Crime has been a HUGE staple of TV over the last several years judging by all the C.S.I.'s alone (next up - "C.S.I. Anchorage, Alaska") and it's not just crime, it's lurid crime. "Dateline", "48 Hours Mystery", even "20/20" has gotten into the act on occasion. Ever since Hannibal Lecter first made his debut we seem to have this cultural fascination with the dark side. Personally I find it very depressing like I was checking out the new Fox lineup last night, something called "Canterbury's Law" starring Juliana Margulies. So far so good, a new legal drama I thought but in walks some guy into her law office and opens up a duffel bag and there are human remains inside. He claims to be psychic and offers to help her find her missing son. Anyway turns out he may not be psychic after all and may have killed five or six young boys and buried them. Turns out he has an advanced and inoperable brain tumor and can't remember whether he did the crimes or not and so I wasted a good part of the evening watching the current weirdness of the latest TV schedule and then you go to bed in a disturbed mood like doesn't TV offer inspiration anymore, human interest stories and people helping each other out? When film critic Michael Medved knocked all the hoopla over "Silence of the Lambs" getting an Oscar nod I thought maybe he was just being his overly critical self, if it's not his cup of tea don't rent it but I now see it was only the beginning of a trend, a genre that Laura Ingraham calls "tragedy tv" and check out all those nasty and gruesome anti-smoking ads on the tube, we all know by now it's bad for you but as the NY Post's Andrea Peyser said the other day by golly children are watching. It might seem radical but I'm almost there. As the bumper sticker says
KILL YOUR TELEVISION!
...take a nice walk by the lake, a long bike ride, a jog on a crisp sunny day, go rollerblading, whatever, just get your duff off the couch and put the remote down and go outside and clear the head. No wonder so many of America's youngsters are chubsters, you don't see 'em playing on the baseball diamond anymore, they're all glued to the computer screen and the porno...
ReplyDeleteWhat else is the Culture of Death gonna wanna watch?
ReplyDeleteI wish I had thought of that line. Going back to "Canterbury's Law" when the character opened up his gym bag mind you this was shortly after 8PM Family Hour on a Monday night, at least have this crap on at 11 or so.
ReplyDeleteHere's where I think the danger lies in movies like Hannibal Lecter, they become like anti-heroes if you will. During the sequel during one particulary gross part I heard a few audience members chuckle, it's almost like they were rooting him on. Also, in your old-time movies you had your villains of course but Good always triumphed over Evil but as you say what else is the Culture of Death gonna watch?
ReplyDeleteWe are so bombarded anymore with disgusting images on TV and movies that we're becoming desensitized to it all.
ReplyDeleteI can't get over some of the dialogue on 2 1/2 Men though the show is frequently funny. Many of us conservatives have said over the years that a strong subtheme to all this violence on the tube and in the movies is Men Behaving Badly, the image is presented that most men abuse women or have the potential to, you have your domestic abusers, stalkers, serial killers, rapists and cyberbullies and the fems often trump up the #'s, 1 in 4 college women will be date-raped let's say though a few conservative scholars have shown this to be false. Always an agenda as they say.
ReplyDeleteLike you had your classic "Hawaii 5-O" in the past and your "Streets of San Francisco", weekly crime dramas but they didn't dominate the lineup - "Book 'em Danno" - but on CBS I think Charlie Sheen is practically the only non-crime thing they have after "Survivor", then you watch the nightly news before you go to bed and if you live in New York the mayors keep reminding you that crime's gone way down only thing is why is it on the news every night?
ReplyDeleteno man it was straight crime like jack lord going up against his archvillain wo-fat, it wasn't some guy in the boondocks eating campbell's soup out of a skull. i can't dig it.
ReplyDeletebooty, it's time we throw our tv's out the window the way they did in the intro to Second City Television. Marshall McLuhan famously said "the medium is the message", well the message sucks and I for one would rather feed the swans (ooops, you can't do that either, they're passing laws against that too, it's just a nostalgic memory now). Scotty, beam me up!
ReplyDeleteThen in the daytime there's nothing but court shows, even the Spanish channels are getting into the act. You almost hate to get sick.
ReplyDeleteListen to talk radio!
ReplyDeletea point there
ReplyDeleteSo just this past Monday instead of an episode of "Canterbury's Law" they replaced it with "House - MD", which yeah the guy's cranky but the show usually inspires in its own quirky way. We can't seem to do anything for Mr. Thompson but hey maybe somebody out there read something you know? It's a little bit of a POWER trip,
ReplyDeletehot-dang!!
Re Sean's show he is a political junkie, even he admits it. I don't need the stuff in my veins all the time you know?
ReplyDelete~~~but then again things will happen like Hillary's trip to Bosnia, stepping off the plane under heavy sniper fire, Jack Bauer waiting in a helicopter and then I just have to get my fix, lol~~~
ReplyDelete