Did I Really See That Last Night?

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By Jim Shearer on 03/31/2009

Filed under: HODGEPODGE

Though I'm currently battling flu-like symptoms, I'm pretty sure I saw what I think I saw last night:

While casually watching an all-new episode of House--where the brutally honest Dr. House and his crew of medical mystery solvers were trying to crack the case of a comatose man--I realized the patient they were pricking and prodding was none other than Mos Def.

He communicated throughout the episode by guiding a yes-or-no computer cursor with his brain waves. A good portion of the episode was also seen through the perspective of Mos Def's eyes--kind of like the scene in The Christmas Story when Ralphie visits Santa Claus at the mall (or The Prodigy's "Smack My Bitch Up" music video). Think that's wierd? I didn't even get into the hallucination scenes.

(above: Is Mos Def in the house? No, but he was on House.)

During a commercial break, Metallica--yes, Metall-fuckin'-ca--then appeared on a commercial for Guitar Hero, facing down a group of legendary college basketball coaches who were dressed like Tom Cruise in Risky Business. Creator of St. Anger, James Hetfield, even gets into it with the patron saint of anger, Bobby Knight.

Moments later, another commercial came on hyping up a Fox variety show featuring, guess who? Ozzy Osbourne--frontman of heavy metal pioneers Black Sabbath. I know the Osbournes did a Pepsi commercial with Donny and Marie Osmond a few years back, but who would have ever thought they'd steal a page from their variety show playbook?

Mos Def and Metallica actually held their own (at least Metallica got to blow up a house at the end of their commercial), but the Osbourne variety hour, Osbourne's Reloaded, well, looks un-watchable.

I'm still trying to figure out if this really happened last night (?). Next thing you know Prince is going to be doing Target commercials...