Wednesday, May 21, 2008

Top Five things I'd like to see Television get rid of...

I like TV, many people do, so I'm told, but somethings about it just get me PO'd. And now the definitive list of things the television world needs to get rid of pronto. 

#5 ER
We all loved the Clooney years, but honestly do we ne
ed more seasons of ridiculous things happening in a Chic
ago emergency room? No one will look back years from now and pine for the Stamos years. You had
 a good but wayyyy too long run. ER time to sign your DNR. 



#4 Gossip Girls

Maybe I'm just getting older. But the genre (and network) that brought us Gilmore
 Girls, Dawson's Creek and Buffy, now brings us Gossip Girls and it turns my stomach. It was one thing when 20 something actors pretended to be angsty 
teenagers with crushes and rivalries, and used language above a third grade reading level. It's another when 20 something actors pretend to be angsty, slutty, teenagers looking to stab each other in the back while comparing sexual positions. I'm not one to stand on a soap box and proclaim that television should be a place for the moral high ground, but do we need this taking 
up our air time?

#3 Access Hollywood, Inside Edition, ETC
.

The beginning and the nexus of the celebrity feeding frenzy. Celebrity "news" programs like these waste so much time, so much money and so much energy filling the nation's bandwidth
 with information we don't need about people we shouldn't care about. It's one thing to give a review or roundup of the newest movies coming out or *gasp* a book review as a way of connecting people with pop culture. It's another to obsess of Brangelina's next move, every night, forever and ever. 


#2 The Today Show. 

Perhaps the most controversial. The Today Show was once a way for Americans to check in with relevant news, then delve into topics that concerned everyday people. The Today Show now is a 4-hour infomercial designed to get people to buy more and more stuff. Worried about home security? Don't start a neighborhood watch or download crime statistics, buy these 
home security devices. Having marriage problems? Well we have an author with 3 minutes of advice and a book to sell. The worst part...the other networks continue to try and emulate the model. Dumbing down to the lowest common denominator. Morning, after morning, after morning.

#1 The Crawl...
Local news organizations started this as a convienient way to have the weather and traffic always accessible during their morning news broadcasts. What started as a good idea has become a monster. CNN, MSNBC and Fox News are addicted to the crawl. The crawl is nothing more than another implement designed to sap Americans' attention spans. Nothing makes me pay attention to CNN's rapid fire clips more than a crawl at the bottom of the screen discussing something totally unrelated. Death to the Crawl!

2 comments:

Unknown said...

Ooooh, ooooh, ooooh! I know what television needs to rid itself of---rehashed television shows like THIS ONE: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gU7EjzF1RJk. As the show itself proclaims,"If you want in the zip, you gotta live by the code." The CW has really lowered its standard for quality programming. 'Gossip Girls' is just the tip of the iceberg!

Michael said...

that tag line made me throw up a little in my mouth.