So this week's entry shall be about TV, which I think I haven't blogged about in a long time!! Mostly random thoughts, that were running through my head when I was attempting to sleep on the MRT this morning.
Speaking of which, I seriously hate that sometimes, I'm unable to get a good nap on the MRT - yeah I always get seat, I don't sit on the reserve seat either! Want to know how to get such good luck? Work at NTU, stay in AMK, and attempt to reach NTU around 815 everyday. I always close my eyes but only manage to drift off in the LAST TEN MINUTES. I really hate that, I wish I had an on and off button. Together with an alarm clock.
Anyway so yeah, I couldn't sleep so I had a lot of random thoughts running through my head. I'm the only person I actually know personally that will care so much about dramas and comedies so I'll make a page break here, and feel free to click through. There will be no structure, just me rambling on and on incoherently, a lot like the thoughts that formulate in my brain soooo yeah!
Recently, I started watching Hawaii-Five-O. Or however you write it. Is it Hawaii 5-0? That is irrelevant. I watched it solely for the purpose of Grace Park, because I was a great fan of her work on Battlestar Galactica. I watched 7 episodes, majority of which I just let the video run and continued playing Hen House on my iPod (I'm at 34.41 seconds!) while intermittently looking up to the screen. Yeah, I can multitask! *puts on sunglasses and smiles smugly*.
After those episodes, I just didn't have the mood to carry on the series regularly because it didn't interest me much. I think it's because there aren't any romantic stories and it is too much of a procedural. It's not that I only watch shows for the romance, it's just that in the procedurals I watch, the show seems to revolve around the central characters and their interesting jobs, rather than actual police cases. Case in point: Bones and Castle, I couldn't for the life of me pinpoint any single case which stands out, unless you are talking about the cases which involve our characters personally.
I get that H5O is a show of mass appeal, I don't hate it or find it particularly dreadful, it's just really meh~ to me. It still is an alright show though, Alex O'Loughlin is REALLY hot. REALLY REALLY hot. And Hawaii (they shoot on location) is really beautiful. Like, makes me want to fly there just to swim in the Pacific beautiful. It's just that the characters are so stereotyped and typical and not given much deep stuff to do, that I just feel bored by it. It's all such a typical show! Okay maybe that's because it's a remake - so I can't expect too much. Maybe the producers main aim is to keep it in line with the original 5-O which is like, from 40 years back, so how original can it be right?
But Grace Park is so nondescript in it. She's a cop. She can kick ass. When asked to act as a damsel to be a bait, she does it. She's hot. 7 episodes into Battlestar Galactica I was already invested into her entire Cylon existence, and where her relationship with Helo would go, whether or not she would betray him etc... Whereas here, it's like okay whatever. By the way, it wasn't like she was the central character on BSG, and yet I got so much more invested in Boomer than I ever will in Kono.
The blame shouldn't be shifted to Grace Park because she's a fantastic actress. So I can only point the finger at the producers/directors of the show. And it's not just the first time an actress/actor from a much more acclaimed show ends up in a new show that's unworthy of the previous one. I think as a TV viewer, that's the really sad part about saying goodbye to shows that you are really in awe of.
Friday Night Lights, Battlestar Galactica, and Friends are examples off of the top of my head where some fantastic acting and/or comedic chops were displayed. But the subsequent jobs of actors from said shows have failed to give them substantial material to work with, and it is such a pity*! Even for Courteney Cox, who maybe has the least problem in all the aforementioned shows, I find that she doesn't make the Cougar Town show for me - Laury and Bobby do instead. In fact, I'm not sure I even like Jules as the main character, she is really insufferable.
*Okay I'm aware that this doesn't apply for everything. I'm just saying when watching a good show, it's more likely than not the actors will not get something as good as what they're doing in that moment again.
Which leads me to my next point. I realise that a lot of the time, I do not watch shows for their central characters! Okay apart from like Bones and Castle, as I stated before. I watch HIMYM for Barney, I watch Cougar Town for Laurie, I guess I watch Prex for Ron who isn't the central character - although Leslie Knope is pretty much awesome. I watch Fringe for Walter, and especially in the later seasons of Chuck I feel that Morgan and Casey have been more entertaining than Chuck. The list goes on and on but I really don't know why I feel this way.
Is it because all possible storylines have been exhausted for the central characters? Is it because TED IS SUCH A DOUCHE ON HIMYM? Yes he is. I don't like him, I don't care about the mother, I want more of Marshall. Or Lily. Or Robin. Or Barney. Anyone aside from Ted is fine by me.
Aside from that, I think it is because during the casting process of a show, the writers have in mind clearly the personality of a central character. They then center the show around said character, making it very hard to change the character without changing the show. Whereas with peripheral (okay I'm aware that it's not a good word to use since I'm still talking about the main cast, just not the leading actors) characters, it is much easier to discover what the strength of the actors are and shape their following storylines accordingly. For the leading character, you can't exactly do that without changing the show fundamentally.
All the above being said, I still do appreciate the art of creating and maintaining a TV show.
It is a terribly competitive industry - hundreds of pilots made a year, only 20 or so picked up by the major networks, and of 20, maybe only 4-5 survive the first season and even less down the road. Not to mention the vulnerability of your job being subjected to ratings, renewal of your show being uncertain... I guess that's why I don't really mind actors being paid so much. Their jobs are so uncertain, and you never know when they'll get a new job, so whatever they earn from an episode might have to tide them over for a while...
It's terribly hard coming up with stories 22 times a year, and repeat the cycle all over again the next year - while keeping it fresh, original, and true to your show. It isn't like a movie where you can just formulate a plot for 2 hours and wrap it up nicely at the end. For TV shows, it's inserting filler episodes, it's working around the tight budget, it's not knowing if the network will cancel your show after 13 episodes, or add another 5 episodes to the initial order of 22 episodes.
It's a lot of unpredictability. Because of this uncertainty, when you start a season of 22 episodes, you are writing maybe 3 episodes ahead of the filming, which is around 5 episodes ahead of airing? You have no idea how the audience is going to respond to any possible storyline cock-up and by the time you view their response, you are 8 episodes down the line and the audience would have to wait 8 episodes (which is like 1/3 a season) to wrap up or close the storyline, and that's 8 weeks of continuously dropping ratings of the audience is that impatient. And if the network is fickle with the amount of episodes they want, how will you decide how to neatly arch your storylines to ensure they make sense and have proper pacing? You can't!
It's also a big headache keeping track of everything that has happened, especially as your show grows older and older. Inconsistency pisses some people off. What if something you do in season 6 directly contradicts what the character said in season 1? People will give you flak for it, but too bad, it is done and there's no going back to undo it. It will be there like a gaping hole staring you straight in the face, but there's no turning back.
WHEW. I feel tired just typing all the above, imagine the stress the showrunners go through when they do their jobs. Respect, really. But when they do their jobs right and everything clicks, the shows the show runners end up with are really amazing. They work on every level, and it's just hard to imagine anything better. Examples include... Parks and Recreation!! Friday Night Lights!! And maybe, just possibly... Parenthood?
Gawddd I really love TV. I wouldn't mind making this my life if I could.
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