With summer coming, all of us are beginning to worry about our bikini bodies and what we can do to lose weight fast. There are many diets out there that have reached popularity, but have negative health effects. Plus, they may not be effective in the long run.

One old diet is the Cotton Ball Diet. The cotton ball diet is exactly what it sounds like: you eat cotton balls, either by themselves or soaked in gelatin. The idea is to fill up your stomach with something that will take away hunger but not add any calories. However, the cotton ball diet deprives your body of key nutrients. Even the fiber that people believe they are getting isn’t the type of fiber necessary to sustain bodily functions. Not to mention the inevitable digestion problems.

Another old diet it the Tapeworm Diet. Before being banned in the United States, Fly by Night, Inc. sold pills called Megaslim that supposedly contained a live tapeworm. You could eat as much as you want, and the tapeworm would absorb at least half of the calories for you. Yet tapeworms may not actually eat enough of what you ingest to make you lose weight, and can cause bad infections, malnutrition, and even death by reaching other parts of your body, like your heart or brain, through your bloodstream.

New diets, reinforced by celebrities, are reaching popularity as well. The Lemonade Diet, also called the Master Cleanse, involves drinking a mixture of freshly squeezed lemon juice, syrup, purified water, and cayenne pepper for ten days.

The purpose is to cleanse the colon of built-up toxins while making the dieter feel younger and more energized. Beyoncé made this diet popular when she announced that she lost twenty pounds for the set of DreamGirls. However, after ten days on this diet you verge on starvation. Beyoncé herself says she wouldn’t recommend this diet for anyone.

The Cabbage Soup Diet involves one week of eating cabbage soup, water, and vitamins. The soup consists of cabbage, peppers, onion, tomatoes, carrots, mushroom, celery, and spices. You can eat as much as you want of this soup, but nothing else. Some celebrities like Sarah Michelle Gellar have reported results about this diet. You burn more calories digesting these foods than eating them.

The Grapefruit Diet, in which you eat nothing except one grapefruit per meal and a lot of water, is based on the principle of cutting back carbohydrates. A variation of this diet is to eat a grapefruit before every meal to cut back on meal size. The grapefruit can be replaced with any other fruit or vegetable.

Dieters average losing about ten pounds in a twelve day period. Yet this diet averages about 800 calories a day. The minimum calorie goal is much higher, and depends on the dieter’s height and weight. Similarly, both Reese Witherspoon and Jennifer Aniston support the Baby Food Diet, with which you replace two or three meals a day with jars of baby food.

You can also have one adult meal and snack on the baby food all throughout the day instead. This diet cuts out a lot of the fillers and added ingredients that adult food features. It also cuts out too many calories: dieters eat less than they should.

The goal with any of these diets is to shed pounds fast, and see immediate results. Yet most of these pounds come from water weight-dieters are likely to gain it all back once they begin to eat regularly again! Plus, most of them deprive your body of key nutrients and starve you, which could have damaging effects on other internal organs if used too drastically or longer than recommended.

Make sure to talk to a doctor if you are going to attempt one of these diets. It is much healthier to simply watch what you eat, cut out fatty or processed food, and exercise regularly. Those pounds have a chance of staying off, even if it takes a longer time.

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On Tuesday April 17, the first season finale of The CW’s ‘Ringer’ aired, and many have doubted if the series will live to see a season two. Despite premiering to a strong figure of 2.8 million viewers in September, the ratings have been in a steady and ultimately precipitous decline to the point where just 1.16 million viewers watched Tuesday’s finale. The fate of the series is now in serious question.

This all marks quite a contrast from this time one year ago when ‘Ringer’ was one of the most buzzed-about and eagerly-awaited new pilots. It marked star Sarah Michelle Gellar’s return to series television after an eight-year break following a seven-year run on the critically-beloved ‘Buffy the Vampire Slayer’, and brought together an eclectic supporting cast including Welsh actor Ioan Gruffudd and ‘Lost’ star Nestor Carbonell.

Originally developed for CBS by ‘Supernatural’ writers Eric Charmelo and Nicole Snyder, the series features Gellar in a dual role as twin sisters Bridget and Siobhan. In the pilot, Bridget, a recovering drug addict and former prostitute, was set to testify against a murderer when fear for her own life prompted her to contact her estranged, not to mention extremely affluent, sister Siobhan for protection.

However, once reunited, Siobhan faked her own death for unknown reasons and Bridget in turn assumed her sister’s identity in an effort to escape from her predicament, but consequently placed herself in even more danger due to her sister’s own problems.

The plot itself is perhaps indicative of why ‘Ringer’ failed to connect with a mass audience. From the first episode alone, ‘Ringer’ featured a convoluted story and a multitude of storylines. As the season progressed, further twists were introduced including, but not limited to: affairs, kidnappings, murders, corporate blackmail, faked assaults, and a paternity mystery which was not resolved until Tuesday’s finale.

With every twist, ‘Ringer’ became more and more of a plot-driven series which relied on sensationalism and shock-value as a means of compensating for its under-developed characters and rushed narrative developments.

Add this to the fact that ‘Ringer’ was paired on The CW’s schedule with the younger-skewing ’90210′, and that it aired opposite heavyweights ‘The Voice’, ‘Dancing With the Stars’, and ‘NCIS: Los Angeles’ which cumulatively attract upwards of 35 million viewers, and it becomes clear that ‘Ringer’ was not in the position to come out of the gate with an intricate premise which depended upon undivided attention from its audience from the get-go.

To make things even more challenging for the creative team behind the series, The CW placed ‘Ringer’ on a nine-week hiatus in the middle of its season, meaning that production on much of the second half of the season went on without any audience feedback.

Once ‘Ringer’ returned to the schedule at the end of January, it was too late to make any changes, and all The CW has been able to do is to sit back and watch the ratings drop in a year where almost all of its other series have been in significant ratings decline.

‘Gossip Girl’, ‘Nikita’, ’90210′ and newcomer ‘Hart of Dixie’ are all hovering around similarly low levels, but none had the expectations of success that ‘Ringer’ had, nor did they have the spectre of Gellar’s cult-classic ‘Buffy the Vampire Slayer’ looming over their heads.

Now with its season wrapped well before May sweeps, a renewal for ‘Ringer’ is looking less and less likely. Even if The CW did consider giving it a last-minute pick-up, the new season would not premiere until September, meaning that the series would be off the air for at least five months, a break twice as long as the one ‘Ringer’ already went through this season and which already proved detrimental to any ratings momentum ‘Ringer’ may have had in its early weeks.

It would take a giant leap of faith on the network’s part, and an even larger creative restructuring behind-the-scenes for ‘Ringer’ to live to see another season.

The article ‘Ringer’ – TV’s Biggest Disappointment appeared first on The Toonari Post - News, Powered by the People!.

I hate to say it, but I think Issue 7 is where Season 9 jumps the shark. Issue 6 tempted us with a potentially juicy plotline with plenty of character development. But in this issue, Buffy and Spike kvetch about their relationship for the billionth time, giant bugs fly around in spaceships, and the issue ends on a truly facepalm-worthy note.

At the end of issue 6, Buffy decided to have an abortion after discovering that she had become pregnant. Rather than follow up on that dramatic decision right away, Issue 7 opens with a pointless scene involving Buffy’s inane roommates (apparently, their names are ‘Tumble’ and ‘Anaheed,’ but I prefer to think of them as ‘Hipster Chick’ and ‘Guy Who Looks Like Stephen Stills from Scott Pilgrim’).

Earlier, they freaked out when they learned that they were living with the Slayer and decided to vote her out of the apartment a la Survivor. But lo and behold, both of them ended up voting in Buffy’s favor when push came to shove. They go to tell Buffy about her reprieve, only to find her stuff in boxes.

It turns out that Buffy has found some new digs. She is now living on an alien spaceship belonging to Spike, her on-again/off-again vampire sex toy. Not only does Spike have a spaceship, but it is crewed by a bunch of giant talking bugs. After some more pregnancy angst (which seems like more of a plot device than genuine emotion), Buffy segues neatly into relationship angst with Spike.

Buffy whines about her desire for a normal life, Spike complains that Buffy is using him, and I roll my eyes because we have all heard this conversation a billion times before. Seriously, these two are stuck in some sort of emotional Groundhog Day where they are doomed to have the same arguments over and over — and over again. Come to think of it, that pretty much describes all of Buffy’s relationships.

Since this is, after all, an issue of Buffy the Vampire Slayer, there has to be a battle. Sure enough, Detective Dowling soon comes under attack by a bunch of zompires. Like all law enforcement officials in the Buffyverse, he is incompetent and unable to defend himself, so he radios Spike for help. Spike naturally obliges (he is, after all, the new Sensitive Spike™, complete with soul), though he makes Buffy stay behind because of her ‘condition.’ Buffy watches the battle from aboard the spaceship until she remembers that she is the title character and jumps into the fray.

Naturally, she kicks butt, and afterward she and Spike end up having a romantic scene amidst the carnage, and we get to see them natter on about their relationship some more. *Sigh* Just as it is revealed that they both want normal lives, Plot Contrivance rears its ugly head, and a random zompire jumps up and rips Buffy’s arm off. Instead of screaming frantically before passing out due to blood loss, Buffy just stands there looking confused. No, it is not because of her hardy Slayer constitution. Apparently, Buffy is a robot!

This issue felt like a gigantic letdown. Having Buffy grapple with an unexpected pregnancy could have interjected a strong human element to the comic. Instead, we are subjected to a mélange of tired tropes. Spike’s spaceship and its bug crew seem like they were lifted from the pages of a bad sci-fi comic, and Buffy-like robots were done to death on the TV show. To series newcomers, the ending might have been a shock, but series veterans are liable to roll their eyes at yet another Buffybot.

In one of the last panels, ‘Buffy’ says that “I think this means I’m not pregnant,” which suggests that writer Andrew Chambliss could be using the Buffybot as a way to extricate himself from the Buffy-is-pregnant plotline. I suppose it could have been worse: she could have woken up and realized it was all just a dream. Still, it will be a shame if such an intriguing plotline is cut short so abruptly.

The article Buffy The Vampire Slayer: Season 9, Issue 7 appeared first on The Toonari Post - News, Powered by the People!.

The current US television season is only just half-underway, but already the major networks (ABC, CBS, FOX, NBC and the CW) have made the majority of their pilot orders with regards to new programming for the 2012-2013 season.

John Wells, former show-runner of the hit medical drama ER and current show-runner of the cable dramas Shameless and Southland, makes his return to network television with two pilot orders this development season. The first of his pilots is a comedy co-effort with Glee actor Mike O’Malley for FOX, and is currently titled Prodigal Bully.

The premise of the series, if it is picked up beyond its pilot order, would be that of “a young boy genius who uses his brains and brawn to get whatever he wants“. As for Wells’ other pilot, he is developing a remake of the British drama hit Bad Girls for NBC. This series would follow the activities of a group of female prisoners, and ran for seven years in the UK.

Other notable figures to have sold new pilots to the major networks include: JJ Abrams (Lost, Alias, Alcatraz), who has sold Shelter to CW; Josh Schwartz (The O.C., Chuck, Gossip Girl), who will be writing Carrie Diaries, a teenage prequel to the Sex and the City franchise); and NCIS star Mark Harmon, who will be producing Joey Dakota for the CW.

It is unusual that so many pilot orders have taken place by the beginning of February, as several midseason shows have yet to debut for the 2011-2012 season, while the fates of such long-running hits as FOX’s House and NBC’s Law & Order: Special Victims Unit remain uncertain. In any case, the networks appear to be stockpiling in a effort to combat the ratings decline which has struck many of them this season – particularly, The CW.

The CW came into this season with the high-profile television return of Sarah Michelle Gellar, however, its ratings declines have been well-documented and the network has now picked up five drama pilots with the potential pick-up of several more. This aggressive development move is in contrast to CBS which has so far picked up just a handful of projects, although, CBS’ ratings are in a much stronger position.

As the remainder of the 2011-2012 season plays out and the networks learn of the fates of their long-running shows, while also seeing how their new midseasons shows fare among established competition, it will become more clear just how many of the ordered pilots will indeed make it to air in the fall, how many will be benched until midseason and how many will be put out of contention altogether.

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Dark Horse Comics has released Issue 4 of their ongoing continuation of the cult TV show, ‘Buffy the Vampire Slayer’. When we last left our heroine, she had been betrayed by her erstwhile ally, Severin. The issue begins with a flashback showing Severin working his mojo on a vampire in a bid to gain information about his girlfriend, Alessandra. He seems to be able to steal magic from vampires, but in doing so, he kills the underlying human.

A mysterious stranger told Severin that he needed to destroy Buffy. As he lunges to attack her and steal her power, he taunts her in typical Buffy-villain fashion. As they grapple, both the San Francisco Police Department and her former vampire love interest, Spike, converge on her. The former plan to arrest her, while the latter is trying desperately to save her.

This issue turned out to be a bit of a letdown, actually. The writers seemed to be treading water throughout much of the text, and the fight between Buffy and Severin was not terribly dramatic. A bunch of panels showing Severin gripping Buffy while mysterious green energy dances around them does not make for a very compelling fight. It almost felt like the fight scenes were being used as filler in between the scenes that were happening elsewhere in the city.

I do not want to give away too many spoilers, but the end of the issue wraps up the ‘Buffy as fugitive’ plot arc in a way that just felt rushed. It seemed to end because the writers needed it to end, rather than ending in a natural fashion.

The dialogue also seemed to suffer in this issue. There were a number of instances where writer Andrew Chambliss seemed to be trying too hard to capture Joss Whedon’s famed Buffyspeak (worst line of the issue: “I’ve just got to keep with the fighty until you use up all your snap, crackle, and pop.”) With Whedon, it seemed natural; with Chambliss, it tends to feel contrived.

In my review of Issue 3, I noted that the characters sometimes did not resemble the actors who played them on TV. That problem is even more pronounced in Issue 4. Willow has a brief walk-on part towards the end, but you would be hard-pressed to tell that she was once played by Alyson Hannigan. Buffy’s resemblance to Sarah Michelle Gellar is also at an  all-time low in this issue, and she still tends to look like she is twelve years old.

OVERALL GRADE: B-

The article Comic Review: Buffy the Vampire Slayer Season 9 – Issue 4 appeared first on The Toonari Post - News, Powered by the People!.

This week saw the release of the latest installment in Dark Horse Comics’ popular continuation of Buffy the Vampire Slayer. For those of you who have been living under a rock for the past fifteen years, BtVS was a cult TV show that aired from 1997 until 2003. Sarah Michelle Gellar played Buffy Summers, a high school student with a supernatural calling.

As ‘the Slayer,’ she had the duty to protect the world from vampires and other supernatural nasties. Buffy’s friends, Xander (Nicholas Brendon) and Willow (Alyson Hannigan), were in on her secret, too, and they were often called upon to help Buffy out each week as she battled the forces of darkness.

As the seasons wore on, Buffy romanced not one, but two vampires, Willow became a lesbian, and the Summers family was enlarged by the addition of younger sister Dawn (Michelle Trachtenberg), who was actually a sophisticated hiding place for a magical MacGuffin known as The Key.

When the series ended in 2003, Buffy was finally able to destroy the Hellmouth that had turned her hometown of Sunnydale into an evil-magnet for seven seasons. Although Buffy vanished from the small screen, series creator Joss Whedon decided to continue her saga in comic book form.

Teaming up with Dark Horse Comics, he produced a popular series of comic books that functions as an eighth season of the TV show in paper form. Season 8 ran for 40 issues until it came to a dramatic end in January 2011. At the end of the series’ final arc, Buffy smashes a powerful artifact that acts as the source of all magic in the world.

In Season 9, Buffy must adjust to a radically different life. The line of Slayers will come to an end with the demise of the present generation. With magic gone, Willow (who had evolved into a powerful witch during the course of the TV show) can no longer use her spells. Buffy’s life takes a turn for the mundane, and she now works as a waitress in San Francisco, while the other members of the Scooby Gang have scattered.

Although much has changed for Buffy, vampires are still a problem. In Issue 3, Buffy encounters a mysterious stranger named Severin. He has the ability to kill vampires by generating bolts of energy with his hands, something that should not be possible since magic has supposedly vanished from the world.

It soon becomes apparent that the demise of magic is affecting vampires in an unusual way, and newly-sired vampires are even more terrifying than the older versions. Eager for answers, Buffy tries to reconvene the Scooby Gang, but her old friends are reluctant to return to the fray.

The events that ended Season 8 have allowed the writers to ‘reboot’ Buffy in Season 9. Without magic, the characters get to experience something resembling a normal life for the first time in ages, and the new emphasis on mundane life is reminiscent of  Season 1  of the TV show.

Back then, Buffy was a high school student trying to juggle the supernatural business of fighting evil with the more pedestrian demands of life as a teenager.  You can also see echoes of that in Season 9. At one point in Issue 3, there is a nifty callback to the first episode of the show, which I really appreciated.

Overall, I think Issue 3 was quite well done. The story unfolded at a brisk pace and left the reader eager to read the next installment. Scriptwriter Andrew Chambliss has done a decent job of imitating the writing found in the TV show. The only complaint I have is the artwork.

Georges Jeanty’s ability to make the characters look like the actors who played them seems to vary from page to page. He does a nice job of making Willow look like Alyson Hannigan, but Dawn does not really look anything like Michelle Trachtenberg. Also, on some pages, Buffy ends up looking like she is twelve years old. Although these hiccups are fairly minor in and of themselves, they do distract from the overall effect.

OVERALL GRADE: A-

The article Comic Review: Buffy The Vampire Slayer Season 9, Issue 3 appeared first on The Toonari Post - News, Powered by the People!.