Steve Perry, take us out… June 11, 2007
Posted by rosolio in Media, Movies, TV, Terrorism.add a comment
I’d say it’s a pretty safe bet that at least 50% of the people who have Don’t Stop Believin’ stuck in their head this morning will be weighing in on The Sopranos finale. A similarly large number probably cursed the name of Comcast, thinking their signal died the second the series ended in the spectacular cosa nostra crescendo everyone was betting on happening. The quick and easy explanation is the David Chase was flipping off the pundits and talking heads who debated whether Tony Soprano went down in a blaze of glory or vanished forever in witness protection. You’ve heard everyone else’s two cents, why not hear mine.
The last episode was about fear.
You’ve got A.J.’s awakening to the ills of the world and a sudden urge to do something about it. This wasn’t out of rage, but out of paranoia. His anger at Bobby Bacala’s funeral at the mundane conversation wasn’t in the Michael Moore “You Should Be Outraged!” vein. It was more “things are horrible and you’re just trying to distract yourself.” Tony and Carmela consulted A.J.’s psychitrist out of fear for their son’s safety. They expressed similar concern, although less so, over the impending marriage of Meadow. Sure, two lawyers getting married doesn’t seem like cause for concern, but every parent is worried about their kids. If they weren’t, they wouldn’t care. And then you have Tony visiting a senile Uncle Junior, afraid he was going to be taken advantage of by his conniving sister.
Mostly, you have a scenario where Tony will be afraid for the rest of his life. Every time that bell in the diner opened, he, like everyone watching, was terrified it was going to be a hitman seeking revenge for Phil Leotardo, or maybe Furio, or the Russian who escaped in the woods, or the Feds with enough evidence to put him away. “The Life [He] Had Chosen” was no longer simply the way things were. It was uncomfortable. And maybe that was the ultimate evolution of Tony Soprano. The matter-of-fact mafioso now had to look over his shoulder like everyone else. And he’ll do it for the rest of his life. And maybe that’s our future who wonder when we don’t have to worry about terrorism anymore. The War On Terrorism cannot be won because Terrorism doesn’t have a nation, flag, or shelflife. Neither does fear. Even though Tony vanquished Phil Leotardo, there’s always going to be another one. There, we’ve got some cultural significance.
Great show, great finale. With The Sopranos gone and Deadwood about to rap up (don’t know when), HBO has only The Wire, Curb Your Enthusiasm, and Entourage (a series at a serious crossroads) to carry the torch. They’ve thrown a thousand new shows up, every single one of them previewed before the Sopranos and one, John From Cincinnati, premiering right afterwards. While HBO execs were obviously thinking that JFC (not too soon for an abbreviation, is it?) would benefit from viewers too catatonic to change the channel after the Sopranos faded to black, I argue it had the opposite effect. I was willing to give it a shot, but was too shell-shocked to give a damn. All I caught was Luke Perry on a beach sounding like the teacher on The Peanuts: waa-waa-waa-waa…right, you can’t really read that. Whatever, you know what I’m talking about.
A few random things:
-Saw Ocean’s Thirteen and enjoyed it. It wasn’t anywhere close to the first one, but after the huge steaming pile of flop that was the second (or twelfth), I don’t think anyone was expecting it to. A lot of people were ready to hate it because it was just basically a camera turned on a bunch of A-List celebrities having a good time, kind of like an US Weekly with a caper soundtrack. Going in ready to hate it isn’t the right move, it’s a good time.
-I think Transformers is going to either break the $100million opening weekend or it’s going to collapse like River Phoenix at the Viper Room. Either is a distinct possibility. It would be hilarious to watch it gross like $30million and having the producers go, “Wait…WAIT…this is what you wanted! Why in the hell didn’t you see this?” It’s a movie based on toys from the 80s. Hot Wheels: Tokyo Drift isn’t going to catch Spiderman either.
-Moving is insanely expensive. It’s about $1,200 to rent a Uhaul. That doesn’t include the convicted sex offender I’d try to pay to move it. I shouldn’t say that, not all movers are convicted sex offenders. Some plead no contest.
-Don’t stop….belieeeeevin’… Son of a bitch, where’s The Final Countdown when you need it? And how much different would the ending have been if Europe was blasting on the jukebox? Or Rock Me Amadeus? Okay, so 80s stuff is sort of coming back, but that music all blows ass, let’s be honest. I can appreciate Party All The Time for what it is; concrete evidence that cocaine can make anything happen. Too bad we can’t FTD a few kilos to Axl and Slash, with forged notes from each other. Let’s bring that one back.
-I’ve got 8 1/2 hours on a plane tomorrow. I’m pretty sure I could get to Spain on that.
Stock and Pillory on NBC February 13, 2007
Posted by rosolio in TV.add a comment
Dateline: To Catch A Predator is the best show on TV. There’s nothing better than watching these horrible people being humiliated. Serial killers aren’t as bad as these guys. The kids who survive molestation are never the same. Ever. And the worst part about it is that victims of molestation end up often doing the same thing to someone else. It’s the most vicious of cycles. This show is certainly making a dent in that cycle.
Thirty-eight internet predators in three days in Texas…and now everyone in the country knows their names and faces.
Advocates of the death penalty love to kick around the word “deterrent”. Dragging these pieces of shit out into the streets and shooting them would be letting them off too easy. Instead, these guys are exposed for what they are in front of their families, their friends, their employers, their neighbors: as pedophilic monsters…they’re done, sentenced to remain in a living hell. That’s a deterrent.
Plus, you’ve got people talking about this stuff which, based on the numbers they’re catching in their dredges, is a lot more rampant than everyone thought.
Hey, something heroic on TV. You get to watch these guys flail, lie, beg for their lives, and occasionally get zapped with a taser. Real deal TV justice. Top notch.
Everyone needs to watch this show. NBC, Tuesdays 8/7c.
The Chicken or the TrimSpa February 9, 2007
Posted by rosolio in Common Sense, TV.add a comment
I know I’ve tread upon this turf before, and if I repeat myself too many times, I stand dangerously close to becoming a preening blowhard with a portable soapbox. But I think I might have a different spin on the topic of hype today and I certainly have a reason to bring it to everyone’s attention.
Anna Nicole Smith is dead…and this is a national tragedy?
Forget about the sanctity of life and the refusal to trash someone’s memory the second they expire for a second; that impulse can be remarkably strong, especially if the life in question is a well-documented one. Anna Nicole Smith was a perfect storm of doom; a piece of white-bread trailer trash who was just good looking enough that a bit of surgery could garner her a career. She is the ultimate gold-digger, marrying a guy who looked like Dana Carvey’s turtle man (that’s right, I paid to see Master of Disguise…Go Dana!) just before he was about to start rolling the credits. This led to a tooth and nail legal battle between her and the old guy’s former heirs (aka: kids) over the vast assets he left behind. Then you have the pill-popping trainwreck of an addict who documented her own self-destructive spiral on the E! channel. Finally, you have a Skinny Again diet pill shill, whose dramatic loss in weight made people feel good about her, even though she was still cracked out on numerous prescription pain killers.
Addiction is a disease, and addicts are not criminals on their own. Putting these people in prison is not targeting their problems at all. But all pity is thrown out the window when an addict chooses to not only ignore their problem, but flaunt it and profit from it; The Anna Nicole Show might as well of been called, “Watch Anna Get Loaded And Do Crazy Things.” Anna Nicole Smith’s son, who famously overdosed about six months ago, died because of his mother’s lack of concern about the nature of addiction. She made no effort to treat her own problem and was undoubtedly a horrible mother if for no other reason than that. There was a second kid, a younger one, in the picture. How can being raised by Anna Nicole Smith be an even slightly good thing. I’ll quote the great Ace Carolla and say that the kid would have a better chance at success if they just pulled it back in one of those water balloon wingers and fired it towards the nearest neighboring family. Yeah, Barry Bonds breaking the home run record would send a bad message to kids. You don’t care about kids, if you did, you’d be glad this crackwhore’s kid was finally free.
So this virulent former model is dead. Why do we care? Why is CNN running nine different stories on her? Why are news outlets trying to call this a national tragedy? If you just walked out of a fallout shelter and had no idea what was going on, you’d think Anna Nicole Smith was the first lady, or at the very least Grace Kelly. Why in the hell is no one bringing up her addiction?!? WHY ARE PEOPLE USING THE WORDS ‘MURDER’ AND ‘NATURAL CAUSES?!?
Because that’s what people want to see.
It’s the ultimate chicken or the egg conversation of our time. A large portion of entertainment today is a traveling freakshow. That’s all reality television and contests are. People tune in to watch American Idol hopefuls make asses of themselves. Many of them have mild-to-severe autism, but if we ignore that, they’re just idiots who chose to chase an impossible dream (I’m so tired of that by the way; this is exactly like watching kids with down syndrome run at each other at high speeds and collide. If you think that’s offensive or immoral and enjoy the American Idol auditions, you’re a hypocrite and lying to yourself). They want fighting on Laguna Beach and Survivor, because people love watching conflict. They want villains like Omarosa. They want to pretend that Paula Abdul is just really tired all the time. They make Paris Hilton famous for being famous and turn a blind eye to her use of racial slurs when Senators have to resign for using the words that sound like racial slurs (niggardly). They chase Tom Cruise around; granted, he’s a crazy person, but no one would know it if the population of this country wasn’t so hell-bent on finding something wrong with people. How do we know Cary Grant didn’t believe that he was the reincarnation of Zeus or that Babe Ruth didn’t think he could shit civilizations? How do we know Audrey Hepburn didn’t go directly from the set of Breakfast At Tiffany’s to a hotel room full of coke for a Blow and Bukkake Potluck? We didn’t know because we didn’t ask…because it wasn’t any of our fuckin business.
Unflattering pictures of celebrities get sold for millions of dollars, as do autopsy photos and rich people’s herpes medication. I’m so sick and tired of people suckling at the hamster feeder that is trying to pass this off as significant. We have 24 hour news markets and a lot that is more important than Lindsay Lohan’s weight.
The news channels will not stop covering it because they need us to make it significant. I just wish it was that easy to turn it off, considering I have to go to these sources to find out actual news. Buried somewhere in stories about Angelina Jolie being anorexic, another rich heiress’s sex tape getting leaked, and a video of a fat dog on a skateboard (…seriously), I found the story on Barack Obama formally announcing his candidancy for President.
Thank god I can’t see the hit count rankings for those stories or I’d probably kill myself.
Common Sense Man: Viewer Discretion Advised January 19, 2007
Posted by rosolio in Common Sense, Immigration, Racism, TV.add a comment
Viewer Discretion Advised
Haven’t gotten anything out there in a while, but then again nothing has gotten me wound up enough to rant about. I have no idea if that sentence is grammatically correct, but I’m not going back to edit it. I don’t want to. There it is.
Muslim groups and Islamic-American watchdog organizations are all bent out of shape about this season of 24, saying they are concerned that it is painting a bad picture of arabs. In an actual quote, a spokesman said: “After watching that show, I was afraid to go to the grocery store because I wasn’t sure the person next to me would be able to differentiate between fiction and reality.” This person is a preening blowhard. Can’t differentiate between TV and reality? Angry that it’s painting a bad picture? The people who are going to be influenced by things they see on TV aren’t going to be by a fictional show that says Viewer Discretion Advised at the beginning. If anything, I don’t know, they might be influenced by the sectarian violence and anti-americanism going on in the middle east. While I’m not in favor of singling out ethnic groups and making sweeping judgements, it is a statement of fact that every IED in Iraq was designed and placed by a muslim gentleman with the intentions of killing an american soldier. So if I’m going to be a small minded thug and say that all muslims are out to kill me, I’m going to get my information from the news…reality…, not 24. It is equally small minded and stupid to be unable to differentiate between the lunatics (yes, lunatics) in the middle east who danced in the streets on 9/11 and the american citizens who happen to be from one of these countries. While it is a statement of fact that sleeper cells may exist, 99.99999999% of the muslims in this country are good people. It’s like any other religion, you’ve got your fundamentalist, every-word-literally nutjobs everywhere. 24 is not saying that all muslims are terrorists, but all jihadists are arabs. Just like every militant doctor-shooting pro-lifer is a Christian.
This wouldn’t make me so mad if 24 wasn’t GOING OUT OF THEIR WAY TO PROVE THE POINT THAT ARABS ARE GETTING A BAD RAP FOR THIS! For Christssake, you letter-writing xenophobes, there’s a whole storyline following the mistreatment of a member of an Islamic-American Anti-Defimation group! It’s making your goddamn point for you! They’re just angry that a show is doing more to dictate what jingoism can actually do than these watchdog group’s pamphlets. Watch the show before you whip out your pen and get all pissed. Plus, if you recall, the last time there was a muslim-related terrorist attack (season 2), there was an evil white capitalist who was really to blame in the background!
24’s not racist; these letter-writers are. Morons. Same idiots who wrote angry letters about Borat being anti-semetic. Nothing to do with religion, race or whatever. Everything to do with assholes who want to get their picture in front of the camera. Imbeciles who shout at the top of their lungs about “Not wanting our children to see a difference between people” while at the same time demanding kids become indoctrinated in traditions that make them “proud to be different.” Don’t look at us differently, but we’re going to be different. Cake and eating it. Don’t hold a PTA meeting because a kindergartener asks a jewish classmate why he’s wearing a yarmulke. EXPLAIN IT, DON’T PANIC!
Don’t get upset about things you don’t understand, don’t assume that fiction (which happens to mirror reality) is going to paint a bad picture of you, and don’t keep shoveling coal into this engine of racism. That’s all these watchdog groups do; make people sit down and study the cosmetic differences between people. Oh no, we didn’t have an Asian person in our miller lite commercial. Are we saying that Asian people don’t like miller lite? Quick, photoshop one in there. Bam, a person becomes a ‘one’.
These are the same idiots who go to Kenya and go “Wow, look at all the minorities.” It’s the same people who don’t want anyone to say Christmas tree, but instead Holiday tree. The tree is linked to Christmas! It’s a Christian holiday! I’m not a Christian, but I call it a goddamn Christmas tree because that’s what it is! What, are you fooling people when you say Holiday tree? Is there someone out there who’s going, “So, when the oil for the lanterns in the desert lasted an unexpected 8 days and 8 nights, there was a temperate PINE TREE IN THE CORNER OF THE ROOM?!?” The people who are so terrified of saying something offensive or racist are incredibly racist and offensive because they’re recognizing lines that can’t cross, which does little more than highlight the lines themselves. Stop seeing the lines and all of this goes away.
I HATE stupid people. Or maybe I just think I do because of the ones I’ve seen on TV.
Off-Tube Commentary and the Pursuit of Happiness June 22, 2006
Posted by rosolio in Common Sense, TV, World.add a comment
Reasonably intelligent people all share the common trait of being in control of what they care about. Or at least can stay aware of it. Usually. Case in point, I was anti-Bloody Mary for my entire career, until tasting what was apparently a mediocre one at Corcorans led me to a totally new conclusion. I didn’t wake up a week and a half later and realize, “Holy crap, I like Bloody Marys now.” Same with entertainment. I knew right away that NBC’s summer test run show ‘Teachers’ was painstakingly awful. I didn’t try to rationalize anything (“Susan from Coupling is on it, and she was…uh…funny on that show…”), I just knew it. I knew I didn’t like the I.O. manual ‘Truth in Comedy’ around page 15 and I was fired up to buy the Oceans Eleven DVD a halfhour after stepping into the theater. You know right away.
There are only two scenarios that defy this trope (keep in mind this is for reasonably intelligent people. It wouldn’t surprise me if this list continued endlessly for people camping out for Larry The Cable Guy tickets. Ohhhhhhh!): 1) when you’re in love, and; 2) when you deeply care about a sport or sports team. Some people never experience one or both of these things, but hey I’m trying to make a point here. The former is obvious, and fairly universal. The whole ‘love at first sight’ thing isn’t reality. What happens is you wake up one day thinking about someone, realize you’ve done that a few times in the last few days, and before you know it, you come to the conclusion that you’re in actual, real-deal love and didn’t know it. Often, this realization can put you in a terrible spot, but that’s not the focus of this column, no no. We’re talking about the latter today, which was spent listening to the Off-Tube Commentary of the World Cup match between Ghana and the United States.
The Off-Tube Commentary to which I refer is one of the most simultaneously brilliant and ridiculous ideas in recent history. The World Cup is totally blacked out on the internet, at least in English, because audio and video rights were purchased by ESPN and BBC Sports. The BBC adheres so strictly to the rules that they will broadcast literally everything except the game itself. So you have all the pregame and predictions and analysis, and then the online radio player shuts off like the electricity at 1157 W. Diversey, Chicago IL, 60614 (see the previous article on this subject). So this tiny English newspaper (which I suspect is the New York Post of the UK, based on the number of headlines involving booze-induced embarrassments and injuries to celebrities) has a link to two guys sitting around watching the game on TV and giving the play-by-play themselves. No official color commentary, no sponsors, just two random fans telling you what’s happening on their TV. This idea is so good, that I’ll probably be trying it at some point during the NFL season. What if they did this for dramatic television as well? “And Michael is down in the hatch, yes, he just told Ana Lucia that he’ll kill Henry…yep, she gave him the gun…oh my! oh dear oh dear oh dear…”
(note: The potential for drinking games surrounding this is totally endless as well. My personal favorite is taking a shot every time one of the announcers describes a player as being “knackered”. Play with the word “quality” and you’ll be shitfaced before halftime).
So I’m listening to it, experiencing the typical ups and downs of a sporting event while still maintaining relative diligence at work. When the dust settled, and jesus, did it settle, Ghana defeated the U.S. 2-1, scoring the second goal off of a penalty shot drawn by the flopping Pimpong (great name). In fact, there was a lot of flopping, so much that the neutral British commentators were making fun of the situation. “And Pimpong goes down like he’s been shot in the leg. There wasn’t any contact. The Germans are awfully strict aren’t they?” The Ghanians basically made Shane Battier and Vlade Divac look like Abe Lincoln (who couldn’t tell a lie) and Dennis Haysbert (who could run for president right now as David Palmer and would win in a total landslide). Whatever, either way, the Americans lost and Ghana sealed the victory by acting as if there was a U.S. sniper on the roof picking them down one by one.
As the clock reached zero, I found myself overcome with simultaneous sadness and rage. I immediately went onto Wikipedia to find out the gross national product of Ghana, hoping to be able to make some comparison to their gutless play on the soccer pitch with their inability to compete in the world economy. I cursed Landon Donovan’s total disappearing act. I started with countless ‘what ifs?’ regarding Eddie Pope and Pablo Mastoreni’s card suspensions and Claudio Reyna’s injury. As I did this, I came to a strange conclusion: I really cared about soccer. I know these guys’ names. I really cared about this U.S. team. I overtly wanted to follow the event as much as possible, but my rooting for the Americans was more of an obligation than a decision. Somewhere along the way, I started to give a shit. It didn’t happen then, but I noticed it then.
This lightning bolt of an epiphany caused me to start thinking about the other times I felt this way. The only teams that I really, really bleed for are the Ravens and Maryland basketball, with the Orioles simply falling a little behind due to the miserable ownership of Peter Angelos, but then again I should include them.
The Orioles had won the first game I ever went to. They beat the Yankees 10-1, Randy Milligan hit two home runs, and I was mesmerized by the fact that at any moment, I could stick a finger in the air and get a hotdog. I wasn’t a fan just yet, though. I wasn’t a fan until my favorite player, the closer Gregg Olson, blew a save against Boston, and I was left crying on the floor, like I played for Ghana and was within 30 feet of an American player in motion. It was the first game I could remember them losing, and I felt like I lost. ‘Them’ became ‘us’, and I did nothing but care.
For the Ravens, it was an end of the season game against the Patriots in 1999, the first season we didn’t totally stink on ice. We were on the brink of making the playoffs, which is sort of like a validating moment for a team that was new to a city so starved for football that we watched minor leaguers running around on a 110 yard field with only three downs for four years. Doug Flutie converted a 4th and a million by scrambling, barely making it, barely sealing our fate. They ended up getting another cheap score and we were done. We had lost…hang on a sec…38 games, but that was the first one I was pissed about. It was the pain then that was counteracted by total psychotic jubilation the next season, when we game back to beat Jacksonville at home. There’s no way it would have felt that good if Flutie’s scramble didn’t hurt so bad.
The Maryland one is easy: Final Four against Duke. Even the total collapse against the Dukies at home earlier that season didn’t hurt as bad as this one. For one thing, I was sick at home and not there (I probably would have gotten sick if I was there). Maybe that 54 second meltdown contributed to this pain, but we had them on the ropes, and it was for a chance to play for a title. We were up 22 at one point, and it was the fucking Dukies. The moment of clarity for me was when Chris Duhon and Steve Blake dove after a loose ball and Duhon slammed his head against the ground harder than any crash test dummy has hit anything…ever. He was jacked up, not like paralysis jacked up, but totally dazed and rolling around like he was about to stand up claiming to be Joan of Arc. As this guy writhed in pain, I remember thinking: “Good.” My investment in this outcome and my total hatred for everything the Dukies stood for completely overrode any sense of humanity that I had. I honestly didn’t care that this guy whacked the hell out of his head. Nothing else mattered except for my beloved Terps (who went on to dominate the Dukies the next year and win a national title…had to get that in there) and the wave of disappointment that enveloped Cole Field House.
The moral of the story? You’re not a fan until you get totally wrecked over a team. A lot of people never experience that; the people who don’t like sports certainly haven’t, and think people who hyperventilate after games (the victorious Tim Rosolio after a Mo Vaughn walk-off in 1996) are out of their minds. You get the same impression of people who are in love. Often their decisions are totally ridiculous, their devastation totally beyond everyone’s comprehension. Am I saying that you need to get completely buried by someone before you can understand what love is? I don’t think I am. I think the better way of looking at it is that you can’t really appreciate the good without getting a brutal, lingering taste of the bad.
Without that hope, none of it would be worth it.
Follow the Worldwide Leader June 20, 2006
Posted by rosolio in Baseball, Basketball, Football, Hockey, TV.add a comment
First, we are going to open with a disclaimer: I am as addicted to ESPN as anyone else. I check the website a hundred times a day. Upon moving to the midwest and being out of the range of my beloved PTI, I’ve begun downloading the podcast and listening a day late. I have this weird feeling that watching a Stanley Cup Playoff game on OLN somehow isn’t as valid as if it was on ESPN, even though it’s the exact same people with the exact same haircuts. ESPN, a jewel in the crown of the Disney empire, has an absolute hidden monopoly on everything revolving around sports.
The term ‘Empire’ carries fantastically negative connotations. It feels weird to write ‘Empire’ and not capitalize it. This is due to the fact that most are not recognized as Empires until it becomes evil. ESPN has not always been bad, but it is this author’s intention to, at least in some way, shine light on a negative trend that is spiraling uncontrollably toward disaster. Picture a volkswagen on fire careening down a street in San Francisco toward a crowded intersection. A little intense, but so is Around The Horn.
Like it was written in Revelation, the sports apocalypse starts with a positive event (I clearly follow the bible intently…anyway). Pardon the Interruption features two of the greatest sports writers (frankly, two of the greatest columnists regardless of subject) this country has to offer: the Old Tyme [sic] sportsfan Tony Kornheiser and the plugged-in, X’s and O’s Michael Wilbon. The idea was that these two very different, but very smart, writers would address the various events of the sports day and argue their opinions. Part of the appeal was that these two colleagues are very good friends, and the dynamic in a way simulates any group of fans discussing the same topics. They don’t claim to be experts, but neither do we, really. I can get in a trench war over whether the 2000 Ravens or 1985 Bears had a more fearsome defense, but unless I’m arguing with Buddy Ryan, neither I nor my adversary has any actual cred that makes us ‘right’. It’s still fun to debate, however, and that’s why PTI is so great.
The problem is that ESPN, through the Nielsen ratings and internet buzz, saw that they had a gigantic hit on their hands; a lively, opinionated sportspage that contrasted directly with the objective, just the facts ma’am Sportscenter. The suits at Team Rodent completely missed the boat as to why PTI is so popular. Rather than seeing the everyday banter of the show, the producers instead took the ratings to mean that audiences wanted to see people fight.
Around the Horn soon premiered: the Game of Competitive Banter. Aside from being advertised as a competition and the constant ad hominem attacks from the ‘contestants’, the show’s real flaw was that through the assignment of points, someone was going to be decided to have been right. Former host Max Kellerman wasn’t shy about mentioning his New York bias, and it showed in his assignment of points. The show has improved with current host Tony Reali as it seems that points are assigned based on argument and stat inclusion. But there are three types of lies, and the show still yielded a winner.
Dozens of other headache-inducing shows and segments featuring talking heads yelling at each other soon followed, but that wasn’t the real problem. The charm of PTI was that Kornheiser and Wilbon would occassionally take ludicrously bold sides, because the idea was to facilitate discussion, and plus it can be funny. It was because of this reason that asinine segments such as the Budweiser Hot Seat came to pass. Dan Patrick would ask pointed and directly controversial questions to athletes and sports personalities, seemingly begging for the person to slip and say something controversial. A classic example occurred with Jeremy Roenick. After being asked about the fans who claim they’ll never watch hockey again after the lockout, Roenick answered very honestly, “Hey, if they don’t want to watch, whatever, good riddance.” Following the interview, a thousand online and televised segments announced that “Roenick does not care about fans!” Patrick claimed total ignorance of the situation, but he threw the bear trap down and Roenick stepped into it. It is also worth mentioning that the rise of PTI changed Patrick’s radio program, which went from witty banter between he and ex-pitcher Rob Dibble, to Patrick’s controversy-stirring rants defended oh so smugly with the “It’s just my opinion” defense.
Patrick is right, it is just his opinion. He’s just another guy, with no more cred than someone working at Walgreens. He’s never stepped on a field of any kind. And that’s why I cut him a lot of slack and listened loyally to his show. I also listened to Colin Cowherd, who followed a similarly abrasive formula.
And then it became clear to me. Cowherd was on one of his rants, screaming about why Americans love the frontrunners and hate underdogs. This is completely insane, of course, as anyone outside of the five boroughs would say that the Miracle on Ice was a greater event than the 2000 Yankees rolling over everyone on the way to a title. His logic was that more people watch when the Yankees and Dukies and Fighting Irish are playing. He also supports Rush Limbaugh, which is a great way to retain listeners, because he makes a lot of money. It’s debatable as to whether Cowherd even likes sports; he certainly hates athletes and reminds his audience daily of all the reasons you should hate them. The problem with The Herd, and it took a long time to decipher, was that Cowherd wasn’t telling you what he thought. He was telling you what YOU thought. And as I looked more and more, I saw a thousand examples all over the place where ESPN was dictating the sports world by telling people what they were thinking.
What?
There is a lot of great stuff on ESPN. Mike & Mike on ESPN radio is great, PTI is great, Chris Mortensen simply has more information than every other football reporter on the planet, and Bill Simmons relates to more fans my age than anyone else out there.
But ESPN waxes poetic about how outraged America is over Barry Bonds and then unleashes a Bonds reality show. They create the Minnesota Vikings Love Boat Scandal; you mean insanely rich people fuck insanely hot strippers on boats? Whaaaaat? Or the Randy Moss mooning incident, or the constant Terrell Owens coverage, or entire days dedicated to the Yankees and Red Sox who play 30 times a season.
ESPN does all of this under the guise of “We’re giving the people what they want.” The reality is closer to this, “We’re telling the people want they want and then giving it to them.”
That’s what media has become. We dreamed of it becoming more inclusive with added interactivity and all of that, but instead of us reaching to them, they’ve reached us. Through weblogs and focus groups and polls, they can monitor their progress. Based on the fact that I checked ESPN.com three times while writing this, they’re doing a pretty good job.
Omarosa and Captain Freedom January 19, 2006
Posted by rosolio in Common Sense, Media, Movies, TV.add a comment
It has been the role of art to, in some way, advance society. Some pieces extend well beyond genius into the realm of historical significance. We listened as Nirvana woke everyone up from the glammed-out nightmare of hair bands. We swam through Ulysses, hearing the words of Joyce take gigantic chunks out of the previously impenetrable wall separating ‘decency’ and vulgarity’. We were mesmerized by the onscreen savvy of Sidney Poitier, as his Virgil Tibbs met the hurricane of race relations head on. The funny thing is that very often, we don’t recognize these milestones as they occur; it takes a little time. There wasn’t the 90s equivalent of Disco Demolition Night with people in ripped flannel going door-to-door collecting Dio albums for immediate disposal. Despite what ESPN would have you believe, history takes a while. What’s my point and what does this have to do with the pursuit of common sense?
Go watch The Running Man.
The somewhat satiric Schwarzenegger vehicle places the hero in a world obsessed with an ultra-violent reality TV show, in which felons run through a gauntlet of gladiators to the visceral delight of millions of viewers. Betcha thought that was far fetched in 1987. Not so much anymore.
The evolution is clear with all of this. The first reality show (and there’s no need to challenge this) was MTV’s The Real World. Some brilliant producer recognized that there were few things Americans liked to talk about more than other people, and gave them a group of people that everyone could talk about together. It was meant to be an objective look at regular kids, like sitting on a bench in Central Park and getting to hear about everyone’s lives. After that wore a little thin, they raised the stakes by being more particular about the characters for the show; for one thing, they began to find people to play their ‘real characters.’ They’re not idiots, they’ve been to a football game where a fight breaks out in the stands: everyone turns, everyone’s got to see that loud jackass in a Browns jersey get pummeled by loud jackasses in Raider jerseys. They started paring card-carrying Klan members with Black Panthers, right-wing conservatives with atheist vegans, Balco-ed out ‘roid ragers with silicone enhanced frequenters of the electric beach. The (Fire)ball was in motion.
The next step was to add fuel to the fire: make it a competition. The old Real World was like watching a soccer game: you go in knowing there’s a good chance the game will end in a zero-zero tie (the Real World corollary being everyone gets along on real world), but you could also see a bicycle-kick game winner (the equivalent being Surfer Joey barging in on Goth Amy and Indie Rocker Steve mid-coitus in a walk-in refrigerator and a huge fight breaking out). They added the Chuck Rule to the NFL to open up the offenses and add more scoring, and they added competition to the reality shows to give everyone something to fight about. Hello, Survivor.
Soon it wasn’t enough to simply pick and choose who to like and hate. The Apprentice designed a scenario where a collection of amoral ass kissers jockey for position to massage the ego of the modern day Auric Goldfinger (side project: go watch Goldfinger, and watch The Apprentice. Same guy. I’m officially waiting for one of Trump’s henchmen to decapitate a contestant with a bladed bowler hat). We don’t even need to find someone to like: we can hate everyone and hope to god they make a fool of themselves. What’s better than that, eh?
(Another sidenote on The Apprentice: the New York Times, which annually shirks journalistic integrity to list the official catch-phrases of the year, included the line, “You’re Fired,” which was copyrighted by NBC. News for the Times: That’s not a catch-phrase, not any more so than “What’s your name,” “Could we have some more bread,” and “It’s inoperable.” Saying it twice doesn’t make it historically significant. Getting canned at work is not going to be done as an allusion to Trump’s Wilde-like wit.)
So Fox, the Vespuggis of good taste and common sense (still lookin’ for that border), kicked out ugly people dating hot chicks, midgets getting married, and gold-diggers going after Joe Millionaire’s fake fortune. I was reminded of Winston Churchill’s famous line whenever that show would air a commercial: “-Madam, would you have sex with me for 10 million pounds? -Yes, I guess I would. -Would you have sex with me for 7 pounds? -No, what kind of girl do you think I am? -We’ve already established that, my dear, it just seems to be a matter of price.” Brilliant. Anyway, Fox trudged down this road until they hit solid gold with American Idol. Originally devised as proof that Americans will buy anything they’re told to buy (Clay Aiken sells out Madison Square Garden, ladies and gentlemen), they found a whole new purpose by releasing the audition tapes of the worst singers the world has ever seen. We get to see these poor saps get their souls torn apart by an ornery British gentleman with an encyclopedia of insults and Paula Abdul, whose cred comes from dancing with a cartoon cat in the late 80’s. They might as well rename the show “Abuse” and people would still watch it. “Today, on Abuse, a 17 year old kid makes a courageous leap for fame and is met head-on with a comparison between his voice and the sounds of Robert Plant dry-humping a car alarm. Followed by your local news.”
I’m not trying to make any sort of stand for decency or ethics here, that’s not what this is about. I just want to make sure we’re all a little more realistic about why we watch this stuff. ‘Dancing With The Stars’ is not about appreciating ballroom dancing. It’s hoping Jerry Rice or Master P kung fu kicks their Columbian partner in the face, intermittently dispersed with shots of Stacy Keibler (a Baltimore native and certifiable 10 1/2 if there ever was one). Sex and violence, it’s all we need. They ignored the sex element on “Skating With Celebrities” and went straight for the death-defying spin moves attempted after two weeks of televised training. While this may be ridiculously dangerous, it’s not hard to book these D-list ‘’stars” for this show; Dave Coulier would absolutely fight Sub Zero to the death to regain his mid-90s Full House stock.
Watch The Running Man again.
The most significant scene in that movie (I love breaking this down like it’s Beowulf) is when Producer/villain Killian (played with gusto by Family Feud’s Richard Dawson) decides that he’s had enough of Schwarzenegger defeating his MetRx Minotaurs and removes the chance element from the show by staging the Austrian’s death at the hands of Jesse Ventura’s Captain Freedom, in what became the nation’s first Governor-on-Governor melee, meant to represent that no matter how high and mighty California might aspire to be, the midwestern sensibility of Minnesota will always prevail. Killian’s audience wanted to see the convicts get their comeuppance in the bloodiest possible manner. The reality show audiences of today want to see people look like idiots or get in fights.
Watch The Running Man again.
Here’s a steaming pile of Common Sense: “Reality TV” is a misnomer because nothing on TV is reality. Omarosa was a construction of careful scripting, strategic editing, and a willing participant. Finding William Hung was more significant to Fox than finding whoever won that year (and isn’t it interesting I don’t know their name?). There’s a reason these people get agents as soon as they are signed to a show. There’s a reason they have AUDITIONS for Reality TV. They’re not going out to the Damen Blue Line stop in Chicago to find people to toss onto an island for a month. At least not without a headshot and stat sheet.
But I don’t blame these TV execs for doing this. I am by no means calling for them to wake up and find better stuff to put on their networks. We won’t watch it. The acolytes of common sense are begging for the next All in the Family or Seinfeld, and Fox has to cancel Arrested Development, the smartest show in the last ten years, because no one’s watching it. Millions tuned in weekly for The Simple Life, and SportsNight came and went with only a couple people noticing. People like their drama formulaic and predictable and their comedy as easy to digest as possible. We get both from a single episode of The Biggest Loser, along with ample “Look At That Fat Guy” gawking opportunity. In the words of Killian, “We’re giving them what they want.”
There is an end to this, and it may be watching Scott Peterson joust on a motorcycle against Ted Nugent (which, by the way, would land Super Bowl-level ratings). Eventually the well will run dry, as the country’s thirst for freak-shows will outrace the network’s creativity. We will get over this; fads come and go. We’ll find something new to talk about at work and plan our gym schedules around. It might be a renaissance of political satire and it might be raccoons doing Shakespeare. Somewhere the Kurt Cobain of television is writing the show that will snap us out of this Reality TV nightmare. Either that or he’s auditioning for Paradise Canoe.
