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The Necessity
Feb. 13th, 2009 11:22 amThe Big Friday Bitch, as follows:
I was thinking last night, appropos of not much, about the continuing "problem" of devoted, creatively-driven fan enthusiasm for frankly crappy shows. As I've already noted, the phenomenon seems to follow pretty strict guidelines: Said shows should have pretty people, palpable ho-yay, an okay premise (but not always), and not require much thought to follow. They are the sort of shows of which people can say: "But it's shiny!" and "Well sure, it's not great, but that means I have something to work with!" And pretty soon, everybody's proselytizing and swapping, and the train's a-rollin' down the track. It's THE NEXT BIG THING, and everybody's either on board, or carping by the side.
On a personal note, I'm glad to see that this year's Escapade panel ballot has already had a write-in nom for Flashpoint, because otherwise, I really might throw up my hands in despair; here, at least, is a show which began strong if formulaic, and has only gotten better with each successive episode. And why? Because, amongst other features of the process, the people who make it actually give a fuck. They're doing the infrastructure work, and happily, because they want it to succeed--and not just because somebody cut a co-pro deal, or threw a bunch of development money at them. It's not like these things aren't a factor, simply that they haven't overwhelmed every other aspect of the project. It may make WORK, but it's not make-work, if you see what I'm saying.
And what, exactly, the Hell do I mean by that?
Perhaps it comes directly from having been A) Canadian all my life and B) at the edges of the Canadian film and TV system for almost that long, but my problem in this case comes from knowing how things work. And when you consider certain Canadian-made shows for more than five minutes straight, you can just see which ones came out of genuine passion and which were put together primarily to eat up funding and/or occupy broadcast slots. Of the latter category, you can also see where some of those shows hired people who were trying like billy-oh to create something good in spite of what they'd been given to work with; much like fans-of-crap, I guess (except that they had RL stuff like bank accounts, mortgages and kids' educations at stake/as their impetus for caring, as opposed to oh crap, I need something new to obssess about).
Unfortunately, this doesn't count for much, in the long run. Psi Factor will always be Psi Factor, no matter how devotedly you try to haul it away from its own origin (which was, very explicitly: "Hey, X-Files is a big hit! And it shoots in and around B.C.! We could do that, for far less money, and as long as we color-coordinate correctly, lazy people won't be able to rouse themselves to change the channel!") Beast-Master is still Beast-Master. Same with Relic Hunter, etc. These shows just have no valid reason to exist, aside from the simple proposition that people trained to do particular things should be able to make money doing them--and shit, as the child of two actors, I certainly get that. But it doesn't make me want to go anywhere near them.
Listen: Obviously, I don't LIKE the Stargates, but I respect them; they were made by people who gave a crap. Fans of their own shows, if you will. They created internal logic, mythology, genuinely resonant characters. Same with due South, which I also would cross whole city blocks to avoid--I'd never say it's a bad show. It comes out of someone's passion; several someones. I get that, and validate it. But these other shows...it's not cheese alone, with them. There's something sort of bankrupt about them, as well as twee and/or annoying. They feel like a marriage based on "settling". They reek of desperation.
Is it that devotion to really good shows could end up getting you hurt, when those shows don't do what you want them to? (I've certainly seen that with stuff like BSG, both currently and in the past.) Or that if you only keep your standards low enough, you can always feel like you're the one the medium/material depends on to elevate it? Or both? Or neither? Or am I just THE BIGGEST BITCH IN THE WORLD?
Dunno. But I need to go eat something, and get back to that hammering.;)
I was thinking last night, appropos of not much, about the continuing "problem" of devoted, creatively-driven fan enthusiasm for frankly crappy shows. As I've already noted, the phenomenon seems to follow pretty strict guidelines: Said shows should have pretty people, palpable ho-yay, an okay premise (but not always), and not require much thought to follow. They are the sort of shows of which people can say: "But it's shiny!" and "Well sure, it's not great, but that means I have something to work with!" And pretty soon, everybody's proselytizing and swapping, and the train's a-rollin' down the track. It's THE NEXT BIG THING, and everybody's either on board, or carping by the side.
On a personal note, I'm glad to see that this year's Escapade panel ballot has already had a write-in nom for Flashpoint, because otherwise, I really might throw up my hands in despair; here, at least, is a show which began strong if formulaic, and has only gotten better with each successive episode. And why? Because, amongst other features of the process, the people who make it actually give a fuck. They're doing the infrastructure work, and happily, because they want it to succeed--and not just because somebody cut a co-pro deal, or threw a bunch of development money at them. It's not like these things aren't a factor, simply that they haven't overwhelmed every other aspect of the project. It may make WORK, but it's not make-work, if you see what I'm saying.
And what, exactly, the Hell do I mean by that?
Perhaps it comes directly from having been A) Canadian all my life and B) at the edges of the Canadian film and TV system for almost that long, but my problem in this case comes from knowing how things work. And when you consider certain Canadian-made shows for more than five minutes straight, you can just see which ones came out of genuine passion and which were put together primarily to eat up funding and/or occupy broadcast slots. Of the latter category, you can also see where some of those shows hired people who were trying like billy-oh to create something good in spite of what they'd been given to work with; much like fans-of-crap, I guess (except that they had RL stuff like bank accounts, mortgages and kids' educations at stake/as their impetus for caring, as opposed to oh crap, I need something new to obssess about).
Unfortunately, this doesn't count for much, in the long run. Psi Factor will always be Psi Factor, no matter how devotedly you try to haul it away from its own origin (which was, very explicitly: "Hey, X-Files is a big hit! And it shoots in and around B.C.! We could do that, for far less money, and as long as we color-coordinate correctly, lazy people won't be able to rouse themselves to change the channel!") Beast-Master is still Beast-Master. Same with Relic Hunter, etc. These shows just have no valid reason to exist, aside from the simple proposition that people trained to do particular things should be able to make money doing them--and shit, as the child of two actors, I certainly get that. But it doesn't make me want to go anywhere near them.
Listen: Obviously, I don't LIKE the Stargates, but I respect them; they were made by people who gave a crap. Fans of their own shows, if you will. They created internal logic, mythology, genuinely resonant characters. Same with due South, which I also would cross whole city blocks to avoid--I'd never say it's a bad show. It comes out of someone's passion; several someones. I get that, and validate it. But these other shows...it's not cheese alone, with them. There's something sort of bankrupt about them, as well as twee and/or annoying. They feel like a marriage based on "settling". They reek of desperation.
Is it that devotion to really good shows could end up getting you hurt, when those shows don't do what you want them to? (I've certainly seen that with stuff like BSG, both currently and in the past.) Or that if you only keep your standards low enough, you can always feel like you're the one the medium/material depends on to elevate it? Or both? Or neither? Or am I just THE BIGGEST BITCH IN THE WORLD?
Dunno. But I need to go eat something, and get back to that hammering.;)
