A Look at the Just-Ended Television Season
It is chic, in some circles, to disparage television watching. Some hosts on talk radio decry television's moral depravity and proclaim it an intellectual wasteland; they will not allow television sets in their homes. Others claims include bias to the right, bias to the left, and so on. Others make sure they watch only the "proper" television, such as Public Broadcast System (P.B.S.) and so on. Not us.
Television is a powerful source of entertainment for us, and we don't care who knows it. Our grown children do not understand why we do not want to go to movies, with their crowds, $5 popcorn, always sitting behind the tallest man in the universe, in order to experience painful sound, air too cold, as well as obnoxious people--and to do it for a mere $25 - $50. Of course, there is the matinee, with all the restless, swirling "ids"--a pleasure akin to ceasing to hammer one's hand because stopping feels so good.
Television brings a wide variety of interesting programs, particularly via satellite. With the digital video recorder, we capture vastly more than movies allow, including movies themselves. And, seeing Harry Potter a year later never strikes us as a deprivation or any other hardship. We really do not miss the smell of grape gum, floors slimy from spilled 300 ounce drinks, sniffing-coughing-chattering, and myriad body odors; then there are the Antarctic hurricane winds and sound with the control turned up to "brain stem hemorrhage." Let the answering machine deal with the telemarketers, and off we go to TV Land. Pour a gin and tonic, grab a few handfuls of roasted peanuts, settle under a comforter to become peppered with cats, and ensure the remote is always visible and handy. That's better than any snobs can admit.
Where did television take us this last season? Was any of it really any good?
We made a list of mostly dramatic programs we enjoyed and then clustered them into three groups, from ones we highly enjoyed to those we liked, and, of course, a group in between. The programs within the groups are just listed, not rank ordered. (We also watch other programming such as scientfic, home and garden, and a few sports shows like college and professional football, movies, and others which look interesting. However, these fall outside the scope of this article.)
Group A (Ones we enjoyed the most)
Group B (Enjoyable and Commendable)
Group C (Somewhat enjoyable)
Examining our list told us that we watched some 18 drama programs and two comedies, one of which nostalgically took us back home to the South. Twenty program series meant a lot of television; yet we got a lot from all of it, particularly from the programs in the first two groups.
We could not help but analyze the programs and our relationship to them. We surprised ourselves with what we found out. We will exclude the comedies and look at the 18 dramas.
Those programs we liked the most had plot and characterization, and good to very good writing. Above all, our list of dramas had the quality of people using their minds to succeed, and succeeding. The least successful had far too much action compared to the thinking, for example, Alias. The one which snatched defeat from the jaws of victory was 24--by utterly groveling to political correctness.
Efficacious people solved problems and pursued values, program after program, week after week. No, these were not deep dramas, like the best of romantic art, but they were not just a plethora of nitwit sitcoms, "tribal" so-called "reality" shows, and terminally banal American Idol type shows. For 44 minutes out of each hour of each show (and 22 minutes of the 30 minute shows), we were treated to people taking life, values, and themselves seriously. Whether the plots involved the likely or science fiction, we could experience the metaphysical values being presented.
We always came away invigorated and re-appreciating the role of art in our very human lives.
We don't recall another season with so much of this kind of programming, given the status of our present culture. So that brought another realization to us, in the form of a question. Are we watching the faint stirrings of reason in art again, after almost being annihilated by two centuries of rotten philosophies? What we saw was no Weimar-style art. Nor were they like French movies with Italian soundtracks. Nor were they like P.B.S. "dramas."
If, as so many try to say, art feeds popular needs and desires, think of what this is saying about all of those of us out there in TV Land. We should be damned proud of our needs and desires. Bring 'em on!
Television is a powerful source of entertainment for us, and we don't care who knows it. Our grown children do not understand why we do not want to go to movies, with their crowds, $5 popcorn, always sitting behind the tallest man in the universe, in order to experience painful sound, air too cold, as well as obnoxious people--and to do it for a mere $25 - $50. Of course, there is the matinee, with all the restless, swirling "ids"--a pleasure akin to ceasing to hammer one's hand because stopping feels so good.
Television brings a wide variety of interesting programs, particularly via satellite. With the digital video recorder, we capture vastly more than movies allow, including movies themselves. And, seeing Harry Potter a year later never strikes us as a deprivation or any other hardship. We really do not miss the smell of grape gum, floors slimy from spilled 300 ounce drinks, sniffing-coughing-chattering, and myriad body odors; then there are the Antarctic hurricane winds and sound with the control turned up to "brain stem hemorrhage." Let the answering machine deal with the telemarketers, and off we go to TV Land. Pour a gin and tonic, grab a few handfuls of roasted peanuts, settle under a comforter to become peppered with cats, and ensure the remote is always visible and handy. That's better than any snobs can admit.
Where did television take us this last season? Was any of it really any good?
We made a list of mostly dramatic programs we enjoyed and then clustered them into three groups, from ones we highly enjoyed to those we liked, and, of course, a group in between. The programs within the groups are just listed, not rank ordered. (We also watch other programming such as scientfic, home and garden, and a few sports shows like college and professional football, movies, and others which look interesting. However, these fall outside the scope of this article.)
Group A (Ones we enjoyed the most)
- Cold Case
- Numbers
- House
- Without a Trace
- CSI-Las Vegas
- CSI-Miami
- CSI-New York
- Stargate SG-1
Group B (Enjoyable and Commendable)
- Desperate Housewives
- Monk
- Blue Collar TV
- Lost
- Kojak
- JAG
- Eyes
- Blind Justice
- 24 (Cowardly concessions to political correctness gutted this show's artistic and enjoyment value)
Group C (Somewhat enjoyable)
- NCIS
- Alias
- StarTrek
- Stargate Atlantis
Examining our list told us that we watched some 18 drama programs and two comedies, one of which nostalgically took us back home to the South. Twenty program series meant a lot of television; yet we got a lot from all of it, particularly from the programs in the first two groups.
We could not help but analyze the programs and our relationship to them. We surprised ourselves with what we found out. We will exclude the comedies and look at the 18 dramas.
Those programs we liked the most had plot and characterization, and good to very good writing. Above all, our list of dramas had the quality of people using their minds to succeed, and succeeding. The least successful had far too much action compared to the thinking, for example, Alias. The one which snatched defeat from the jaws of victory was 24--by utterly groveling to political correctness.
Efficacious people solved problems and pursued values, program after program, week after week. No, these were not deep dramas, like the best of romantic art, but they were not just a plethora of nitwit sitcoms, "tribal" so-called "reality" shows, and terminally banal American Idol type shows. For 44 minutes out of each hour of each show (and 22 minutes of the 30 minute shows), we were treated to people taking life, values, and themselves seriously. Whether the plots involved the likely or science fiction, we could experience the metaphysical values being presented.
We always came away invigorated and re-appreciating the role of art in our very human lives.
We don't recall another season with so much of this kind of programming, given the status of our present culture. So that brought another realization to us, in the form of a question. Are we watching the faint stirrings of reason in art again, after almost being annihilated by two centuries of rotten philosophies? What we saw was no Weimar-style art. Nor were they like French movies with Italian soundtracks. Nor were they like P.B.S. "dramas."
If, as so many try to say, art feeds popular needs and desires, think of what this is saying about all of those of us out there in TV Land. We should be damned proud of our needs and desires. Bring 'em on!
posted by George Mason @ 6/07/2005 07:30:00 AM
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