Heck, if Karen can mention West Wing on her blog, so can I!
It does seem kind of numbing, realizing that was the last episode ever. I’ve followed lots of television shows from start to finish, some running longer, some running less time. Some were probably important in my life at the time, some less so.
I don’t know if the end of any ever seemed quite so gut-wrenching.
West Wing was a special entity. It was real life. But it was a fantasy. (Even more so after the election of George W.) It was intelligent and literate and informative. (I never knew as much about current political situations, and American politics – and actually, never knew less about American politics than I know now!) It has to have had some of the finest writing and acting that I can recall in any television series I’ve ever watched. (And I’ve always had a bit of a love affair with the television. It fascinates me and repels me. Intrigues me, inspires me, bores me.) I love books passionately, but I love theatre even more, and television is sometimes like a tiny captive theatre. Not always! But sometimes.
West Wing had passion and great beauty. Oh, it had silliness and humour and stupidity and anger. It made me go away and look things up. It rootled about in my memory and pulled up quotes and references I didn’t even know I had stored away. It made me far more aware of current events.
They lost their way a bit when Aaron Sorkin left the show, though he’d left them with a crisis to carry them along a bit, the abduction of Zoe Bartlett. However they seemed to find their stride again in season 6, and by season 7, although it was a very different show, it was a comparable one.
I think I’d have been perfectly happy if it had carried on to become whatever new show it was destined to be, during the tenure of President Santos. I think it would still have been very good TV.
But I don’t think I can ever be as innocent in politics again, having seen West Wing. Oh for the likes of President Bartlett! Yes, it was a fantasy, but what a fantasy!
Showing posts with label tv. Show all posts
Showing posts with label tv. Show all posts
Monday, May 15, 2006
Thursday, May 04, 2006
The TV Blob
Because I’ve been promising to do it. (And someone mistyped blog as blob on a list I get, and I so liked the term I’ve started to use it from time to time. Sometimes they just feel more like “blobs”.)
Yes, I’ve been meaning to write a rant about tv. Not really sure why. It’s not like my life so revolves around TV. Though, admittedly, in winter when we turn back our thermostat because we have ineffective and expensive electric heat, it does seem that the only room suitable to hanging about in is the living room, and the warmest spot is huddled under the down quilt on the couch. And since we both desperately need new glasses, reading books is starting to become less of a long-term option.
Hence the TV.
And it’s NOT like we don’t have enough videotapes and dvd’s to sink the Titanic, because we do. So, in a normal evaluation, I’d say we’re far less hostage to what’s on offer.
But because I seem to feel so passionate on the subject, I had to analyze my reasons.
-yes, I’m older and slower and live in the country, so don’t have as many ‘going out to do’ things. At least not so many I’m actually prepared to drive to get to.
-and, okay, after spending fifteen years doing a long commute that left me pretty much useless in the evenings, I may have just developed habits.
But I think that some of the reasons I’m intensely concerned and frustrated about television also have to do with things like: increase of choice, but decrease of choice.
-yes, there are so many more channels out there now, but in reality there’s so little choice. We ended up having to get satellite because our ‘natural’ signals, which had started out fairly weak and limited, eventually dwindled to nothing one summer. We spent that summer watching videos, if we watched at all, but eventually decided to get a small satellite package. [Note: we’re also outside the real signal range for CBC radio, in the gap between different towers, so we have to pull radio in via the satellite, too.] But really, the longer and closer you look at what’s going on in the broadcasting world, and I have more awareness of it, having worked in the world of advertising, you see that for all the channels that may exist out there, there’s really only a couple of signals being passed around.
This is something that has infected all the media. It used to just be a bit of an annoying laugh at work, who’d bought up whom this week, and what address databases would have to be tweaked.
But now I’m really noticing just how little diversity there is in the media world.
And really, it’s pretty sad. It’s not like there’s variety. It’s not like there’s a range of viewpoints. Pretty much anywhere you turn, it’s the same thing.
Now there are cases where consistency is a good thing. It is (or was, as I’m currently discovering) a nice thing to know that a Tim Horton’s one place, was the same as a Tim Horton’s someplace else. Or that on a long trip you could stop at a Wendy’s or a McDonalds along the way, and pretty much know what you were going to get, when you didn’t have the time or inclination for experimentation.
But I don’t stop at Tim’s and the Golden Arches for every meal! Heavens, no!
And I really hate getting my media fixes in repetitive doses, either.
I also think that there was a point in the life of television viewing, and it may not have been that long ago, though perhaps it’s just my memory failing, that you could turn on the boob tube, and whatever was on offer might be something you’d watch. Or not. But somehow I recall it as more possible. Yes, it’s always seemed that there’s a higher percentage of programming geared for “not me”, aimed at the lowest common denominator. But these days it seems that the lowest common denominator must have dropped drastically, because I’m sure it’s not that my IQ has gone up. Can’t have. I’m sure we had lead pipes in my youth, and lead paints and radon gas and asbestos insulation, and we played in building construction sites and sewer pipe excavations, and lumberyards at night…. It didn’t kill me, but there’s surely no way it’s improved me!
So, why does it now seem that there’s programming on TV that not only do I not want to watch, I have to hastily and actively flip away from!
And it’s always been the case that shows which seemed to be good, and even had a following, get cancelled. So I guess there’s always been an “inexplicable” factor. Look at Star Trek! T least one can make the case for Star Trek, that it was an unknown quantity to the people running the game. They didn’t know what it was, they didn’t understand the genre, had never even met the genre before, so simply couldn’t understand or believe that it might develop a fan base. Now it’s an empire.
It’s just that now it seems that the dumb shows have got dumber, and the few other shows have become more vulnerable.
And even in the last couple of years, we’ve had that new mutant baby, the “reality TV” show. Brrrrr. Scary stuff. In a paraphrase of one of the Mythbusters guys, “I deny your reality!” Sorry, that reality is no reality I’ve ever met.
The very first time that Survivor was coming on, without having seen any advertising or heard much about it, I thought, oh neat. Get a handful of McGyver people together and see them do all nifty things in the wilderness. A really keen and enjoyable idea for a show I thought.
OOPS! Was I wrong! And since then, based solely on unavoidable commercials, since that’s as close as I let it get to me, it has even dwindled from the game show to soap opera and now, it seems, beyond Jerry Springer and into…what? Bedlam? (In the original definition of the word.)
I understand how this “new” form of TV may be cheaper to make. No actors to pay. No real directors. No visual values or effects. The biggest cost is prize monies or locations. But keep it as far from me as possible!
On the other hand, it’s been immensely satisfying when the odd show has turned out to be intelligent, well-written, well-acted, well-crafted, and despite that, becomes a hit! (e.g. House with Hugh Laurie. Holding its own at about number 8.)
But I think what I’m finding so perplexing (and therefore irritating) is that even when I find a show I’d like to follow, it becomes almost impossible to do so. Never mind that serial TV can really muck with scheduling your life, of the several shows we’ve even been trying to follow, (that haven’t been inexplicably dropped because they were too intelligent for your average bear, and there was something vaguely similar but dumber out there competing,) we’ve found that TV networks and stations don’t seem to follow that old concept of letting the public know when the program is on, and urging them to stick with it. No, now the process seems to be more like a game show – guess what night or what time it’s on! Or, if you figure that out, we’ll trick you by sticking in a random repeat. Or the latest trend, and extra special episode that just kind of recaps what’s going on. The kind of info we wouldn’t need to have recapped if the episodes just ran in regular order at a regular time and night!
And then, even given that you have to be a dedicated sleuth and follow ALL the clues, catch ALL the ads and promos, check the stations’ websites almost daily, if not more frequently, they still like to weed out the weaker, by posting conflicting info.
Perhaps all this additional thinking and puzzling is supposed to tire out our brains so we’ll be more complacent about what’s on offer?
And of course, this always harks me back to the ad agency days, when a lot of what went into planning a media campaign had to do with demographics, and target audiences. Ideally, a campaign is pitched at a specific market, which is often categorized by the time they’re watching and the type of programming. If no-one can ever figure out where the shows they want to watch will be on, how in heavens can the advertisers hope to find them? So, it’s perplexing indeed. In fact, I can’t really figure out who the winner is in this case.
The television programs fail to win the necessary ratings to continue, because their audience keeps losing them. The advertisers either can’t tell when the heck their ads are running, or don’t manage to find their proposed audience more than once every couple of times. The stations and networks themselves lose support.
I was regularly amused by the fact that on CTV’s website, a message forum had regular discussions about West Wing episodes over the last year, while everyone was actually watching it on NBC, because CTV had the rights to show, and couldn’t be bothered. No-one was actually watching CTV! And were regularly commenting that on the CTV forum.
Sigh.
All of a sudden I understand the amazingly fast turnaround on dvd releases!
Anti-V
(Canada’s NOT watching CTV!)
Yes, I’ve been meaning to write a rant about tv. Not really sure why. It’s not like my life so revolves around TV. Though, admittedly, in winter when we turn back our thermostat because we have ineffective and expensive electric heat, it does seem that the only room suitable to hanging about in is the living room, and the warmest spot is huddled under the down quilt on the couch. And since we both desperately need new glasses, reading books is starting to become less of a long-term option.
Hence the TV.
And it’s NOT like we don’t have enough videotapes and dvd’s to sink the Titanic, because we do. So, in a normal evaluation, I’d say we’re far less hostage to what’s on offer.
But because I seem to feel so passionate on the subject, I had to analyze my reasons.
-yes, I’m older and slower and live in the country, so don’t have as many ‘going out to do’ things. At least not so many I’m actually prepared to drive to get to.
-and, okay, after spending fifteen years doing a long commute that left me pretty much useless in the evenings, I may have just developed habits.
But I think that some of the reasons I’m intensely concerned and frustrated about television also have to do with things like: increase of choice, but decrease of choice.
-yes, there are so many more channels out there now, but in reality there’s so little choice. We ended up having to get satellite because our ‘natural’ signals, which had started out fairly weak and limited, eventually dwindled to nothing one summer. We spent that summer watching videos, if we watched at all, but eventually decided to get a small satellite package. [Note: we’re also outside the real signal range for CBC radio, in the gap between different towers, so we have to pull radio in via the satellite, too.] But really, the longer and closer you look at what’s going on in the broadcasting world, and I have more awareness of it, having worked in the world of advertising, you see that for all the channels that may exist out there, there’s really only a couple of signals being passed around.
This is something that has infected all the media. It used to just be a bit of an annoying laugh at work, who’d bought up whom this week, and what address databases would have to be tweaked.
But now I’m really noticing just how little diversity there is in the media world.
And really, it’s pretty sad. It’s not like there’s variety. It’s not like there’s a range of viewpoints. Pretty much anywhere you turn, it’s the same thing.
Now there are cases where consistency is a good thing. It is (or was, as I’m currently discovering) a nice thing to know that a Tim Horton’s one place, was the same as a Tim Horton’s someplace else. Or that on a long trip you could stop at a Wendy’s or a McDonalds along the way, and pretty much know what you were going to get, when you didn’t have the time or inclination for experimentation.
But I don’t stop at Tim’s and the Golden Arches for every meal! Heavens, no!
And I really hate getting my media fixes in repetitive doses, either.
I also think that there was a point in the life of television viewing, and it may not have been that long ago, though perhaps it’s just my memory failing, that you could turn on the boob tube, and whatever was on offer might be something you’d watch. Or not. But somehow I recall it as more possible. Yes, it’s always seemed that there’s a higher percentage of programming geared for “not me”, aimed at the lowest common denominator. But these days it seems that the lowest common denominator must have dropped drastically, because I’m sure it’s not that my IQ has gone up. Can’t have. I’m sure we had lead pipes in my youth, and lead paints and radon gas and asbestos insulation, and we played in building construction sites and sewer pipe excavations, and lumberyards at night…. It didn’t kill me, but there’s surely no way it’s improved me!
So, why does it now seem that there’s programming on TV that not only do I not want to watch, I have to hastily and actively flip away from!
And it’s always been the case that shows which seemed to be good, and even had a following, get cancelled. So I guess there’s always been an “inexplicable” factor. Look at Star Trek! T least one can make the case for Star Trek, that it was an unknown quantity to the people running the game. They didn’t know what it was, they didn’t understand the genre, had never even met the genre before, so simply couldn’t understand or believe that it might develop a fan base. Now it’s an empire.
It’s just that now it seems that the dumb shows have got dumber, and the few other shows have become more vulnerable.
And even in the last couple of years, we’ve had that new mutant baby, the “reality TV” show. Brrrrr. Scary stuff. In a paraphrase of one of the Mythbusters guys, “I deny your reality!” Sorry, that reality is no reality I’ve ever met.
The very first time that Survivor was coming on, without having seen any advertising or heard much about it, I thought, oh neat. Get a handful of McGyver people together and see them do all nifty things in the wilderness. A really keen and enjoyable idea for a show I thought.
OOPS! Was I wrong! And since then, based solely on unavoidable commercials, since that’s as close as I let it get to me, it has even dwindled from the game show to soap opera and now, it seems, beyond Jerry Springer and into…what? Bedlam? (In the original definition of the word.)
I understand how this “new” form of TV may be cheaper to make. No actors to pay. No real directors. No visual values or effects. The biggest cost is prize monies or locations. But keep it as far from me as possible!
On the other hand, it’s been immensely satisfying when the odd show has turned out to be intelligent, well-written, well-acted, well-crafted, and despite that, becomes a hit! (e.g. House with Hugh Laurie. Holding its own at about number 8.)
But I think what I’m finding so perplexing (and therefore irritating) is that even when I find a show I’d like to follow, it becomes almost impossible to do so. Never mind that serial TV can really muck with scheduling your life, of the several shows we’ve even been trying to follow, (that haven’t been inexplicably dropped because they were too intelligent for your average bear, and there was something vaguely similar but dumber out there competing,) we’ve found that TV networks and stations don’t seem to follow that old concept of letting the public know when the program is on, and urging them to stick with it. No, now the process seems to be more like a game show – guess what night or what time it’s on! Or, if you figure that out, we’ll trick you by sticking in a random repeat. Or the latest trend, and extra special episode that just kind of recaps what’s going on. The kind of info we wouldn’t need to have recapped if the episodes just ran in regular order at a regular time and night!
And then, even given that you have to be a dedicated sleuth and follow ALL the clues, catch ALL the ads and promos, check the stations’ websites almost daily, if not more frequently, they still like to weed out the weaker, by posting conflicting info.
Perhaps all this additional thinking and puzzling is supposed to tire out our brains so we’ll be more complacent about what’s on offer?
And of course, this always harks me back to the ad agency days, when a lot of what went into planning a media campaign had to do with demographics, and target audiences. Ideally, a campaign is pitched at a specific market, which is often categorized by the time they’re watching and the type of programming. If no-one can ever figure out where the shows they want to watch will be on, how in heavens can the advertisers hope to find them? So, it’s perplexing indeed. In fact, I can’t really figure out who the winner is in this case.
The television programs fail to win the necessary ratings to continue, because their audience keeps losing them. The advertisers either can’t tell when the heck their ads are running, or don’t manage to find their proposed audience more than once every couple of times. The stations and networks themselves lose support.
I was regularly amused by the fact that on CTV’s website, a message forum had regular discussions about West Wing episodes over the last year, while everyone was actually watching it on NBC, because CTV had the rights to show, and couldn’t be bothered. No-one was actually watching CTV! And were regularly commenting that on the CTV forum.
Sigh.
All of a sudden I understand the amazingly fast turnaround on dvd releases!
Anti-V
(Canada’s NOT watching CTV!)
Monday, January 30, 2006
tiny little explosion....
That I don’t have time for.
I’m sitting here trying to finalize designs for the next show, Bedtime Stories by Norm Foster, a world premiere. (Which means he keeps doing rewrites, and now I have a new character to design for!) And after the designs I have to come up with a costume plot. (Not that calling any of this “finalized” means it is. The designs will fluctuate as I can find things to work with, or have to revise ideas…
But there I am, taking a wee break, and thought I’d run my semi-daily check of CTV’s website on programs they have the rights to and can’t be bothered to schedule…. Yup. Commander-in-Chief has now achieved the “not actually scheduled” status. This after they showed the pilot, and caught our attention, and then reawoke it with a “marathon” at Christmas, (of course, leaving out a few episodes so they could fit enough in to sync up again with the American network…, though then they stopped at part 1 of the two part episode…..)
Sigh.
And, now I notice that we call it an “encore” presentation when we show a re-run. To make us feel more …. Mmmm….benefitted? Rewarded? Certainly I’m seeing why more shows are coming out on DVD before they’ve hardly finished playing the season, and why people buy them.
Of course, I couldn’t talk myself into spending DVD prices on a tv show I wasn’t fully committed to; But we have as many West Wing as they’ll let us have, I’ve been devouring House season 1, and am waiting to order House of Eliott Season 2, and adore Farscape…
And I get to schedule them where and when I want now, and am not held hostage by anyone. (Well, except for Theatre Orangeville, who wants me to work faster faster! Hurry Hurry Hurry.)
I’m sitting here trying to finalize designs for the next show, Bedtime Stories by Norm Foster, a world premiere. (Which means he keeps doing rewrites, and now I have a new character to design for!) And after the designs I have to come up with a costume plot. (Not that calling any of this “finalized” means it is. The designs will fluctuate as I can find things to work with, or have to revise ideas…
But there I am, taking a wee break, and thought I’d run my semi-daily check of CTV’s website on programs they have the rights to and can’t be bothered to schedule…. Yup. Commander-in-Chief has now achieved the “not actually scheduled” status. This after they showed the pilot, and caught our attention, and then reawoke it with a “marathon” at Christmas, (of course, leaving out a few episodes so they could fit enough in to sync up again with the American network…, though then they stopped at part 1 of the two part episode…..)
Sigh.
And, now I notice that we call it an “encore” presentation when we show a re-run. To make us feel more …. Mmmm….benefitted? Rewarded? Certainly I’m seeing why more shows are coming out on DVD before they’ve hardly finished playing the season, and why people buy them.
Of course, I couldn’t talk myself into spending DVD prices on a tv show I wasn’t fully committed to; But we have as many West Wing as they’ll let us have, I’ve been devouring House season 1, and am waiting to order House of Eliott Season 2, and adore Farscape…
And I get to schedule them where and when I want now, and am not held hostage by anyone. (Well, except for Theatre Orangeville, who wants me to work faster faster! Hurry Hurry Hurry.)
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