Tag Archives: Rick Petko

American Chopper: Senior vs. Junior: Mikey’s Art Opening

25 Apr

April 25, 2011

American Chopper: Senior vs. Junior returned last night.

Let’s recap what came before.

Paulie and Senior fought, a lot. Sr. got fed up with his son’s laziness, Jr. got fed up with his father’s constant abuse, Junior ended up leaving OCC and, after a no-compete period, founded his own bike company, Paul Junior Designs. What did he do during the no-compete time? Not much. He tried to push a line of doggie toys but that went nowhere. He started his own bike company, brought in Vinnie to do the real work, and brother Mikey came along for the ride. Along for Mikey’s ride was his new personal assistant, who happens to be blind so Mikey is really his assistant’s assistant. He also set up an art studio inside the shop after he failed to become an adult and live on his own.

Senior kept rolling along, meaning that he badmouthed Paulie at every turn to random strangers. The lawsuit between them continued to drag on. Paulie owns 20% of OCC and Senior wants to buy it at market value, which he cleverly contends is zero. Paulie shot back with “if the business is worthless sell it to me.” Senior didn’t bite.

Notable events were Paulie firing the bad-attitude kid, Odie, and Mikey breaking an expensive prototype on loan to PJD. Paulie got married and Senior didn’t attend the wedding. Jason “fan favorite” Pohl got married and Senior did attend the wedding. And for all the people who thought that Odie and Cody were the same guy, Paulie brought in Cody who worked rings around Odie.

Mikey tried to reconcile with his father but kept adding new conditions, that last one being that Senior must see a relationship counselor. He did, but Mikey decided that he only did it as a condition to a reunion and not from his heart so he nixed it. He’s like Linus in the pumpkin patch looking for sincerity or the Great Pumpkin won’t show up.

And the most likeable member of the show, Gus the dog, died.

That should bring you up to speed.

The new episode picks up right where that left off. OCC had recently launched a second lawsuit against Paulie because, they allege, Joe used OCC contacts to get business for PJD. Paulie’s lawyer assured him that it was unfounded and he had nothing to worry about. We’ll see.

As far as the bikes go, PJD was contacted by NFL’er Jared Allen to make a bike for his Homes for Wounded Warriors charity. They build houses for wounded vets. This is going to be the third or fourth military-themed bike we’ve seen on American Chopper so we’ll see how it goes.

And how is it going so far? Depends on who you ask. Brendon is doing most of the fabrication and he’s working from Junior’s vision. I say “vision” and not “designs” because there are no designs. Brendon is doing it all according to whatever Paulie feels like at the moment. So when Paulie had a new idea to taper the tank, which was nearly fabricated, Brendon had to cut it in half and go back to work on it. I’m not saying the bike won’t come out nice but is that the best way to work? Who knows what is going to pop into Paulie’s mind next?

Over on the OCC side, the company was contacted by Supernatural Cymbals, who make high-end brass cymbals. (I bet you guessed it from the name.) They came in with a fairly specific vision and while OCC did a great job on the bike, it is worth noting that Supernatural micro-managed them a bit. The bike was black and brass and featured wheels that looked like cymbals, covers that looked like cymbals, pretty much cymbals wherever they would fit.

In something I give them a lot of credit for, OCC built a forge and melted down some brass, which they them cast into a headlight. That was a very nice touch.

Supernatural is, for no reason I can fathom, big fans of the OCC band, and donated some new instruments to Christian, the band’s drummer. This was a big show for Christian as Senior decided that Christian was ready to do an unveil himself. Seriously, how hard are the unveils? We’ve seen a hundred on this show and all Senior does is ride the bike out and say a lot of “idears” and “this is a really cool bike.” Anyway, in the words of Paul Senior, “he’s ready.” I wonder what the criteria were?

BTW- For those keeping score, Jason Pohl got name-checked about 6 minutes in and was seen wandering around behind “Free Rick!” Petko a couple of minutes later. Thankfully, that was all we saw of him this week.

The big deal this episode was the opening of Mikey’s gallery. Yes, seriously, he opened a gallery in what appeared to be an old barn to showcase his art. He told Vinnie and Paulie and went back to finger-painting. Honestly, he was finger-painting.

To promote the show they went back to local radio and on the Fat Guy with the Wheezy Voice Show. I’m sure he has a name but I wasn’t motivated enough to look. It didn’t take long to get around to the subject of their father and his big advice? “Just enjoy yourselves.” Genius. Dr. Laura he isn’t.

So Mikey, after weeks of trying to find the right way to reconcile with his father, didn’t invite him, deciding that it wouldn’t be the right time. I’m dying to know what the right time would be but I’m not going to wait a lifetime to find out. Senior, upon being told about the gallery, decided that he wasn’t going to go if he wasn’t invited, but if he was invited he wouldn’t have gone anyway. He would have gone later though, when Mikey wasn’t around, just to see the art. And likely to badmouth it too.

We got to see Mikey’s art all together, displayed on the walls of his own art gallery and words cannot describe it.

Yes they can: TOTAL SHIT.

They were reminiscent of the scribblings of a distressed monkey. There was nothing artistic about any of it. Much of the “artwork” was indistinguishable from the drop cloths Mikey stood upon to make the paintings. Others resembled bad fifth-grade art projects that even parents are ashamed to put on their refrigerator.

But I was impressed that Mikey wore a suit. He really looked presentable.

The Orange County Chamber Of Commerce was over the moon that another business opened up to stimulate the local economy and pay property taxes. They described Mikey as a “breath of fresh air” and someone who “dares to be different.”

I looked to see if Mikey’s legally blind assistant was there. I didn’t see him but to be fair, he wouldn’t have seen me either.

The emotional hook of the show came when a father and son visited both Paulie and Paul Senior. The father had the same bad relationship with his son that the Teutuls have. The father was diagnosed with cancer, terminal, and he traveled to cold upstate New York to get the Teutuls back together. He wanted them to learn from him and make peace before it is too late. It was his dying wish.

What did Senior take from the emotional visit?
That he already did his “due diligence” about reconciliation and that “maybe it will change Paulie’s thinking.”  

I hope the old guy isn’t clinging to that as his last hope.

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American Chopper Senior vs. Junior: Odie, Cody, and the Foreclosure.

2 Feb

February 2, 2011

The big deal hyped for the show this week was the foreclosure on OCC’s building. It was the smallest focus of the show and also a big letdown. I’ll get to it later.

The bikes this week deserve more attention than usual because for the first time in quite a while I was impressed by the bikes.

OCC has again teamed up for a bike to benefit the St. Jude’s Children’s Hospital. Their mandate was to build a futuristic bike for the kids. Their design-monkey Jason was away on his honeymoon so the bike had no weird spikes and was able to be ridden comfortably. The bike was designed by Robb, their painter, who admitted he “doesn’t know shit about building bikes” and wondered if it was even possible to build his design. I don’t understand why OCC has only one guy capable of building bikes, and why Paul Sr. puts so much trust in him. The one bike Jason didn’t design was better than the last dozen he did.

Of course it wouldn’t be OCC if someone didn’t throw a fit- usually Paul Sr. This time it was Robb, who tried pulling an amateur diva act on Rick when he saw that the guys had changed his design. He threw a tantrum, got an attitude, and totally gave Rick a hard time. Who does he think he is? He is the painter- the low man on the totem pole. He doesn’t know how to design bikes. He is not a boss. And of all people he’s giving Rick a hard time? Rick is probably the best worker there. He is definitely the most professional. (If he ever worked with Vinnie they would put Senior and Junior out of business.) I don’t think I ever saw Rick get angry before, and still he resisted the urge to tell Robb where to go.

But he did design a nice bike.

As for the rest of the build, Senior paid a visit to St. Jude where he toured a hospital. At one point he looked into a microscope. Ever see a dancing bear in the circus wearing a tutu? Senior looking into the microscope looked just as silly.

Over on Paulie’s side, PJD was designing two bikes for a new insurance company, Universal Insurance, not to be confused with Universal Exports, which was James Bond’s cover. I suspect that one of the reasons they went with PJD was because OCC was too expensive for them.

One of the bikes is going to be given away to an employee, but the other is going to be a showpiece for the company so Paulie is doing something special. The gas tank is nothing but a see-through frame. The “transparent tank” looked great while the real tank was hidden on the bottom of the bike in a scoop.

Paulie’s bigger problem was Odie, who was developing a bad attitude.

Odie got an attitude? Odie, of all people? He has no clue how lucky he is to be there.

“Odie’s working through some immaturity issues,” Paulie said, and it shows. Odie showed up late to work, bad mouthed Paulie, talked back, and didn’t take Jr. seriously.

“He’s your boy,” Vinnie said.

Regardless of what anyone thinks of Paulie, he is Odie’s boss and he deserves some respect. Odie has to realize that he is nowhere near the level of any of the other guys in the shop and shut up. The kid has to pay his dues, especially after he showed his near-incompetence in the construction of the ugly Blingstar ATV.

Meanwhile, for everyone who ever typed “is Odie Cody from OCC?” in a search engine, this episode was for you. PJD needed some extra help so Vinnie brought in Cody, who hadn’t worked with Paulie since leaving OCC three years ago. Vinnie said that they were working with “three and a half guys.” Who was the half? Odie? Mikey? Even Vinnie is only their part-time since he has his own shop. And Paulie, like he did back at OCC, showed up two hours after the rest of the crew did, but in his defense he may have been at his lawyer or doing something else for the company since he’s the boss. PJD is seriously understaffed.

For all you conspiracy theorists out there, yes, Odie and Cody were together in the same place at the same time. In fact, Cody was the total opposite of Odie- professional and a good worker. Odie spent some time shooting jealous looks his way.

The news that OCC missed two payments on their building hit the newspapers. The bank has put them in foreclosure. Senior’s lawyer downplayed it and called it “debt restructuring.” Basically, they are looking for more favorable terms from the bank. It doesn’t necessarily mean OCC has no money. Banks will not renegotiate their terms if you pay on time because it shows that you have enough financial means so why should they work with you to lower your payments? If you miss a couple of payments it looks like you can’t pay so the bank, who wants their money, will work with you to come with a way so that they will get their money. Plenty of people deliberately miss payments for this reason.

They lawyer claimed that it will not affect OCC’s “day-to-day operation,” which begs the question, what is their day-to-day operation?

Look at a similar show, Cake Boss. Other than making cakes instead of bikes they really do the same thing: The show focuses on the fancy products made for high-paying clients. But on Cake Boss, you always see the thriving bakery shop in the front that sells tons of cookies, cakes, and pastries. The business would be a success without the huge fancy cakes. You never see anything else going on at OCC. Do they still make regular bikes? Do they customize customer’s bikes? I don’t have a clue (though I’m sure someone will write in and tell me) but you never see anything else going on there

Regardless of the financial state of OCC, Paul Senior is doing just fine. In addition to the farm he owns, he has, according to Mikey, “50 to 60 muscle cars and 40 motorcycles.” That could be an exaggeration but Mikey is in a position to know. Paulie pointed out that “they got no money to pay their bills but they have money to pay lawyers to sue me.” He also expects to be blamed by Sr. for their woes and he is probably right.

Like I always said, OCC has plenty of money spread around through creative bookkeeping. I will believe they have money troubles when they are out of business and Senior is riding the bus.

Here is the Discovery Channel description for next week’s show:

American Chopper: Senior vs. Junior
Fired
TV-PG (L)

Tensions are high at PJD as Odie back talks Junior. Junior fires Odie who then turns to Senior for counsel, and hopefully, a job. PJD pulls off a double-unveil for Universal Property Insurance while OCC unveils a bike to an enthusiastic crowd.

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