NOW THAT THE season is fully underway, a couple developments in shows that I like have me alternately scratching my head and slapping my knee with glee.
I'm saddened to read Alex and others pull a WTF? on the new season of Friday Night Lights. I'm still working my way through the excellent season one DVD box set and I'm chagrined to hear they take a detour to O.C.-ville in Season Two. (Maybe that's the deal with the devil they made to try to get the ratings up?)
But for me it's all about The Office. I know that some have had trouble with the one hour episodes, but for me, the wound's not fatal. Yes, the kind of observational comedy that is the show's stock-in-trade works better at a half hour, but then again, the shows still succeed at delivering the funny -- a domain that Seinfeld never managed to master in the one hour format.
In the premiere, I got really excited when I thought I knew where they were going, and disappointed when they went another way. In the Jim and Pam plot, I thought for a while they were going to deal with it by not telling us definitively one way or another whether they were together -- using the conceit of the documentary show to give us tantalizing evidence one way or another, and string us along for awhile. Maybe that would have sucked, I don't know. But I think they could have drawn it out a bit more. (Though the payoff of the office finding out, and Phyliss, of all people, immediately making the "bitch turn" was inspired.) Greg Daniels is a smart guy, and this show's continued ability to surprise me makes me think that making that choice of getting Jim and Pam out there means he's got bigger fish to fry.
Psychologically, it also presents -- for anyone still apt to make the comparison, the last important break with the DNA of the series' British parent. With the Jim/Pam pairing, we're now in uncharted territory that the British series never had to explore.
The last episode I watched (I think I'm one behind) gave a hint as to another way they might be mixing it up. Ryan's return to Scranton was a gut-buster -- nowhere more so than with Creed's jet black hair and attempts to be young, bra. "Can we get Red Bull in the vending machine?" Heh heh.
But it was with Jan's short, key appearance that I thought, "oh, wait a second."
By giving Michael the idea of the ageism suit, I think we may have just caught wind of how Jan's gonna get her groove back. And stick it to that weasel Ryan.
Melora Hardin playing the Lady Macbeth to Steve Carell's hapless middle manager is a jolt of juice I'm eager to watch unfold -- a glorious twist in a relationship that's been a guilty viewing pleasure for some time. Now if they manage to make us feel sorry for Dwight as he pines for Angela, the top of my head might come off.
It's funny how writing full time really has changed the way I watch TeeVee. Time was, I'd watch the same way a lot of people I know watch -- getting pissed off when the show goes in a direction you didn't expect or like. I guess maybe that's the frustrated artist way of watching TeeVee.
Now, I get far more joy when I watch and think, "oh, man -- that is a direction I NEVER would have thought of!" I derive intense joy from seeing writers do way, way better, be more original, more surprising, more inventive than I think I could have been in that situation.
Which, it occurs to me, is the way that regular people -- not internet superfans, not nitpickers, and definitely not jaded writers -- watch.
It took writing full time to return me to what I loved about watching TeeVee in the first place.
Man. Weird.
Go Jan!
3 comments:
"Time was, I'd watch the same way a lot of people I know watch -- getting pissed off when the show goes in a direction you didn't expect or like....I derive intense joy from seeing writers do way, way better, be more original, more surprising, more inventive than I think I could have been in that situation."
well that's the rub isn't it? going in a different direction, and going in way better, more original, more inventive direction are very different things.
Not really though. Witness the reaction to the Sopranos ending. Instant reaction was rage -- but then some came to think that it was perfect.
some. not nearly anything close to all.
but there's no doubt in my mind that it's the right ending.
our job as writers used to be defined as coming up with a satisfying ending -- but that's bled down to giving the audience the ending they expect or want. "Dramatically satisfying" and "satisfying" are two different things. We need to always fight for the former.
well i only believe it's the right ending from a logistical point of view. they had no good way of ending it - so the best way is to create controversy and avoid the issue altogether.
perhaps that's inventive and different in terms of meta-management of a tv show, but as a dramatically satisfying ending it's complete abdication. it might be the smartest way to get out from under a difficult situation, but i don't think it'll ever be taught in a dramatists curriculum on brilliant endings.
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