a trotting hippo set to a bouncy 1950s novelty track (I Want a Hippopotamus for Christmas), has been ubiquitous lately and has in fact led to a run on merchandise.

Sadly for Telus, who were trying to sell telephone and internet service through the campaign, parents have been racing to malls across Alberta and BC to buy plush hippopotami for their indoctrinated children. Radio stations across the region have also been inundated with requests for the tune. There is no word from area zoos if the visitation to the hippo displays have picked up as well, although I wouldn’t be surprised.