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Ramblings From the Ragged Crumbling Edge Of The Reality-Based Community

Friday, April 08, 2005

THE JAG-ED TRUTH ABOUT TELEVISION RATINGS

...HEY. We're back!. Ah, Blogger and a slow dial-up modem; it doesn't get any better than this...

...but that's not what's on my mind....

...CBS has cancelled my show. They have tracked down and identified the only network prime-time show I have watched with any sort of regularity since the demise of Star Trek - Next Generation. The dirty rat bastards have cancelled JAG, not so much because it has poor ratings but rather mostly because it’s popularity doesn’t fall with the age demographic for which they and all the other entertainment programming networks hunger for (according to an NPR analyst from where I first heard the news), which stops with bizarre ageist finality at 49, which - perversely enough - is a demographic benchmark I just blew right out the side of a mere couple of months ago (so, ok, the threat of David James Elliott - Harm - leaving may have had some influence in their decision, but I'm not buyin' that excuse)...

...we need to be clear about this: I am not inconsolable at my loss. I have lived to date a life far more eventful that the one I might have chosen, were options presented to me at the outset. This isn’t crushing, but it is too bad. I have watched this show grow and develop since its inception on NBC a number of years ago. Watching syndicated reruns of those early episodes makes me realize now why NBC cast it off to begin with (what with the stilted acting and stiff story lines), but at the same time more recent episodes produced after CBS picked the show up have offered a nice juxtaposition that displays the deepening of the colors in which the main characters and their side stories are painted. I have hung on the story-lines - some of which have been admittedly cheesy, but are most certainly beyond the reproach of anyone who would actually watch any of the host of reality shows that have blighted our viewing landscape for the last few seasons; I have waited for the sexual tension between Harm and Mack to finally work itself out somehow in a happy-ending fashion (I have children; I have seen every animated movie produced in the last 16 years; I expect a happy ending); I have cheered Bud through his rehabilitation and return to service after the loss of his leg; I’ve wallowed in all of it. There are only a very few truly good theatrical shows on television: 24, Lost, Law and Order, and maybe one or two more besides JAG; most of the rest is an unremitting dreck of ephemeral sit-com’s, reality shows, and put-up talent contests of various sorts. We’ll now be losing two of the best at the end of this season. Life goes on, and it will probably be to my betterment because of the time I’ll be able to spend away from the television engaging in presumably more edifying endeavors...but, still, there is a niggling little sense of loss, the same sort of feeling that crawled down my spine when I heard that ‘Bloom County’ or ‘Calvin and Hobbs’ or ‘The Far Side’ would no longer be appearing in the newspaper to feed my comic strip need....

...there’s always syndication, I suppose, and perhaps some TIVO-type device that resides in my future to simplify the recording process. For now, however, it’s just another day where the bean-counters having won out, and those kind of days always suck....
Posted by: Jack K. / 6:46 PM 0 comments

Tuesday, April 05, 2005

PAPAL SUCCESSION IN THE CABLE ERA

...the tradition of voting for a new Roman Catholic Pope dictates that the Cardinals burn unsuccessful ballots with additives to make to smoke coming out of the Vatican chimney black and the ballots that finally arrive at a clear winner be burned with other additives to make the smoke be white. These differential colors of smoke would informing the waiting masses as to whether or when the final decision had been reached. Back in the day, wet or dry straw was used to contribute to the coloration; in later days chemicals have contributed to the color. Even though it seems straight-forward, sometimes the time of the day or the ambient light conditions as a result of cloud cover or time of day has led to some unfortunate misinterpretations of the actual color of the smoke. There was a time, known by theologians and historians as "before FOX news", when these sorts of misunderstandings might cause a certain stir in St. Peter's Square, but the speed with which news was transported around the globe was such that these sorts of mistakes could be rectified before damage was done. We are now, however, in a new era, referred to as the era of "FOX News" by those aforementioned experts, and - as we saw on Friday - this new era, represented by FOX News, holds the promise of delivering shock and confusion around the world in a moment's notice under entirely false circumstances...

...the Vatican, apparently on the direction of Pope John Paul II, has decided to employ a 'belt-and-suspenders' approach to the advent of this era of "FOX News", where it's possible for news to flash around the world on electronic wings in an instant that "the Pope has died" fully 26 hours in advance of the actual event. They will be employing the ringing of bells with the release of the white smoke, to assist those who are actually involved in collecting news in the manner that this era of "FOX News" apparently dictates, to make sure that the total lack of journalistic rigor or integrity doesn't intrude on the ability of those business's that are trapped in the era of "FOX News" to actually get the story right. In this age of instantaneous media, it simply wouldn't do to have the word flashed incorrectly around the world that a new Pope had been chosen when such wasn't the case; the ensuing confusion would be too great to contemplate. Think of it as the FOX rule, the signalling of the election of a new Pope reduced to a level of simplicity such that even morons or Fox News producers and FOX on-air talking heads can't screw it up. It's obviously a soluiton for the times...
Posted by: Jack K. / 8:50 PM 0 comments

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