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The setting: One nondescript Sunday night, interchangeable with any other
Sunday night. Come eight o'clock, engorged with ham, potatoes, and other
staples of a god-fearing family meal, you flip on your television, hoping for
a bit of wholesome entertainment to wrap up your weekend. You're shocked
by the godless filth you see, but can't look away, such is the (unholy)
quality of the Sunday-night primetime lineup.
The players: FOX and ABC, two national broadcast corporations, each
present a strong, highly-rated team of pokemon, ready to battle all the other
trainers and catch 'em all!
Hah hah. Hah. Hah. Seriously, though, there are some good things
happening Sunday night. Fox shows four back-to-back sitcoms, anchored by
The Simpsons and Family Guy. Attention deficit, crass, and
stupid, they're the perfect way to cap off a weekend. ABC, shooting for a
reputation as the tasteful, intelligent station, sucks audiences in with
three relatively innovative, well-produced dramas, all significantly
different thematically, but incredibly addictive.
The battle begins:
You turn on FOX, finding bright yellow people running amok in an idyllic
midwestern cartoon town. Over the next half-hour, there are a few good
laughs, but more chuckles at sly cultural references or at the meandering
plot. While The Simpsons had a few years as one of the funniest
shows on TV, its golden age is gone, and it seems to just be riding its
season out. However, in the same way most of us went out and saw the new
Star Wars trilogy, seeing familiar characters in a lovable franchise
is enough to make the show enjoyable.
In a weird way, The Simpsons is actually one of the most
wholesome comedies out there. It keeps out of sex, drug, and violent humor
more than most other shows, and often ends in a pretty heartwarming
fashion.
Bored by a commerical, you flip over to ABC. Lost is playing, a
series which treats a relatively silly premise remarkably well. A plane
crashes on a remote pacific island, leaving forty-odd survivors on the beach.
At first expecting to be found by rescue planes, they soon realize they
are alone, and that on the island, nothing is what it seems. Cheesy?
Indubitably. However, the show's pacing and plot causes a rapid suspension of
disbelief, and creates one of the most addictive series out there.
Each episode focuses on one or two people out of a fairly large ensemble
cast, without losing perspective on the whole groups' situation. For the
first episodes, we get flashbacks to the situations that led up to their
flight on that particular plane, which explain their reactions to the crash
and their behavior afterwards. The characters are all very well-cast and
-acted; while mostly written into somewhat stereotyped roles, they manage to
each elicit sympathy in their own way.
If this sounds a little questionable, do a science experiment. Acquire
the very first episode of the series, and watch it all the way through. Then
try not to watch the next five back-to-back. Of all the shows on television
Sunday night, Lost perhaps demands the most serial viewing.
"Now with less of a chance of sexual side effects." Don't you
hate those commercials? Click. Back to FOX, on which The War at Home
is just beginning, a beginning which, in my estimation, has no measurable
effect on anyone anywhere. A nuclear family of quirky individuals inhabits a
house. Someone does something stupid and lies about it. Increasingly absurd
attempts are made to correct the problem and hide the lie, all of which only
magnifies the situation. Eventually everything is resolved, usually in an
amusingly serendipitous manner that manages to avoid any lasting
consequences.
Come 9:00, the competition heats up. Family Guy, crass and
absurd, proves a formidable gladiator on this electron-gun stage. Essentially
a skeleton plot linking together a series of rascist, mysonginist, or simply
tasteless gags, it provides the sort of attention-deficit humor America so
loves. Consider yourself warned: if you're not comfortable with pointed
stereotypes of you or people you know, avoid this show. It jumps from one
group to the next, egalitarian in its ignorant, base depravity. However, if
you're okay with that, it's hilarious.
Note that at 9:30, FOX currently shows American Dad, essentially
a Family Guy spinoff series with the same basic feel and structure.
ABC has made the wise decision to try to scoop up all those viewers who
reject Family Guy's unique take on quality television (the
"We'll be more offensive than anybody" strategy, as far as I can
tell). Their secret weapon is Desperate Housewives, a disguised soap
opera that addicts its audience through running, simultaneously, four
twisting tales of four deeply troubled women. All of the classic soap opera
elements are there: forgotten characters popping up at opportune times to
disrupt an idyllic resolution, characters prone to exaggerated emotional
meltdowns and elaborate scheming. However, a big production budget, quality
acting (with a few exceptional performances, such as that of Marcia Cross),
and likeable, quirky characters all contribute to its salvation.
Whether Family Guy or Desperate Housewives, the 9:00
time slot presents some pretty fresh writing, and an almost-guaranteed good
time. Chances are, you'll fancy one show quite a bit more than the other; as
far as I can tell, there's not much common ground for viewer crossover.
10:00 is exclusively the domain of ABC, as FOX switches over to local
news at that time. This leaves viewers aching for a third hour of television
with only the second-season series Grey's Anatomy, a drama about a
hospital chock-full, as far as we can tell, of attractive, witty surgical
interns. The series draws on a relatively unknown cast, all doing a pretty
good job of avoiding stereotypes and presenting complex characters. Susan Ho
deserves special recognition for managing to portray an Asian female neither
fighting to be her own woman in a culture of oppression and mysogyny, nor
playing the oft-seen 'dragon lady,' dangerous but seductive creature of the
Orient. It's a great breakthrough step for Asian-Americans in the media,
who are perhaps typecast more than any other ethnicity.
The pacing in the series is good, jumping between the humor of each
characters' particular neurosis and life situation, and genuinely sad, unjust
acts of fate. Meredith Grey, the show's loose focus, voices a small lead-in
and lead-out in each episode, tying together all of the storylines into one
theme or (often-cliched) universal truth. It's a little cheesy, sure, but
gives the stories the appearance of being tighter than perhaps they really
are. Grey's Anatomy overall comes across as well-written, healthily
funny, and a little touching.
I enjoy Sunday night television immensely. Regardless of your tastes,
there's something on to please, and FOX and ABC offer quality programming
that should keep you happily sendentary for hours on end.
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