Network TV? Anyone? Anyone?

Does anyone actually watch network TV? Tonight I practiced what is commonly known as an exercise in futility. For an hour (roughly 8pm – 9pm) I channeled surfed from 2 – 221 and there was fuck all worth watching. I mean nothing. Between the reality TV on half the network stations and the bad (and terribly un-funny) sitcoms that rehash the same jokes that weren’t funny when Polly Holiday said them on “Alice” or John Amos on “Good Times”. There hasn’t been a well written sitcom on TV since the second to last season of Seinfeld. What happened to Gary Marshall, Carl Reiner, Mel Brooks, Larry Gelbart and Norman Lear? These guys knew what was funny. There isn’t a producer on network TV today who has a clue what is really funny.

As far as dramas, most of it isn’t worth the what they paid the IATSE guys to stand around to watch it being made. The lone bright spot sitting solitarily atop the gigantic steaming heap of dramatic network garbage is “The West Wing “. It is probably the single most intelligently written show on network television. Quite frankly even it has had some moments where I wanted to hurl my recently devoured evening meal. While the writing is still quite good, it definitely dropped a notch or two when Aaron Sorkin left the show. However he did leave it in good hands and it remains one of the few watch-able shows on network. The rest of it is geared to halfwits and morons. The level of story is so one dimensional that you can read a book, play chess and write a thesis while keeping up with the integral “plot points”.

Answer me this. How many versions of Law & Order and CSI do we really need? The original versions of both series I have always found inspiring (though let’s face it, Law & Order has to be coming to the end). I tried to watch L&A Special Victims and the other one with Donofrio (who I do like as an actor) but the shows were un-watch able. As for CSI … CSI Miami doesn’t know what it wants to be. They have pretty much jettisoned the whole Crime Scene investigation thing and David Carruso is pretty much a Homicide, Narcotics, Missing Persons investigator who heads up a crime lab team … yes very realistic. I had high hopes for CSI NY (as a NYCer and Ex-EMT) not to mention a huge fan of Gary Sinise, who I believe to be one of the finest actors of this generation. I watched the pilot for 15 minutes and had to turn it off in favor of Dennis Farina’s entrance on Law & Order (the original). What a tremendous disappointment (Not Dennis, he rocks as always,) but CSI NY. What a pile of shite.

I could probably write an entire blog about how Reality TV is the herald of the end of civilization as we know it. You know, Bread and Circuses, Roman Coliseum, Most Dangerous Game but that’s been done to death. Just know this. If you want to gauge the state of network TV, just count the number of Reality shows in primetime. For every reality show that runs on one of the big 3 between 8pm & 10pm , Monday through Friday, that is one slot they couldn’t fill with quality dramatic or comedic programming,

Think about it next time you curl up with a pound of Orville Redenbacher’s extra buttered microwavable, non incendiary, slightly combustible, authentic, imitation popping corn and turn on “American Idol” or “Survivor - Newark”. You could be watching something good … but your not.