Only Happy Endings, That's Our Recipe

Finally, we're here.

It's my favorite time of the year. It's like the excitement of my birthday and Christmas all rolled up into a nice little package with a big bow on it. It's like the Superbowl for women and gays worldwide.

Of course, I could only be talking about the Oscars.

I have been a fan of award shows for a long time now, probably since I was in early high school or so. I don't think I became obsessed with them though until I was in college, and I'm pretty sure there's 2 reasons for that:

1. Reese Witherspoon winning for Walk the Line

2. The invention of Facebook

After that, I was hooked. For life. While I find myself generally enamored with all things awards, the Oscars clearly are the biggest and most extravagant of them all, giving a whole new level of excitement to my usual daily celebrity infatuation. However, as much as I love this show, I only really enjoy it if I'm watching it by myself. I have been asked for years why I haven't ever had an Oscar party, and the truth is that while I like a good theme, I love the freedom to watch the show as selfishly as possible. Also I need absolute concentration in order to keep up my barrage of Facebook/Twitter updates.

I've been prepping for this all week. From organizing the pool at work to giving myself a glitzy mani in honor of the occasion, I was beyond ready when 8:30 EST rolled around.

i'd like to thank the academy... and opi

I even put on my very best casual wear. I mean, how hypocritical can you be to watch the most fashionable night of the year in ordinary sweats?

this shirt says "i'm fancy but comfortable"

My husband now finally understands the magnitude of such an occasion that he even made me an Oscar-worthy dinner. Suck on that, Wolfgang.

also he let me eat on the couch. now that's love.

Of course I started with the E! preshow around 2:00, suffering through such time fillers as an undergarment fashion show, a parading of Hollywood's "It" animal actors and Photoshopping actor's heads on runway looks trying to predict who was going to wear what. My main motivation for tuning in is that I love me some Ross Matthews.

At long last it was time for the actual preshow, you know, the one where there's like, actual celebrities on it. Of course the moment that everyone is talking about is when The Dictator's Sacha Baron Cohen poured the "ashes" of his good friend Kim Jong Il onto an unsuspecting Ryan Seacrest. Now I know that many found this to be in poor taste, but after my initial gasp, I sort of loved it because a.) I have always thought that Seacrest is a tool and b.) it was one of the very few spontaneous moments of an otherwise stuffy celebrity lovefest.

how could anyone not have seen this one coming?

While Seacrest clearly didn't get the joke, it was refreshing to see that there are still some people in Hollywood that know how to roll with the punches.

team fey, now and always

The red carpet was filled with it's usual mix of the biggest celebrities of all time and a couple of attendees that made you go "huh?" (Bo Derek? Lea Thompson? Sheila E? Seems like someone got a little loose with the invites this year!)

The biggest couple that everyone was waiting to see were clearly the Jolie-Pitt's. However, since they showed up at the last possible second there was almost no footage of them on the red carpet, which I think truly shows what huge assholes they both are. I get that they're not like a super showy couple and they're all about being appreciated for their "work" and protecting their privacy, but come on. Even if they avoided cameras every day the rest of the year, this should be the one day that they give back to the public a little bit, you know, the people that watch your movies?! Clearly Angie was trying to overcompensate for her complete inability to appear soft or likeable, as she had a smile like the Cheshire cat plastered on her red shellacked lips the entire night. They probably could have sent their wax figures from Madame Tussaud's in their place and we wouldn't have been able to tell the difference.

ugh that damn leg. we'll get to that later

Finally it was time for the show to start. In his usual fashion, host Billy Crystal started with a montage that involved him being a part of the Best Picture nominees. Deja vu? Absolutely, but at least he stuck with what works. That led into a song and dance number. Predictable, but you could have had a that monkey from the preshow up there and it would have been more entertaining that James Franco from last year.

Crystal continued his tried and true bits of witty (but not nasty) banter and the "What Are These Celebrities Thinking?" screenshots. While I felt like this was a show I had already seen (a few times), there's not denying that Crystal was clearly in his element. Was it the most exciting thing in the world? No, but I sort of looked at the whole thing with a "if it's not broke, don't fix it" attitude. That being said, I think it was important for him to steer the show back on track after last year's disaster, but it has the potential to get tired if they try to replicate this recipe every year from now on.

There were of course, a few magical moments. The Best In Show cast Wizard of Oz focus group. Octavia Spencer's emotional acceptance speech. Emma Stone pluckily towering over Ben Stiller. Anytime anyone from Bridesmaids was on screen ever. Even those freaks from Cirque de Soleil were kind of a fun addition to a telecast that otherwise would have had little to no performances on account of the lack of Original Song nominations.

The show was still highly predictable as always, but with a few twists here and there. The only award that I would consider an "upset" (as Hugo and The Artist winning a bazillion awards apiece came as a surprise to no one) was Meryl Streep winning for Best Actress over her former costar Viola Davis. I have to admit, I was sort of starting to doze off at this point (it was a LONG day and I was starting to feel a sinus infection coming on) and this shocked me right out of my semi slumber. Obviously, Streep is amazing in everything she does and already has 2 Oscars and 17 nominations to her name, but sometimes it's just like, isn't that enough? She is going to continue to make amazing movies probably until the day she dies, but the thing that made me kind of sad is that roles like Davis' in The Help only come along once in a great while. Despite the fact that it's two thousand freaking twelve, strong parts for African American actresses really are few and far between. And she had won so many awards for the role already and many critics had her picked as the favorite to win, and I was just slightly disappointed. And by slightly, I mean I gasped and jumped off of my couch in fury.

Another moment that started out as my least favorite and quickly turned into my most favorite was Angelina Jolie's continued pose off with herself that she carried all the way from the red carpet up to the theatre-formally-known-as-Kodak's stage. She just stood there, throwing in everyone's faces how long her legs were, how big her lips were, how thin her arms were, and continued that fake ass smiling the whole way through. I didn't know how much more of her I could take. She looked like an evil Barbie. Also, when did velvet come back? Honestly.

someone's been watching antm

And then all of a sudden, one of those moments happened when you just look up at the Hollywood gods and say "thank you." After announcing them for winning Best Adapted Screenplay for The Descendants, Jim Rash stole the show from his fellow writing partners without even saying a word. If you don't know who he his, clearly you are not watching Community which probably means that there is a huge void in your life and you should stop reading right now and Hulu it, because it will change your life. Well, your TV life, anyway.

this is me smizing, bitches

All in all, I enjoyed the show. It was pretty much what I expected, but it's still always exciting to me. And my favorite part? Mercifully mocking the show and its guests via Facebook statuses. Why? Who knows. Because it's fun. Also because I'm awful sometimes.

Since only my very lucky Facebook friends are so honored to see said statuses, here's a couple of screenshots of some of my favorites posts from last night. Enjoy.

Next up? The fashions. And the un-fashions. Yes, we're saying that now.