Jersey Shore: Two is Better Than One?

“The Godfather: Part II.” “Terminator 2: Judgment Day.” “Aliens.”

Each of these sequels at the very least equaled (or, depending on who you ask, surpassed) the classic original work of art they followed.

Last night brought the second season premiere of “Jersey Shore”, which sought to uphold that lofty tradition after its instant-classic debut season last year.

Did they succeed? Of course not.

But that’s kinda the point of “Jersey Shore.” There are no aspirations of greatness or deep meaning. It’s the TV version of the mindless summer entertainment we usually get at the movie theatre this time of year.

That being said, I’m going to be keeping my eye out for and hoping “Jersey Shore” can avoid the “Hills” conundrum. In case you don’t know what that is (since I just made it up), it refers to what happened to MTV’s other smash-hit reality show, which started off chronicling the lives of clueless unknowns, but eventually became about chronicling the lives of clueless unknowns who’d gotten famous due to their smash-hit MTV reality show, and how they dealt with that fame.

I didn’t get too much of that in the first episode.

Unfortunately, what I did get was WAY too much of my two least favorite things about Jersey Shore: 1.) Angelina 2.) Ronnie/Sammi Sweetheart drama.

And even that followed a mostly tedious 10-15 minute road trip segment with the cast making its way down to Miami (The Situation and Pauly D are stuck in the mud! Um, ok) that was pretty much singlehandedly saved by Snooki. Whether she was basically conceding that she’s pretty much going to cheat on her gorilla juicehead boyfriend Emilio, (“I was like, EMMIIILLLIIIOOO!!!), chomping on fried pickles or giving the camera a Jim Halpert-esque look when that redneck tried to hit on her, Snooki carried this portion of the episode and gave us plenty of hope for the upcoming season. Also, damn that Obama for putting that tax on tanning!

Once they arrived at the house, things got interesting. Well, as interesting as the manufactured drama of inserting the toxic Angelina back into the mix can get.

Let’s talk about Angelina briefly, who I absolutely loathed watching last season. It turns out that I only hated her half as much as her fellow cast members. I couldn’t understand why the producers had brought her back, though I could definitely understand why she’d want to come back. (She basically walked away from the show 10 minutes before it exploded into a phenomenon.)

Watching the season premiere, I got it — she’s just there to stir the pot. Angelina’s ability to (backhanded compliment alert!) get men, women, organisms to hate her is a rare gift. I’ve seen quite a bit of reality TV, and even the bitchiest of contestants can usually find some sort of ally. (The closest Angelina has is The Situation, who is really just one giant instigator.) So, brava to Angelina for being a rare and special breed of horrible.

At least Angelina made things interesting. (And by “interesting”, I mean loud.) I’m SO over the Ronnie/Sammi relationship.

Mostly, I’m just confused. I thought I remembered Sammi breaking up with Ronnie, but in last night’s premiere Sammi was the one moping around about how awkward it is to live in a house with your ex and how she still loves him. Fortunately, my girlfriend Erica was there to explain that, most likely, Sammi wanted Ronnie to come after her and fight for their relationship after she’d broken his heart, which led to this exchange:

Me: “That’s such ‘girl logic.’”
Erica: “Yeah, pretty much.”

Naturally, the two got into a big blow out which culminated in a drunken, “obliviated” Ronnie (props to Vinny for coining that term — and that’s the end of my obligatory Vinny shout-out for the week) calling Sammi the c-word. I don’t know why but I found it thoroughly amusing that, even within this group (that gets most of its dialogue bleeped out) the c-word still made everyone go eerily quiet.

Sammi ended up crying back at the house, while Ronnie got drunker than I’ve ever seen another human being. (Except maybe for Tommy Gavin in this week’s “Blackout” episode of “Rescue Me.”) There was triple kissing, dancing on stage with strippers, making out with “grenades” and “land mines.”

In case you didn’t watch last season, a “grenade” (The Situation explained) is a “bigger ugly girl”, while a “land mine” is a skinny ugly girl. Although, it felt a bit too much like The Situation was TRYING to make the term “land mine” happen, I appreciated this bit of wisdom.

In fact, there simply wasn’t nearly enough The Situation and Pauly D in the first episode (my two favorite characters) other than the gag-inducing revelation that they’ve both now hooked up with Angelina. Leave it to Pauly D to somehow make the idea that he’d hook up with her on a “rainy day” seem funny and charming. Hopefully, we’ll see more of these two guys going forward, and less of all the repetitive junk that clogged the premiere.

So what’d you think of this episode? Did J-Woww simply hang too many clothes on that shelf or was it just poorly made? When and how did she change into that pink dress for her arrival into the Miami apartment? Finally, who is less likable Angelina or Betty Draper?