I think what is happening is that the variation in quality of TV is wider than it has ever been, so we both have some of the best shows ever, like The Wire, and some of the worst, like practically all of reality TV.
In the early 1950s only reasonably well to do people could afford TVs, so programmers could broadcast good shows (like the original Marty, the stuff that Rod Serling wrote before Twilight Zone) and get good ratings. Then when there were only a few channels but almost everyone had TVs they had to lower the level and we got The Vast Wasteland. Now with tons of channels you can do good stuff that appeals to a minority again while also doing stuff that would have been rejected as too stupid 50 years ago. So worst ever and best ever are both correct, but the mean might be a bit above where it used to be.
If television shows form a pyramid, then the pyramid has gotten larger. It has a wider base (the plethora of terrible shows such as most reality TV) but also a higher peak (“The Wire”, “Breaking Bad”, etc.)
I recently watched “The Best Exotic Marigold Hotel” (and “Skyfall”), and that has really driven home the point that not having older actresses on tv and in movies more is a Very Bad Idea. Dames Judi Dench and Maggie Smith are absolutely captivating on screen - sure, they’re a bit more wrinkled and saggy than they used to be, but so are the guys.
You will recommend Breaking Bad to everyone you know.
You will never stop talking about Breaking Bad or The Wire.
Give this Doper a cigar.
How does the HBO type cable model fit that great revelation?
Fwiw, the quality of UK tv drama is driven by standards in public broadcasting - no advertising at all.
I decided to give a new show a chance and watch it with an open mind. The A&E show “Bates Motel” has received rave reviews from the critics, so I thought it was worth a shot. I caught a re-run of the pilot episode over the weekend…and I think I wish that I could erase some of the imagery from my mind!!!
Prequels have a lot of unique limitations and they rarely succeed. From the start, the ending is already set in stone. They simply fill in the time period leadin up to the predetermined ending.
One of the few prequel series that I actually enjoyed was ‘Smallville’. Even though I knew that it would end where the Superman story/movies began, it was still a fun show. But there were frustrations as well, such as the death of Lex Luthor at the end of Season 7. As happy as I was that he was gone, I knew that ultimately he would return somehow because hee is Superman’s arch nemesis in the Superman movie…
‘Bates Motel’ is the prequel to the movie “Psycho” and focuses on the disturbing, obsessive and deeply disturbing relationship between Norman Bates and his mother, Norma. Eventually, it will show us the horrible treatment and abuse that turned Norman Bates into a dress-wearing killer who keeps mom’s skeleton around for company and moral guidance.
After watching the first episode, I question whether we really need to watch all the sick experiences and psychological abuse that created the adult Norman Bates??? ‘Psycho’ made it very apparent that Bates suffered unthinkable damage at the hands of Mommy Dearest. But I really didn’t need to see just how fucked their mother-son relationship always was!
Hearing the young Norman tell his mother that they are soul mates and were meant for each other, while mother (Norma) smiles at him with adoration…it was beyond disturbing! And the context in which they shared this warm and fuzzy moment of psychological incest put it off the charts on the fucked up meter! Norman and Norma (cute, eh?) were out on a lake in a rowboat late at night when he professed his love. The purpose of their moonlit outing was to dump the body of a man that Norma murdered (in self-defense, allegedly).
I guess it’s safe to say that Norman takes after his momma!
I am very conflicted about watching future episodes of the show. The mother-son relationship will only get sicker and I feel like I already need therapy after just the first episode! I’ve read several articles speculating that the unthinkable may happen…why bother having that awkward, embarrassing discussion about the “birds and the bees” when you can show them instead???
If I continue watching and that happens, I will see Pscyho in a totally new light! I would probably be a psychotic cross-dressing murderer also if I was abused and violated in every possible way by the one person who was supposed to protect me!
I will probably need to find a good therapist if I continue watching the show, but I’ll commit to one more episode before I decide…
Just saw a trailer for a new version of The Saint, a series almost nobody remembers is being remade. But it seems to have some amount of continuity, judging by the cameo appearances.
Looks quite good, if a little unoriginal.
I think other posters are right. Every country has its own mildly entertaining actors who nevertheless gain an enthusiastic local following. American cinema is a behemoth and both the good and the bad are distributed world wide. My teenagers enjoy American comedy but I’ve never heard them talk about Adam Sandler. They do vaguely recognise Steve Martin. They are much more amused by Jackie Chan and Owen Wilson.
*Breaking Bad *and *The Wire *are both so freaking brilliant that I’m currently working on a memory-erasing device, so that I can forget all about both shows and get the experience of watching them fresh from the start all over again.
(Concerning Breaking Bad, I’m also building a time machine, so that I can jump ahead and watch the final eight episodes already. I can completely sympathise with the dude who stole that script from Bryan Cranston’s car.)
Prequels almost always diminish their source material, IMHO. We don’t really need to know why Indy is afraid of snakes, or how Darth Vader came to be evil. It just undermines their original mystique if you try to explain every detail.
IMO TV is as good and as bad as it has ever been. I don’t think there has ever been a time when there were more than three or four shows I actually wanted to watch.
Right now, (since Downton Abbey is not running) there is
[ul][li]The Good Wife[/li][li]Hoarders[/li][li]Blue Bloods[/ul][/li]Are these shows any better or worse than previous shows I never missed, like Hill Street Blues or The Bob Newhart Show? Probably not.
“Three hundred channels, and nothing on.” Not, in my view, all that different from back when there were only four.
Regards,
Shodan
Well said. Initially I agreed with the OP that television sucks but after reading other points of view, I think you are exactly right. My instinctive reaction that tv is mostly bad arises because of the mindless dreck such as reality shows which fill the hours.
However in amongst that are real gems of drama and I wouldn’t be without them. As you say, ever it was thus. Middling shows, boring shows, faint comedies, and then the show you want to watch whenever it is on. The production values of modern television are startling good as are the script writing and acting.
My main point is that tv is generally too disturbing to watch. If people from even 1980 were shown what is all over network TV, let alone cable, now, they would be ashen and agape, and people from 1950 would just drop stone dead.
I can’t do that to my mind. I peek now and then, but mostly avoid it all.
And that includes Breaking Bad, I suspect, though I’ve only seen a small amount (though there was a murder in what I saw). I don’t care how brilliant it might be (though I suspect that is an exaggeration)–it aint getting in here.
I don’t think I used to be this way, but I am now.
I feel contempt for those who create this stuff and for my society that laps it up.
What a load of shit. I was watching TV in 1980, and I wouldn’t have been “ashen and agape” at these shows. It’s not like it’s anything, thematically, that hasn’t been done in films for decades. I assure you, the vast majority of the population is not the shrinking violet you are. If you’re going to discount stories simply because they contain murder - well, enjoy watching nothing but Sesame Street.
pinemarten, a word of warning: avoid any performance of “Titus Andronicus”.
Maybe the people of 1590 were made of sterner stuff than those of 1950.
People in 1950 had just fought a world war. I think they could handle Breaking Bad. :rolleyes:
Except that the division between real life and what you saw in movies was enormous, and American women and children didn’t see the grotesque horrors of war. (Not much, anyway… My mom told me that when she saw newsreel footage of Nazi camp liberation, she stood up screaming…)
I have to say that in at least one case, I am amazed ny what network TV is showing, but I guess they have decided they have to compete with cable. I refer to Hannibal which depicts extremely graphic and grotesque murders, way, way worse than any thing I can recall seeing on any other network show. I wonder how much complaining there has been?
Supernatural can be pretty graphic as well, for network TV anyway, but it sort of flies under the radar because it’s on the CW.