Two and a Half Men Premieres With Record Ratings and a Barely Clothed Ashton Kutcher

Alan Spills Charlie's Ashes

Two and a Half Men steamrolled over Dancing with the Stars, ratings-wise, with its Season 9 premiere, drawing 27.8 million voyeurs, I mean viewers.

The episode started with Charlie's funeral.

Apparently he died in Paris. Where he was on a romantic trip with the long-smitten Rose.

However, Rose caught Charlie in the shower with another woman. Rose said her love was unconditional, but the next day somehow Charlie found himself shoved in front of a Paris train, rendering him, in Rose's words, "Like a big balloon of exploding meat."

Which had Charlie's nephew suddenly hungry.

It was a very irreverant funeral with a lot of bitter women.

Later back at Charlie's Malibu Beach house a parade of amusing guest stars showed up to check out the house for sale, like John Stamos and Dharma & Greg, aka, Jenna Elfman & Thomas Gibson.

UPS delivered Charlie's cremated ashes. Which you knew Alan would manage to spill, which he did when Ashton Kutcher showed up outside the house, looking in, after an aborted suicide attempt.

Ashton Kutcher is billionaire Walden Schmidt, who was wanting to kill himself after his girl friend dumped him. Soon Alan was consoling Walden, talking him into going out to a bar and out of his wet clothes, which had Alan obsessed over Walden's plus-sized private parts. And the fact that Walden was very comfortable with being naked.

At the bar Walden and Alan met a couple girls. Soon they were back at Charlie's with Walden and the two girls upstairs in Charlie's bedroom. The next morning Walden came downstairs, still naked, to introduce himself to Bertha, then informed Alan that last night he'd had sex with the two girls. To which Alan replied that last night he'd cried and masturbated.

It never ceases to amaze me what words and situations get said and portrayed on modern American TV.

But we retain enough prudishness to blur out Walden's nakedness.

Walden informs Alan he is buying Charlie's house, and is giving Alan a big naked hug when Alan's ex-wife and son Jake walk in to see Alan being hugged by a tall naked stranger, who then goes upstairs with Alan's ex-wife proclaiming, "I like him," as she watched Walden's blurred bare butt go upstairs.

I suspect the ratings for Two and a Half Men will go down now that the voyeurs have their one time look.

How Is Ashton Kutcher Going to Replace Charlie Sheen on Two and a Half Men?

I'm guessing it is going to be interesting to see how Ashton Kutcher replaces Charlie Sheen on Two and a Half Men.

Is Kutcher taking over the role of Charlie Parker?

Or will there be some other means to get Ashton into Charlie's house to live with Alan and Jake?

Surely they are not going to do a Bewitched type thing where Dick Sargent replaced Dick York as Darrin Stevens with no explanation, not even something as simple as having Endora cast a spell to change Darrin's looks.

Maybe the plot could have had Charlie having spent extensive time in re-hab, to emerge as a much better looking, taller, version of his former self.

Or they could have Charlie dying in some comic way, to have it revealed that he left his money, royalties and house to his ne'er do well cousin, Ashton.

They could have Charlie in an accident that requires facial reconstruction.

Two and a Half Men will not be paying Ashton Kutcher as much as they paid the ungrateful Charlie Sheen. Sheen got $1.25 million per episode, plus profit participation that brought the total to around $2 million per episode. Ashton supposedly will be getting a measly rumored $625,000 to $800,000 per episode.

$800,000 is more than I make in an entire year. I don't know what I make for an episode.