[Stop Me If You Think You've Heard This One Before ]
The Life and Times of an Invenerate MisanthropeT.V Shows I'd Actually Pay To Watch
2008-03-04
As I'm posting this, I'm channel surfing the various cable news channels about this ‘Super Tuesday II' (Electric Boogaloo!) , and currently watching various talking heads play ‘what if?' as they try and kill dead air time until the polls close and they finally get some results to report. It's got so bad on Fox News that they actually brought Bill O'Reilly in to sound off about how Rush Limbaugh's going to decide Texas for Hillary. So you'd probably think I was going to go on about politics again.
WRONG!!!
I'm going to discuss old T.V instead.
I'm not sure I understand this idea of buying whle seasons of T.V shows on DVD. It just seems moronic to me, especially when just about every show is repeated in syndication on cable ad infinitum. Still there are some shows that are so good that you have to watch again and again. So with that in mind here's...
...10 TV shows I'd pay money to watch... if I had to.
10. Duckman
This was a really weird cartoon about an anthropomorphic duck, voiced by Jason Alexander, with a horrible disposition and a sex-addict personality. This was the kind of show that could toss in an entire episode referencing Dostoevsky, and not have to explain the references, or not bother to.
9. Season Two and Three of Melrose Place
These are the seasons where Heather Locklear turned up, Michael Mancini turned into a full-time scum bag, Sydney & Marcia Cross's psycho doctor showed up, and basically Aaron Spelling decided to ditch all kinds of realism in favor of a kind of ‘Dynasty' on HGH.
8. Magnum P.I/Married...With Children (tie)
Magnum just always seemed cool to me; come on he drove a Ferrari , lived in Hawaii, had an uptight English guy to order around, got down with lots of fine ‘80's babes, was a detective and had a bushy mustache. As for ‘Married...' it really had it there for a while , up to about ‘95/'96, and never got enough credit. How come ‘The Simpsons' gets all the credit for saving Fox (even though it's ratings were average for years, and now firmly sucks, when Al Bundy and co were the networks first big hit?
Basically the unofficial Ferris Bueller T.V show (there was a Ferris show I think, but this stomped on the nuts of it). This show didn't even pretend to be realistic, but somehow managed to blend surrealism with social commentary and pop culture references all coupled with ham fisted ‘After School Special' type life lessons.
I know it's become the ‘kewl' thing to like this show ever since people have gone into full-on Seth Rogen/Judd Apatow worship, but this show was fucking brilliant (and like all Apatow T,V shows had a limited production life). The characters were all well drawn and fleshed out , the actors looked totally normally realistic, and the whole thing perfectly evoked the high school experience that actually made you uncomfortable in places. Plus Joe Flaherty rules.
5. Get A Life.
A sitcom designed to be bad, which made it good. I'm not going to go into too much detail , but the premise of this show was Chris Elliot playing a thirty year old paperboy who lives with his parents and temporarily dies every other episode.
4. Batman the Animated Series.
I wasn't overly excited when this came out, I didn't really dig Burton's first Batman film, and the second was only saved from ridiculousness by Chris Walken's over the top performance. I was pleasantly surprised; this is still the best representation of Batman on screen (as great as ‘Batman Begins' is , this is better). They got the villains exactly right (especially Mark Hamill's Joker) some villains have never been as good as here.The thing was dark, and Wagnerian and uncompromising, something you never normally expect in a kids cartoon. Plus it didn't just obviously use old comic stories, but created its own. If only Paul Dini's comics writing was as good as this.
3. House M.D
This show is as a bad comic book. You get a patient-patient gets treatment-treatment works-patient has relapse-patient gets new against the clock diagnosis-patient recovers in the end. On paper this should be just another medical drama, but this show is really a series of character studies. Plus, I've got to say, Hugh Laurie is brilliant in the titular role. I've long said we need more misanthropes on T.V, and finally we have one.
2. Quantum Leap
The show with the best built in gimmick to lure viewers back ever. That bit at the end where Sam beckett would ‘leap' get a brief glimpse at where he was and utter ‘oh boy...' was genius. This show managed to always remain fresh despite the formulaic premise simply because it was always different every episode. The only thing it ever got wrong was when Sam leaped into Lee Harvey Oswald and had to kill Jackie Kenndey to fulfill his mission. I miss this show.
1. The Adventures of Pete & Pete.
This was like if Ian Kennedy Toole wrote ‘The Wonder Years'. This amy have lasted only three years, and iy may have been on Nickelodeon, but this was essential viewing for my friends and I during college. The world of was truly a surrealist's absurd wet-dream. Plus any kid show with random guest stars of Steve Buscemi, Iggy Pop, Patty Hearst and a Michael Stipe as an ice-cream man ,and they don't detract fromm the show must be good.
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