[Many of you commented on certain mysterious changes noticed during last week's episode of The Soup. Head Writer and Executive Producer, KP Anderson, wades shin-deep into the blog to respond.]

Hi everyone. As you may have read or heard, Joel McHale is on location in Illinois shooting a movie, and we are coming to him to shoot the show at a secret, undisclosed location in St. Louis. As you know, we don’t take much time off from the show and are, in fact, slowly trying to destroy Joel the way they did Judy Garland. At any rate, the thing about secret, undisclosed locations is that they seldom come with the same studio lighting, makeup and wardrobe we get when we play on our home field. So that would probably account for the astute observations you've all made regarding Joel’s look.

Mostly, it’s a lighting issue that we will be trying to adjust as we head back to St. Louis this week for our second, and final, shoot out there. The staff and crew at the secret, undisclosed location are awesome and have treated us incredibly well as did the small but lively audience who were held at gunpoint and forced to watch.

As for Joel’s chest hair, I know. You should smell it.

We leave you now to your posts and promise to never read again. Seriously, say what you feel no matter how it hurts us. We don’t even look at it. Ever.

Best,
KP Anderson
Exec Producer/Head Writer
Location Studio Lighting Expert

AP Photo/Ric Feld

Oh look, it's Friday, and that means it time to take another lucky dip into The Soup's mail pouch and see which missives we've been missing. As always, if we haven't answered your question here, it was only due to the limits of time and space and probably not out of an unresolved act of vengeance. Unless your name is Mindy Cohn. Yes, we're still holding a grudge. Some things can never be forgiven.

vacrn127 asks: Hey, I am a huge fan of the show, and I live across the street from E! studios. Wondering if you give any tours or allow people to watch taping.

You are more than welcome to continue watching tapings in the same manner that you always have, via a high-powered telescope which you keep on your balcony. If we could ask one thing of you though, please, just tighten up the belt on that bathrobe a bit.

conlan27 asks: Have you considered changing the name of "Chat Stew" segment to "Crock of Chat"?

Not yet. But let's consider it now. Hmmm. OK, and we're done here.

buggie98 asks: I think the soup is the best show on the planet but what I want to know is if you have any bloopers and if so please send them to me

Keep Reading

Well, if you aren't thoroughly offended, disgusted, discomfited or spent, you can watch this clip and more of a perhaps similar character on tonight's episode of The Soup.

Corbis, iStock

This morning, while jogging through the Internet’s myriad vaults, we stumbled onto a Reuters/Hollywood Reporter interview with Fox president of alternative entertainment Mike Darnell. It's he who must bear ultimate responsibility for such reality television nadirs as Who’s Your Daddy?, Temptation Island, The Swan and, most recently, The Moment of Truth. No doubt, badges of pride to him, all.

It’s an enjoyable interview; Mr. Darnell is well-spoken and we found his bald-faced forthrightness rather amusing. It took until the piece’s penultimate exchange before we were stunned back into real reality and forced to question our complicity as media consumers.

Read on with caution, as we didn't make this next part up.

Darnell: Female Prison Beauty Pageant. It was done in Croatia and is a big number waiting to happen. It's empowering to women; it's empowering to prisoners. The whole idea of going from prisoner to hot babe is interesting.

Female Prison Beauty Pageant? Really? In spite of Mr. Darnell’s claim, we fail to see how this could possibly be empowering to either women or prisoners, much less both. And, even so, we aren't convinced it’s really such a good idea to empower prisoners. Seems kind of like the opposite of what you’d want to achieve there.

Of course, following this logic to the finish line, the season finale could be amazing!

Just imagine: a maddened throng of hardened female criminals, decked out in shimmering ball gowns and sparkling tiaras, vengeance-filled invectives spilling from their rubied lips! They storm the warden’s office and set fire to the guard’s station. An appropriated cargo van bursts through the chain-link fence surrounding the penitentiary! Behind the wheel, Miss Incarcerated 2008 bears down on the film crew. Grips, camera operators and craft services scatter! One man maintains his resolve, seemingly apathetic to the certain doom coming down hard upon him. It is, of course, Fox president of alternative entertainment Mike Darnell. The van comes to a sudden and screeching halt—the front bumper just inches away from the blood-rusted, pitchfork-gripped in Mr. Darnell’s left hand. Sprouting a pair of massive, leathery wings, he lifts his cloven hooves from the sodden earth beneath him and sends a blazing rain of hellfire down upon the whole lot beneath him. Souls screaming in agony! Ratings through the roof.

Yesterday we mocked you, Jason Castro, and in today’s clip, you see the results through your strange, emotionless glassy-eyed stare. Sail on, sailor. Though your fans may have abandoned you, your peers physically dragged away by a seemingly terrified host—watch how Seacrest keeps himself and Syesha out of striking range—just know that you’ll always have a place in the hearts of...Oh, we’ve already forgotten who we’re talking about here.

Inexplicable American Idol finalist Jason Castro giggled and shrugged his crazy-eyed way through a severe dressing down this week, after a performance labeled both “atrocious” and “a massacre.” When asked to explain himself, J.C. provided what seemed like a charmingly off-the-cuff answer, but does anyone else get the feeling this may not be the first time he’s used that excuse? “Jason, you just ate a handful of dryer lint! What were you thinking?” “I was thinking...Bob Marley!” Don’t feel too bad for Jason, though. Something about him makes us think he won’t be retaining much short-term memory of the event.

Thinkstock/Corbis

Sorry for the delay.

Congratulations to The Soup Blog reader and all around correct answerer, Nickyechick! Enjoy your notoriety while it lasts—happiness is fleeting.

Clog Narter was, in fact, on The View. Specifically, we found ourself seated between Whoopi Goldberg and Joy Behar.

On our left is happiness by another name...Joy.

On our right is an exclamation of the same...Whoopi.

Three more sit to the left of the first...Sherri Shepherd, Elisabeth Hasselbeck and Barbara Walters.

The ends are bad but the middle is the worst...no comment.

Thanks to all participants! We'd say this was a rousing success as someone actually divined the answer from our purposefully obscure clue. Watch for further installments, as soon as we feel like making them.

Photodisc, Paramount Pictures

[The Soup Blog is pleased to present the first in what we anticipate will be additional postings from our guest reporter, Your Mom.]

Hi hon, it’s your mom. How’s everything going? I hope you and Gordon aren’t still fighting. Well, anyway...Last night, your father and I went to see that new movie out called The Iron Men. Obviously, not my cup of coffee in the morning but Don really wanted to see it for some reason and getting him out of the house on a weeknight happens about as frequently as a phone call from your brother. So, I took the opportunity. We had a pretty good dinner at the Sizzler. Not my choice either but it was right there next to the movie theater in the mall and, well, you know your father. He’d eat a hubcap if it came with a side of ranch dressing. I had a chicken Caesar. It was just OK. I had a little heartburn last night, but I don't know if it was from the salad or something else. Well, it was a pretty good movie anyway. You know who was in it was that actress, she’s tall and thin and, oh, I can’t remember her name but she had red hair just like you used to in this one. I wish you’d put your hair back to its natural color. You always had such beautiful hair as a child. Everybody thought so. Well, anyway...in the movie the main guy, who I also know I’ve seen somewhere before, he makes a robot that he can fly around in and punch up some bad guys. Pretty cool! I bet Gord would love it. Well, your dad fell asleep about two-thirds in and if the movie wasn’t so loud I’m sure there would have been a LOT of complaints because he was snoring, of course, and you know what that sounds like. I guess I’ve gotten used to it now...I hardly even notice it anymore. Well, anyway...lotsa love to you and Gord. Oh, and when are you going to send me pictures of the new puppy? I want to see him! OK, write back or call or just come visit even, but if you do, promise that you'll bring that little doggers with you, all right?

Love,
Your Mom

Extra’s hard-hitting reporters nail their own hard-hitting Extra reporter Mario Lopez to the wall over his duplicitous allegations of public decorum. In Mario’s defense, while the unyielding fact finders were able to collate countless examples of Mr. Lopez in various states of flexed and oiled shirtlessness, exactly none of them show any evidence of “run(ning) around.” You may have won this time, Dimples, but if we know Extra, this battle—and by battle, we mean showing creepy videos of you with your shirt off—is far from over.

Mankini. There, we’ve said it. While no one has yet been able to pin down exactly why this enigmatic creature has become the dominant cultural magnet of our time, we here at The Soup Blog have our suspicions—most of which revolve around the fact that he repeatedly appears on television sans shirtwear. Recently, your humble correspondent had the opportunity to sit down across a virtual table and engage Mankini in a freewheeling email conversation to find out just what makes him hum, beep and whir. The results, as you could well imagine, were both wholly unexpected and somewhat surprising.

You died last year, how are you feeling today?
Well, when you die, you gain a ton of perspective. So I guess, I’m feeling extra perspectivey.

Keep Reading

On VH1’s Celebracadabra (apparently that’s a show), the usual assortment of questionable celebrities train to become magicians and win $100,000. Yes, it has come to this. Trouble occurs this week when ANT refuses to enter a costume shop due to a paralyzing—and evidently, snippy—coulrophobia. While he maintains that “it’s a clinical fear,” we wonder if it’s not just another example of self-centered clown intolerance. You know, ANT, just because some clowns are sneering evil demons, it doesn’t mean they all want to devour you. Get over yourself, already.

Thinkstock/Corbis

In a brand-new idea that has never been done before anywhere—who's Matt Lauer? Never heard of him—we proudly commence what we hope to be an intermittent feature here on The Soup Blog. Each time we decide to post this, Clog Narter will be hidden in a non-geographical location. (Read that last bit again, it’s very important.) The first of you lucky people to post the correct answer in the not-really-working-all-that-well Comments section below wins absolutely nothing! Appealing, no? Appalling, yes!

Based on the following clue, can you guess where Clog Narter is?

On our left is happiness by another name,

On our right is an exclamation of the same.

Three more sit to the left of the first,

The ends are bad but the middle is the worst.

Again we ask, Where in the World is Clog Narter?

(Answer to be revealed on Tuesday, May 6, just after lunch PST.)