In the four months since the last episode, things have been quiet around the Osbourne household -- Ozzy had a public health scare and subsequently charged his doctor with overmedicating him, Sharon successfully launched a daytime talk show, Kelly moved out of the house and then back in, and Ozzy put himself in the hospital for six months by flipping his ATV. In that veritable vacuum of attention, what is there for a girl to do but force her family to host a Christmas special, about forcing her family to host a Christmas special! Let the meta non-fun begin!
House. Night. The door opens. We're upstairs. Ozzy and Sharon sleep. Ozzy dreams...
Dream. Violins play as Ozzy walks up his now rose-covered staircase. He enters the bedroom to find Britney Spears sitting on the bed, dressed provocatively, but ironically wearing more clothes than she usually does. Poor Britney. Her handlers force her to do frigging everything. Can't the girl ever get a nap? Her and Ozzy, the both of them must just be exhausted. While Ozzy's fantasy is to have sex with her, I'm sure hers would be getting to go to sleep for three days. Ozzy shuffles into the room and says, "It's Britney Spears!" I guess they blew the audio (no pun...) because they pipe in a voice-over of some girl saying, "Merry Christmas, Mr. Osbourne." Ozzy: "Fuck. Where's my Viagra when I need it?" Britney smiles. And then...oh, that's it. That was the whole joke. Hm.
Now Sharon dreams. Jessica Simpson's husband walks through the foyer lobby. Sharon hugs him and then says that he feels warm and makes him take off his leather jacket. Sharon tells Jessica Simpson's husband that it's much cooler upstairs. Upstairs, she asks Jessica Simpson's husband his opinion about "Demi and Ashton" and he says they have a real connection...oh, they're going with the whole "older woman younger man" thing. It's taking me a few beats to get the "jokes." I'm sure it's just my fault. She tells Jessica Simpson's husband to think about that and then miraculously appears a second later in a sexy outfit. Jessica Simpson's husband says he's been a little tense. She straddles him, and Producer Sharon forces Jessica Simpson's husband to recite lines about how he's been waiting for this...and they make out as a song I can only guess from its lack of melody and rhythm is by Jessica Simpson's husband plays. Kissing. Kissing. And the dream ends...to find a dog licking Sharon's lips. Ew. And, better this than the other.
Ozzy dreams of Britney and then of himself yelling "Viagra!!!" and he wakes up. He tells Sharon he had a terrible dream that it was Christmas. "Darling, it is Christmas," she says. "Oh, fuck!" says Ozzy. And that's it. Really. Really? His having a dream it was Christmas had nothing to do with the Britney thing or...wow. Okay. Roll with it, Stee.
Computer animated city with skating and trees and such, and then we get the list of the special guest stars on this Osbourne Family Christmas Special: Carmen Electra, Anthony Anderson, Britney Spears, Brendan Fraser, Mandy Moore, JC Chasez, Big Boi, Jonathan Lipnicki (?), Eddie Griffin, Brittany Snow, Rob Zombie, Adam Carolla, Eva Mendes, Nick Lachey, Dave Navarro, Wilmer Valderrama, Tracy Morgan, Triumph the Insult Comic Dog, Mike Myers, and Jessica Simpson. Wow, that's a giant list of Who's Not.
Living room. Since they've been "acting" so much lately, it's hard to tell when they're not, but Sharon and Ozzy are having a "normal" conversation in which she reminds him about the Christmas special they've been talking about having and he asks "Who?" and "What?" a lot. Ozzy yawns as she explains it. "I like Christmas," Ozzy deadpans. Okay, that's funny. A little less funny now that we know he's just heavily medicated and about to crash on his ATV.
Ozzy is outside, holding the pipe of a big snowmaker. He sprays snow all over the back yard, loving it, wearing a robe and ascot. As we get a montage, someone explains to the family that they're going to have snow and reindeer and elves (midgets, we see) for this party they're throwing. More shots of the party. Dogs run. Chanukah celebration. Someone cooks something. Servers. Guests. Sharon tells Kelly about the party. Ozzy arrives. Sharon lies to Kelly, saying that "really, really fun people" will be at the party. We see the above people arriving. No party that Jonathan Lipnicki shows up at could possibly be fun. Ozzy chats with Triumph the puppet.
On their stairwell, Sharon and Ozzy toast the crowd, saying they wish their holiday dreams come true, blah blah blah fruitcakes. Eva Mendes sees the camera and purses her lips as far as they'll go without breaking off. Where's David Spade? Really. He should fire his manager -- this is exactly his crowd and he's not invited. Just shoot him.
Wow, I really didn't know this was just going to actually be a party that they just film. This sucks. And then it sucks infinitely more when Tracy Morgan comes in dressed as Santa. I want to go home. Oh wait, I am home. I want them to go away. Unfunny Claus gives Kelly and Jack gifts. Tracy gets Jack an afro pick. Ha, for his big hair. Get it? Sharon gets some "Bling Crosby" or some shit the crazy man is talking about. Whatever. It's jewelry. I'm trying hard to find Tracy's jokes, but just like watching the last five years on SNL, I can't. He says he didn't want to feud with Kelly...so he got her some money. Sharon asks why it's "47" dollars he hands Kelly. He says Santa got hungry and bought himself a burrito on the way over. Okay, I guess I "see" the joke there. I'm just not sure it's funny. They keep cutting to Carmen Electra -- the only one at the party actually paying attention to any of this shit. Man, Jack looks like he wishes he could be out back doing some Oxy with Dill and the midgets. Tracy wants Kelly to sit on his lap. He's the one.
Shot of a mini train. Partygoers. Partygoers. Dave Navarro and Carmen Electra. Sharon is telling Carmen how to make cookies and keep her man happy and Ozzy keeps ruining the shot, drunkenly saying, "No, I'm not," in response to nothing. Doesn't even make sense. See, most women who have alcoholic husbands hide them away and try to keep private their most drunken and embarrassing times. To Sharon, that's camera-time.
Boobilicious Kelly sits on Unfunny Claus's lap. Something about gold records and Santa being black.
Back to cooking. Ozzy whisks.
Back to Tracy. Triumph insults his acting. Tracy looks genuinely hurt.
Whisking. Ozzy says Sharon's the woman so she should be doing this. Then for some reason, Eddie Griffin comes by and tries to take over and do his shtick that's so tired it never even woke up. He proceeds to pour salt all over the place and fuck up the cookies. The funny part is, people are actually standing around watching. This is the worst party ever. Ozzy just walks away from Griffin's shtick.
Unfunny Claus has Jack cornered now. Jack wants a $30 million distribution deal, and a hooker. He tells Jack not to break the non-existent hooker. Jack leaves. Tracy makes a "Ho Ho Ho" joke ("Ho's" -- get it?) and then has to explain it to the camera.
Up . Mandy Moore. Jack and Kelly get in the spirit. Ozzy tries to put lights together, and...you know what, who cares? Some shit is going to happen. You can wait. Commercials.
Oh boy. A new season starts on January 13th! It's going to be ATV-riffic!
Ozzy and Sharon sing "Jingle Bells" until he says that this is fucking stupid and stops. Ozzy tangles with lights. Totally staged. He says, "Sharon!" and walks away, muttering.
Dancing and singing chipmunks. Ozzy calls them stupid. He pounds on a laughing and dancing bear. Trash-talking gorilla. Ozzy hates it. He throws the dolls outside. Lola and a new bulldog (?) fight over them. Ozzy goes to Jack's door -- a trash-talking wreath talks shit, and Ozzy eventually walks away. Unfortunately, I can't do as much from this show.
Daytime now. Mandy Moore is at the door with gifts. For some reason Jack tells her to go away. In this lame staged thing, Mandy supposedly comes by every year to get the gloomy Kelly and Jack to wrap presents and stuff stockings and get in the Christmas mood. Mandy says nothing is going to get her down this year. Kelly says she does this each year and they hate Christmas -- but she says it's different this year. She gives Jack a gift which he throws away. Montage! Mandy makes snow angels with paper and scissors. Kelly cuts one in half. Mandy rolls out dough; Jack puts Lola up on the counter to eat it. Mandy's cookies are done; Jack laughs, because I guess she's eating dog-tainted cookies maybe? Mandy makes a wholesome letter to Santa. Kelly swears in hers. "No no no no no," Mandy says. It's great that they judged that Mandy ad-lib to be good enough to keep. What is the criteria? And what is a bad Mandy-ad lib, then? Jack shows up with a mistletoe cap. He chases her around the kitchen trying to hump her. But Mandy loves God and her cross-eyed boyfriend, so she won't do him. Now they make stockings. Sharon comes in, and they hold them up. Kelly's and Jack's make it so the three together read, "Mandy This Sucks." They're missing a comma, but who am I to nitpick? "No no no," Mandy repeats again. Hey, if it works for you once...
Now the kids string popcorn. We see they've tied Mandy up. She Hulks out and breaks free of the Binds of Terrible Sketch Comedy With Non-Actors and jumps up, swearing at Kelly and Jack and the dogs. "Fuck you, I'm out of here," she says. Kelly and Jack watch TV.
Party again. Carolers. Petting zoo. Same footage of the midgets. One of the carolers starts coughing. Ozzy gets a kick out of Triumph. The dog makes jokes...no, he doesn't. He just calls Christmas bullshit.
Inside. Ozzy and Triumph sing a duet of "Cats Are Cunts." It's a tiny bit funny. People laugh. Carmen loves the camera. The feeling isn't mutual. They keep singing "Cats Are Cunts." Bob Smigel loves plugging his album. He loves money like Sharon does. Isn't Smigel the name of the Hobbit dude's bad side? It's fitting.
Eddie Griffin and Unfunny Claus do some "Yes, And..."-ing. I think it has something to do with Eddie having had an affair with Mrs. Claus, but Unfunny isn't mad. Stee isn't laughing.
Commercials.
Day. House. Sharon is going to dress Lola up. And Peggy-Sue, the new bulldog. A dog dresser comes over with clothes. Holy shit. The dogs all get dresses and suits. Holy moly, Sharon is batshit. Minnie tries to bite Kelly. What a wretched dog. I wish Jack had really killed her. Martin also tries to bite Kelly. Dogs can smell evil. Kelly asks why Martin is such a dick. Man, after all the scripted shit, this batshit-crazy but real stuff is so refreshing. Some other bulldog is Santa. Are there three bulldogs? I'm lost.
Kelly brings Lola in to see Ozzy in the home recording studio, where he's with some guys screaming into the mic. Ozzy sees the dog and laughs. As always, tons of people are around. Sharon comes in and shows off the other stupider dogs. Ozzy apologizes to the dogs for getting tortured like this by Sharon. Ozzy shouldn't be the only one.
Party again. A girl who looks like Tori Amos or one of the Olsen twins stands around. Yeah, good times.
(Why the hell can't the captioning group get their shit together? The only shows that need to have bad recapping are real-time events like sports or the news. This is a taped show, and the captioning is a jumbly mess. Get your shit together. Thank you.)
I spoke too soon about the "good times." Here comes The Strange Case That Is Adam Carolla. So quick-witted and funny on the radio -- I really enjoy listening to him on "Loveline." But oh so bitterly unfunny and off-putting in person. Perhaps it's because he's so unpleasant to look at. Could that be it? I don't know. There are lots of unpleasant-looking comedians. I think he just has a brand of humor that his face doesn't support. It's a biting-wit thing that his appearance somehow nullifies. Let me know if you have any ideas. Anyway, he makes a bad joke about how their kitchen is bigger than his whole house. He's in the kitchen with Jack, and he's going to show him how to make cranberry sauce. He hates canned sauce. Jack agrees. Poor Jack. He's looking like Dame Edna more every day. In reference to a hat with ornaments dangling off it, Adam Carolla makes a joke about not having had balls on his head since...and in the waiting for that punchline, I quickly thought, "Okay, Carolla is going to prove my point about how he can be really funny, because this is such a hack set-up, he's going to twist it at the last minute and left-field me into hysterics." No such luck. He says, "Since I was going for the writer gig on the new Kimmel show." Eh. Even he had to codicil that one with, "A little ball humor there." A very little.
Carolla makes the sauce and puts it onto the stove. He talks about unsweetened cranberry juice, and realizing that's going nowhere, starts ribbing Jack for being in recovery. Carolla calls the mixture "fried hell in a hand basket." Wow. Jack promises he'll make the stuff, and Carolla says he'll see him for Easter. Then he tells Jack, "I'll see you in hell." Whoa. That's not very cool.
Party. Party. Carmen Electra sits on Unfunny Claus's lap. Oh no, it's Eva Mendes. She asks if he's drunk. He tries to make her touch his candy cane. Sharon is nosy, butting into everyone's conversations. She tries to show the camera the dog's dress, but the cameraman doesn't even care.
We get a quick shot of something so disturbing, I can't talk about it right now. But it rhymes with "Onathan Ipnicki," and it hasn't aged well. It also may have something to do with looking exactly like a Sleestak, but we'll talk about it later.
Triumph sings with the dogs. The dogs jump at the puppet as he does shtick about "eating ass." He says that just because Anthony Anderson is the most famous person here, it doesn't mean the bar is lowered for quality. First of all -- ha. Second of all -- the quality bar couldn't be lower at this point. MVP: Most Valuable Primate had a higher quality bar.
Triumph does shtick with Anthony Anderson, asking him what he does. He says he does nothing. Triumph says that Ozzy is Satanic and A.A. is "a black mass." Hm.
Now we get a singing of "The Twelve Days of Christmas" with floaty quasi-celebrity heads in a computerized wintery landscape. Ozzy sings the first day. He's very loud and happy -- probably sober for once. Brendan Fraser decides to sing the second day in a totally different key. Kelly skips to fourth day, and is way out of her limited range; wow, her voice sounds bad here. Then someone sings the third day, but I'm not sure who it is. Mandy Moore, maybe? Brittany Snow? Then Triumph. Then the heroin addict Jason Mews (I think -- not that I just "think" Jason Mews is a heroin addict, I just think that's him, since they didn't pimp him at the beginning) with some high girl hanging on him and some Background Dude. Then Eddie Griffin way too close. Big Boi. The snoochie-boochies again. Wilmer (in what will be his sole appearance in the entire special). Ozzy. Sharon. Triumph. Snoochies. Big Boi with his mouth full of fronts and his elocution not what it used to be, before the fronts and the weed. Anthony Anderson actually sings, and pretty well. Whoa! JC Chasez looks crazy -- like David Copperfield. The girl who I've since found out is indeed Brittany Snow, from some NBC show I've never seen. Sharon. Jack. Mike Myers. (Mike Myers? I guess they did his movie.) Triumph. And then: Jonathan friggin' Lipnicki, dressed like Vanilla Ice. Holy shit! See, I didn't want to ruin it before. He looks crazy! All lispy and awkward, with braces and a Mohawk and old woman sunglasses and a hood and a gold chain. Holy shit. (Now, in his defense, I dressed a little bit like that when I was in seventh grade. But then in my defense, I didn't have agents or managers telling me to step away from the mousse.) Anthony Anderson, singing his fucking talented heart out. Kelly. JC. Brittany Snow. Ozzy swearing. Tracy Morgan singing all soft and sweet. Not trying to be funny, but being funny, which is sort of his comedy M.O. Triumph. Rob Zombie. Mike Myers. Mewes. Anderson. Triumph, making a "Tony Danza sucks" joke. Timely. Kelly. JC, trying to really sing and failing. Brendan. Lola. Anthony Anderson. Triumph, this time a Cher joke. (Not everything rhymes with "poop.") Tracy Morgan. I'm so tired. So very tired. Mike Myers. Triumph. Lisp-nicki! Poor kid had to say "geese," a word that strikes fear into the lispy pubescents everywhere. Anthony Anderson. Kelly. Snow. Triumph. Poop jokes again. And Ozzy ends it. Wow. That was something amazing. Commercials.
House. Sharon tells the bitchy Kelly that they have to have a fitting for the Christmas show for Kelly. She is happy about having new clothes, but she doesn't want to wear Christmas-y clothes. They talk about Santa hats and shit. Sharon assures her. Sharon smiles evilly. CUT TO: the designer trying to Punk her, showing her ugly clothes. Kelly tries to play along, but it's a lame joke. Finally Kelly just walks away. But she has to stay for the family and continue the bit. Feh.
Party. Ozzy introduces Kelly. She gets up and sings "Have Yourself A Merry A Little Christmas." She sounds all right, except her "troubles" with the high notes are anything but "out of sight." During this we get black-and-white shots of past Osbourne Christmases. As Kelly sings actually pretty all right, Eddie Griffin almost falls asleep. The montage continues. The singing. The glass breaking. Hm. That was shockingly decent. I'm immediately deeply suspicious.
The party continues. C-list celebrities everywhere. Triumph. Doesn't Smigel get tired of himself?
Living room. The quasi-somebodies are gathered to do a reading of "'Twas The Night Before Christmas." JC says, "Dudes." Electra reads. Tracy Morgan ghettos it up, adding a reference to "Cristall." Eddie Griffin goes one step better, adding "blings" and "hos." Fantastic. A.A. pretends to laugh. But then he...hm. I guess the black folks get books already doctored? Because he and then Big Boi read nonsense. I'm confused, and I really don't care. Merry Christmas! I'm in the spirit now. Ozzy laughs. He's drunk. They thankfully truncate the shit out of the story, and we barely have to sit through it. Commercials.
Ozzy and Sharon. He spits out some chestnuts, in yet another failed bit.
Practice room. Bitch Boy and Ozzy are there with some daddy-o-looking dude with a beret and a blue and purple goatee. He reminds Ozzy that he's singing a duet with Jessica Simpson and they're going to rehearse Ozzy now. Daddy-o sings the beginning of "Winter Wonderland" in a Woody Allen voice, and Ozzy jumps up and yells about how he's the Prince of Darkness and he's not singing that and Bitch Boy is busting a gut. Others dutifully laugh their asses off. Daddy-o scrambles to keep his job. The piano guy starts again, and Daddy-o tells him it's going to be a comedy bit and Ozzy will sing all evil and Jessica will sing all pretty, and he does it and Ozzy laughs and then asks what's it for (the comedy special, they tell him) and he asks why Kelly can't do it. Because he will indeed do whatever Sharon tells him, that's why.
He runs out and goes to Sharon and yells at her, pissed off. "Think of me, Sharon!" he says. He actually seems pissed, saying that he'll be doing tampon commercials. Poor Ozzy, railing against his rep being tarnished. Sharon and Kelly dutifully let the old man fight the windmills some more until Sharon finally reminds him that there was a song he wanted to do, but he keeps yelling and leaves. Good for him. (Too bad it won't keep.)
Yup. CUT TO: Ozzy singing by the piano, all dressed up in his Bing Crosby hat. Jessica Simpson is there with him. Man, I never watch her dopey show, but she is one good-looking lady. She sexes up to him as she sings "Winter Wonderland."
Now they're in a snowy set, playing with a snowman. Some shtick with the carrot and Ozzy making it a carrot dick. Then they're trimming the tree. Sleighing shtick. Ooh -- in a bit of unfortunate foreshadowing, Ozzy falls off the sleigh onto his back. Yikes. The song continues as they throw snowballs and then hug, and Sharon comes in singing and Ozzy supposedly yells, "Sharon!!!" and...oh god, this is like recapping After M*A*S*H or watching Michael Jordan play basketball with the Wizards. Just a sad gloomy shell with all the joy removed. Ozzy and Jessica sip tea. Singing. Hugging. Clapping. So, that happened.
Triumph does roofie humor with the reindeer. Then the whole party is outside singing "We Wish You A Merry Christmas." The random friends-of-friends and MTV execs look embarrassed to be there. And they should be. The song eventually comes to a limping halt. "Now fuck off!" Ozzy yells, and people semi-laugh, the same laugh when Great-Uncle Jim tells the same joke he's been telling for the last thirty-five years. And...that's it.
Well...hm. What grade to give the show? Hmm...I'm going to have to sleep on that one. See ya!