Armed & Famous Opinion

This show turned out to be more interesting than we thought it would be. For anyone who is not familiar with this show, Armed and Famous takes "D" list Celebrities, and follows them as they go through the Police Academy in Muncie, Indiana, and become real Police Reserve Officers. At first glance the idea of having Eric Estrada, Latoya Jackson, Jack Osbourne, Jason "Wee-Man"Acuna of MTV's JackAss, and former WWE Wrestler Trish Stratus being given guns and let loose on the unsuspecting citizens of Muncie seemed a bit ridiculous. Initially, Sue and I were not going to watch it.

Out of curiosity we decided to watch the first episode last night. I actually got interested in seeing Eric Estrada get zapped with a Taser. The Sergeant that was put in charge of training these Celebs had a look of disgust when they first filed into class. However during the academy training, they had to experience being zapped with the Taser. (The part I was waiting for) Apparently there is a rule that before you are allowed to carry a Taser, you have to have experienced it. All of the "D" listers with one exception opted to have alligator clips applied and then get the 50,000 volt current. Trish Stratus however decided to let the training officers shoot the barbs into her back. She decided that she wanted to know what it really felt like. I applaud that.

On the gun range, Jack Osbourne fired one of the best target scores the T.O's said they had seen in quite some time. The original Training Sergeant admitted that he was impressed how serious the Celebs took the program. Frankly I was kind of surprised that the show didn't suck.

Then they graduated, and were given guns and badges, and sent out on the streets of Muncie with experienced Officers. Latoya Jackson cracked up her partner when they went to a steak restaurant, and Jackson wanted a tablecloth, and a finger bowl. Estrada helped arrest an elderly crack dealer, who went GA GA over being busted by "Ponch" from Chips! Trish Stratus showed compassion when she and her partner helped a family whose home had burned.

They ran another episode tonight. Jackson freaked out when she went on a call in which the complainant owned a cat. Apparently she watched a relative who was attacked by a cat when she was young, and has a phobia about cats. Eric Estrada and his partner had an older woman walk up to their patrol car, and ask him to sign her boob. He was rather taken aback, ( as were we...) The woman reached into her blouse, and I think Estrada thought ( as we did) that she was gong to flop out her breast. The woman pulled out a prosthetic breast. He gamely signed it, while his partner sat there shaking her head, not having a clue how to react.

All in all, I was surprised that these "D" listers actually take this bit seriously. Even Jason "Wee-Man"Acuna whose claim to fame is doing "JackAss" on MTV. Latoya actually went to see a shrink to try to get past her fear of cats, so she could function on the job.
It will be interesting to see how long this thing is set to last. I suspect it's just a limited run show. We may not go out of our way to watch it, but might check it out again.