You know what makes a lot more logical and logistical sense than Lonely Boy and his mousy-sexy English teacher getting busy in the costume closet before the senior play? Music and the Internets! Josh Schwartz understands that. In between working on his already-established television shows (Gossip Girl, The O.C., Chuck), which all function as idiot-box crack to its fans, he has been toiling on a little hypertube gem called Rockville, CA with Alexandra Patsavas, the music supervisor on all his current projects. The web-only series chronicles the obsessive fans, musicians, and industry insiders that frequent a certain divey-yet-charming venue. And each four-six minute episode features a performance by bands some blog already told you to love (i.e. Passion Pit, the Kooks, and the Broken West). So yesterday, we stole a few minutes of Schwartz's time to ask him about SXSW, the forthcoming Gossip Girl spin-off, and how making Rockville helped him recapture his early twenties.--Sharon Steel

Sharon Steel watches the Real World Brooklyn so nobody else has to. Last week, Katelynn cage-danced. This week, Obama gets elected, and the war comes home to Red Hook.

MTV

Uncle Sam in the building

When you watch The Real World: Brooklyn, you have to keep a significant time delay in mind. We've finally reached the beginning of November, when Obamarama invades the Red Hook Castle, just in time to piss off token wingnuts Chet and Scott. But in "Saving Private Ryan," we also learn that the dude we've referred to as our Idiot King has to return for active duty. Sometime in February. That means there's a pretty decent chance he's in Iraq right now. There's no way MTV could have planned this, and we're certain nobody--not the Overlord producers, and least of all Ryan himself--expected it to happen. But it did. Also, Chet got a life-sized cardboard cut-out of himself made at the Fairway supermarket. Of course.

Sharon Steel watches the Real World Brooklyn so nobody else has to. Last week, Chet auditioned for an MTV VJ Slot. This week, a Red Hook castle prankathon!

MTV

Wow, Scott looks ridiculous.

The Chet Show last week was a real meat-and-potatoes kind of episode, so I wasn't surprised when the tenth Real World: Brooklyn, otherwise known as "Pole Dancing and Pedro," turned out to be a blandly edited hour about how Katelynn and Scott Zach Morris are baby-children masquerading as adults who fight like lovahs but are actually BFFs for life. Also, Devyn came out of the phone room--it's like her Life Guru hovel where she goes to meditate on Life Guru things--and screamed at both of them. That was pleasant. Onward!

Every week, Sharon Steel watches the Real World Brooklyn so nobody else has to. Last week, J.D. threw a tantrum. This week, Chet gets his make-up did!

MTV

Says Chet: "I feel like I'm a celebrity in my own mind, and that's a good feeling." Retch.

Something weird happened this week while I was watching The Real World: Brooklyn. There was a Calvin Klein jeans commercial that ran several times. It featured panting models lying half-naked on top of each other. This is normal. What isn't normal is when you are repeatedly forced to notice that MTV has taken to letting companies buy airtime for advertisements that are smuttier than the smut on your DVR. It feels like they're putting a face on all of us. The Real World is very different, now. Different how, you ask? "Dilators, Dresses, and Bow Ties" was an hour-long potpourri of storylines, rounded out by a series of Orville Chetenbacher (he's back like Britney, bitch) asshattery zingers. Perhaps the best yet. In this episode, everyone was a minor player. Each roommate's star glowed like the numbers on my digital alarm clock, which have counted down the hours and days of my heretofore meaningless life to one very special moment: when Chetubular the Morminator finally got to have his make-up professionally did. My friends, some things are worth waiting for.

Every week, Sharon Steel watches the Real World Brooklyn so nobody else has to. Last week, boyfriends, girlfriends, and mice came to visit. This week, the castlemates fight about being dirty. Snore.

J.D. actually throws Devyn's phone in the water when she won't listen to him

Now that The Real World: Brooklyn has covered the oft-charted territory of premature bonding, sexual tension that fizzles, girls vs. boys battling, mice in people's beds, and pee-stick snipping, the roommates have moved on to Phase Six Red Alert, which occurred right on schedule this week. Phase Six consists of smashing things and using that delightful phrase that we've so longed to hear this season: "I'm fed up with a lot of the drama in the house." And so we return once again to a far-away fairyland called Red Hook, where family meetings and chore lists are mandatory because JD a/k/a J. Dingus, Esq. said so; Idiot King Ryan is the next Steven Spielberg; and MTV confirms that, as is often the case, women are secretly much filthier than men.

Every week, Sharon Steel watches the Real World Brooklyn so nobody else has to. Last week, transgender housemate Katelynn repeatedly attacked stripper's poles. This week, boyfriends, girlfriends, and mice come to visit!

Ryan a/k/a the Idiot King and his long-term GF Belle

Did the cast of The Real World: Brooklyn apply for Public Library cards when they moved in? They should have. Because as we all know, King's County is where literary superstars are made, not born. And as we turn the corner of Episode 7, several hard-won alliances are beginning to solidify, separating the literary strongmen from the hack jobs. Not to mention their guests, who are now vacationing at the Red Hook Castle as if it were a regular ol' B&B. This week, Devyn and Idiot King Ryan entertained beaus and Belles! Also this week, Chetubular the Morminator revealed a magical power greater than the ability to summon holograms of abstinence-preaching Fox News pundits out of his satanic coke bottle glasses. Chet isn't destined to be the next Carson Daly, or Ryan Seacrest, or Pete Wentz--or any of the men he loves idolizes. He's Dr. Phil Chetollins, and he just got a $5 million advance for a two-book deal, which totally made aspiring author Idiot King ever so jealous! Lean in close, and let the Morminator whisper sweet nothings of wisdom, along with the secrets of love, life, and the universe, into your willing ears!

Every week, Sharon Steel watches the Real World Brooklyn so nobody else has to. Last week, Chet interviewed Pete Wentz. This week, GIRLS VS. BOYS ZOMG!

Transgender "pioneer" Katelynn hits the stripper pole in Pennsylvania

When you have cameras shoved everywhere but up your butt, and roommates who like to walk around half naked, things on the Real World: Brooklyn can get a little bit, how shall we say, full of the dramz. And since the roommates continue to refuse to cut the King's County tension with a polite, ratings-friendly romp in the sack, there is only one other way to vent their chromosomal friction: GIRLS VS. BOYS ZOMG! This week's Real World was a classic Battle of the Sexes. So pick your team, set aside your dog-eared gender studies text that you studied "on a collegiate level," as dear Devyn would say, and let us guide you in a step-by-step analysis of the differences between fem-bots and cavemen. It won't hurt a bit!

Every week, Sharon Steel watches the Real World Brooklyn so nobody else has to. Last week, Chet acted like a boob instead of touching one. This week, everybody's favorite MTV Morminator interviews Pete Wentz.

A disturbing, self-motivational movement has swept up The Real World: Brooklyn roommates and made them want to, like, do stuff other than drink their faces off and fuck each other. Episode Five revolved around three boys, their silly pranks, heavy emotional burdens, and an Epic Fail dream or two. Scott, a/k/a Zach Morris, would like his roommates to stop behaving as if they're in a close-knit high school clique, and instead compliment his abs more regularly. Idiot King the Bard put his music on hold out of respect for a very sad anniversary. And Chetubular the Morminator takes the lead as our terribly precocious ingénue, truly putting Carrie Bradshaw to shame this week. Watch out, Whitney Port, you cow-eyed vixen, you! Oh, sugar, we're so going down. I'll explain this and much more in our weekly recap, so throw on some classic Fall Out Boy and click on this shit.

Every week, Sharon Steel watches the Real World Brooklyn so nobody else has to. Last week, Ryan sang about a tampon. This week, he dons a mustache while other stuff happens to far less interesting people.

Last night's Real World: Brooklyn only featured about five minutes of Ryan, who we've permanently dubbed King County's Idiot Monarch-Jester, on camera, and the five minutes the overlord producers did show weren't all that ghastly. He is appealing to both the masses and the underground, you see, with an amusing, faux-handlebar mustache--how did he know that nobody in Brooklyn can resist witty facial hair?

For the most part, Episode 4 revolved around Sarah's history of abuse and her terrible relationship with her father. I can't make fun of that, so instead I'm just going to tell you about the Singing Drag Queenie who covered Lee Ann Womack's "I Hope You Dance" at the Pete Wentz Bar, J.D.'s Freaky Friday Flubs, and Chetubular Morminator, who is the one-man Real World version of Tess of the D'Urbervilles. Things dragged more than a little, and I fear it was because Idiot King was denied his due airtime. While I sit with the shame of that statement, huddled in a corner, chewing my hair and choking back tears of indignity, join me for a recap--one in which I enliven boring scenes by inserting famous people and making them better scenes, albeit ones that didn't actually happen. Got it?

We already met the Real World Brooklyn cast members (twice, [cough] three times). Last week, Sharon Steel watched Ryan make out with a drag queen and wash his mouth out with Soap. This week, he sings about a tampon.

Baya and Ryan

There comes a time in every Real World season where an entire episode is dedicated to potential hook-ups and questionable flirtations. And last night was that episode. The sexual tension pits Baya against Ryan, Devyn against Scott, Chett against some Brooklynite model who is ten thousand times out of his league, and Katelynn against her long-distance boyfriend Mike, who likes her so much he pretends she doesn't exist. This week, I watched and wept as the King's County swore in its newest Decider. It's summer in Brooklyn, and the air is thick with heinously inappropriate crushes and fear.