Baltimore City Paper's 1997 
"Best of Baltimore" Issue
Best Worst TV

Xena better watch her back. The warrior princess' late-night TV queendom is being attacked by a slack-bellied drunk called Grape Ape and "Penile Knievel," a daredevil who shoots bottle rockets out of his urethra. These charming creatures are just two of the local luminaries given 15 minutes of infamy on Atomic TV, one of
newest-and most disturbed-wee-hours offerings on Baltimore City's cable-access channel (Television, 8/6).

The 60-minute show is the chromosome-damaged brainchild of Scott Huffines, whose Atomic Books store sells sleaze and zines in Mount Vernon, and partner-in-perversion Tom Warner, who's said to have sharpened his video skills by clandestinely taping women's posteriors at local festivals. Together they fashion a block of celluloid scrapple-bones and gristle intact-featuring 50s-vintage training films, civil-defense footage, campy ads, sex, violence, bad fashion, corny music, and dubious home-grown nut-jobs (such as the self-styled Mr. Knievel and his fire-in-the-hole penis pyrotechnics). Some bits wear thin (brisker editing, guys) and the interview segments tend to be hopelessly corny and/or too focused on the interviewer. But hey, in-your-shocked-face amateurism is what Atomic TV is all about.