Not long (enough) ago, I dated a woman who was really into Lifetime. I (belatedly) discovered that women who watch tend to be paranoid, or at least “extremely distrustful,” about men.
Well in the morning they have “Frasier,” and that’s very well-written. I guess I didn’t turn it off one day and slowly got drawn into “Golden Girls.” My folks used to watch this and I used to ignore it…but pretty funny sometimes. And racier than I ever thought my parents would EVER watch.
Next thing you know, I’m watching “Will and Grace.” I’d heard some good things about it and watched, long ago. Maybe I caught a really lame episode, but now I find much of it hilarious. And Karen (Megan Mullally)? Don’t get me started.
Frasier and The Golden Girls is on every night, too (I know, because that’s when I watch it). They also play episodes The Nanny (which I find funny though I know most people don’t), Still Standing (a pretty smart comedy at times), and Reba (never watch it, have no opinion). They also scored points with me because they used to air the American version of How Clean Is Your House? and I love that show. I haven’t watched Blood Ties and Army Wives, but from what I’ve heard, they’re both pretty good shows. They also play interesting movies in the afternoon (even some you might not expect, like Goodfellas).
Having said that, they do play a lot of movies about how men are only going to hurt you, and probably in horrific ways. Their original movies channel (LMN) is just awful with those movies. And they have horrible titles, too. I think I could forgive them a lot, except their titles are so awful.
For awhile, it seemed like Lifetime was trying to move away from their standard, “winning” formula. Turns out, they were just shuffling most of their movies over to LMN.
In the mornings they have some good stuff on and at, like, 2 in the morning they have some good stuff on (or at least they used to when I had cable) but the afternoon/evening program is all very “scorned, abused women” stories and talk shows. Or at least it was when I had cable. I haven’t had cable since 2005 though so it might have changed since then.
As a baseball fan I saw The Natural on one of the Lifetime channels. Not only that but the channel guide description was something like, “Guy with magic bat…” So I assumed it was some hokey Disney type family fare and never gave it a shot. Then I finally watched it on HBO or something and realized that both the Lifetime and the Magic Bat brandings diminished how good of a movie that was.
Yeah, they’ve even broadened their horizons to THREE winning formulas with the need to fill a movie channel!
Revolves around grown women: men will rape/kill you, MAYBE if you’re lucky there will be one man who will protect you, but that rarely occurs don’t get your hopes up.
Still women, but with an added focus on younger children: a paranormal experience will occur, may be the ghost of a sibling who died earlier on, one I swear to god had a little kid worshiping demons (though I think t3h ev1l menz taught him to in that one)
A teenage girl who will do something mildly bad, and either her parents will call the police (one where she was being defiant and she slapper her mother and ended up in a facility and court-appeal hell for a couple years) or she’ll be in the wrong place/wrong time with her boyfriend and the law will lump her with his transgressions just for the hell of it despite any linking evidence. The court will then proceed to waaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaay overreact and she’ll be in some kind of jail/detention center and be raped, beaten etc, also the person in charge of the facility will be a nice-on-the-face-but-secretly-a-belligerent-conniving-asshole™ surprisingly, this may actually be a woman!
(My mom watches LMN 24/7 I’ve walked in on more gunshots, rapes, murders, threats and what else than you can count in these movies, they’re truly disturbing. I can handle chick-flicks, these aren’t, they’re just terrible and depressing.)
Don’t forget the newer ones where a teenage girl does something mildly bad, or simply has the misfortune to have the wrong weight/ethnicity/religion, and is shunned and/or bullied by her entire school and the surrounding teenage community at large, led of course, by OMG a girl! Teh Queen Bee oh noes!!!1one!!!
I think that everybody who thinks they know what Lifetime ‘women’s’ movies are about need to readjust their cable connection, because their perception is faulty.
The theme is
Yeah, generally all men are out to abuse/rape/kill (ARK) you and there’s usually some men who seem nice but they’re out to ARK you too it turns out, and then there’s maybe one man who actually is good (but you better keep an eye on him) but he generally gets knocked out or killed by the ARK man, so you’re on your own to save yourself.
That’s their “original movies.” The regular network shows they re-run like Frasier or Xena are okay. If I had a son though, I wouldn’t let him watch this network. Way too much anti-male brainwashing.
Don’t forget the neighbors who will come over to your house and urge you not to turn in the Evil Man who raped you, even though he lives just across the street, because he’s such a nice man. And you weren’t really hurt, were you? I mean, it’s not like he beat you or anything. What’s a little non-consensual restraint between neighbors? Plus, you’re a single mom, so you’re trash anyway.
Seriously. If you’re going to watch chick television, make it Oxygen or We, in very small doses. Lifetime will eff you up to the point where you’ll start apologizing to your own mother for having a penis.
So what’s the demographic here? If Lifetime movies are about ARK, can we conclude that a lot of women have been ARKed? As my OP stated, I caught on to this late but for the record, I later discovered that my girlfriend would have fit into the ARK thing. And, FTR, the relationship didn’t turn out. well. at. all.
Should we conclude that women watch the “made for Lifetime” movies because they’ve already gone through such drama themselves? I mean, I can be fascinated by a good vampire flick although I’ve never been bitten by one—so I don’t want to jump to conclusions.
And how do we reconcile Frasier? Are they just hoping I’ll leave the TV on until the “Your ‘wonderful’ husband is really a rat bastard” movie begins?
They paid for the rights. Shrug. Plus, it’s not like Frasier is a manly man. I mean, come on…this is a guy who’s been mistaken for a gay man on the show more than once.
