Fame and fortune cookies

We admit it. We're mildly excited about tonight's premiere of Survivor: China. Even though this is the 15th edition of television's most enduringly absurd reality show, and we became bored with its predictable formula, oh, about seven seasons ago.

Fortune says: Enjoy this cookie while watching 16 Americans starve on national television.

Still, we can't help feeling a little thrill each time a new one comes around because maybe this time will be different. Maybe this will be another Borneo, or Panama, or even All-Stars. But if we get any whiff of another Fiji, we'll be flipping channels before the first torch is snuffed.

CBS and Global Television have been trying to build excitement for this season because of its location in China's Jiang Xi province -- they're calling it the first time a major American television show is set "in the most mysterious place on Earth." But will producers take true advantage of the location and play up its Eastern exotica, or will this be like every other edition of Survivor -- a fortune-cookie version of Chinese culture?

The signs are not good. If you were walking by the corner of Yonge and Queen Sts. yesterday, chances are you were handed -- guess what? -- a fortune cookie, branded by the show and by food-court fixture Manchu Wok. Again today, a blond woman in a red satin Chinese brocade top (she wasn't fooling anybody) was handing out the cookies outside the Metro Toronto Convention Centre.

Sigh. At least we can feel relieved, not slighted, that there has yet to be a Survivor: Canada. This only means we can avoid having to shield our eyes during a cringe-worthy season of Mounties, igloos and moose burgers.

Let the Sopranos theorizing begin

(Sopranos spoiler alert - and we really mean it.)

Many of us thought the cable went out when it came to the last few pivotal seconds of last night's series finale of The Sopranos. Between the final scene and the credits, the screen didn't fade to black, it simply went black and stayed that way for several seconds.

Newspaper reporters, given only a few minutes to process the ending of the HBO series before they filed, were left wondering, as Tony Soprano himself might say, "what the f---?" 

But online, amidst complaints that this was the worst episode ever of The Sopranos - including one woman's note that she'd like to send series creator David Chase an invoice for her years of cable bills - and postings of the lyrics of the Journey song "Don't Stop Believing,"  which Tony (James Gandolfini) picked to play on the jukebox in the diner where Carm, A.J. and Meadow were meeting for dinner, another  theory emerged:

Tony Soprano was dead.

To justify this theory many fans, including some on televisionwithoutpity.com, went back to the first episode of the season, at the cottage, where  Bobby and Tony are in the boat. They're talking about what it's like to die. Tony's brother-in-law thinks you don't hear anything; it just goes black.  A flashback to this scene was included in the penultimate episode last week.  Tony was dead, they posited, shot by the suspicious-looking guy in the USA cap last seen entering the bathroom.

There were also a few dream theories: when Tony walked into the diner, didn't he see himself sitting in the booth, waiting for his family? Or was that just a quick jump-cut?

One TWP poster, called DCRob, summed it up this way: "What better way of showing us that Tony's life always hangs by a thread, that everybody and everything around him is full of peril, that the end could come in an instant? And that until that moment arrives, he goes on with the quotidian business of life."

- Tanya Workman

Got your own theory? Use the comments link below.

Graft grief

Anyone want an eyepatch emblazoned with the logo for the new Mark Burnett series Pirate Master (skull and crossbones) and the red, blue and green CTV logo?

How about a poster-sized treasure map of Dominica complete with pictures of the contestants and handy peel-and-stick Xs to place on those "cast adrift"?

These items, sent out by CTV, arrived in the mailboxes of entertainment editors and writers in poster tubes that don't easily into office recycling bins.

VINCE TALOTTA/TORONTO STAR

Some TV swag is very creative and even useful, but still, just send a screener.

They're an example of the "graft" networks send out to promote their wares.

In the past, as former associate editor of Starweek,

I and several of my colleagues have received: a makeshift toolbelt (to promote either Canada's Worst Handyman or Handyman Superstar Challenge,

I can't remember), a roadside assistance kit (for Corner Gas), a mini "Judy" mannequin with scissors in her back (for Project Runway on Life), a chessboard (for CTV's Conrad Black movie), a see-through pen with fake blood in it (for TMN's Dexter) and a stress ball that looked like a brain (for CBS's

now-defunct 3 Lbs.).

Yes, this stuff is kinda neat. Yes, it's all about hype.

Yes, most newspapers have policies about what swag is acceptable to keep.

But seriously, just send me a screener. Even thought it means some very creative (though not always) folks would be out of a job.

That said, the 4-year-old who's going to get my eye patch and stickers thanks you. Arrrr...

-Tanya Workman

It's a stretch

While waiting in line at the recent Hot Docs festival for a screening of Yoga, Inc. -- which explores how the ancient Indian spiritual practice has in the West become an industry that amasses more revenue than Coca-Cola -- I came across an opportune poster stapled to a telephone pole.

Punk rock yoga has made it to Toronto -- at last! "Combining yogic philosophies with a punk rock attitude," participants listen to loud "non-traditional music" while doing their downward dogs.

Is this any more surprising than the myriad of other yoga "innovations" you can find in Toronto and beyond? There's hot yoga, power yoga, yoga for abs, yoga for scuba divers ... And then there's all the trendy yoga accessories that apparently get you that much closer to Nirvana. Oh, and I almost forgot: the exact opposite of punk rock yoga.

But are all these variants any reason to be critical? Are they a sign that we've missed the point of yoga? Perhaps. But in the West, variation was necessary to help yoga catch on -- and now the practice is far more popular here than in its historic home, India. Even if the nature of it has morphed so much as to be an entirely different species.

Yet even if you're doing yoga for the wrong reasons, it's still better for you than, say, watching television.

Yoga, Inc. airs tonight through Sunday at 8 p.m. on the Documentary Channel.

-Ariel Teplitsky

Givin' it 110%

Overheard on the TTC: a group of 20-somethings discussing the latest stripper wannabe to be booted off "reality" show Pussycat Dolls Present: The Search for the Next Doll.

"She couldn't dance," said a guy with hair that would make Sanjaya jealous. "It's 50 per cent dancing, that competition. Fifty per cent dancing and 50 per cent looks."

Then as an afterthought he added, "and singing."

-Shauna Rempel

Knock 'em dead

It’s well known Hollywood lore that one of Kevin Costner’s first feature roles was in 1983’s The Big Chill — as the corpse around whom the plot of old college chums reuniting revolves. It’s arguable that his acting never really broadened beyond this early mute cameo, but still: this was his big break.

And this may be yours: CTV is launching an intriguing contest during tomorrow night’s episode of CSI, the “CSI Miniature Killer Contest,” named after a recurring plot of an elusive serial killer. Over the next three Thursday episodes of CSI, if you “see the doll” (a doll icon will pop up on screen), call 1-866-4730-CSI or go online and enter.

Here’s what you can win: a Costner-worthy cameo in an upcoming episode — as a corpse! That’s pretty cool. The winner, who will also get the requisite trip for two to L.A. and a set tour, will be announced during the season finale, May 17. And if CSI is your Big Chill, what will be your Waterworld?

-Ariel Teplitsky