The Hills is marketed as a reality television show, claiming that it is not staged or written or planned in any way, but a product of spontaneity. But something drew me out of the reality so much that I wanted to…. perhaps write a letter inquiring how they expected us as viewers to accept this as truth. Not the valley girl accents or the endless parades of blondes with big boobs or the empty conversations about broken hearts and shattered relationships, but the camera!
There would be a shot of let’s say… Kristin and her boyfriend (or former boyfriend- it was hard to keep track) The camera would have a shot of them from the front, cut to the back with the exact same conversation and film them from behind except, you couldn’t see the camera! So… I perceived that as the scenes were staged. I couldn’t really concentrate on much else…
I had a very hard time getting through Breaking Bad. The whole show seemed very contrived to me. I could see the directing. I could see the acting. I could see the lighting. I could hear the writing. I could hear the sound guy picking specific sounds that symbolized something. Upon watching Mad Men, I was instantly wrapped up in the story and completely abandoned all thought of looking for symbols and metaphors and shot choices. Any inclination towards analyzing and over-analyzing was lost as I was drawn to the characters and their stories.
After watching the latter, a show equally contrived (That’s what television is, after all) I wondered: how do we shape reality? And how does that affect the way we view television? Perhaps Breaking Bad portrays reality so well that it seems fake, the writing, acting, etc. Mad Men, on the other hand, is more of a spectacle, you could say, but seems to be very natural.
South Park is one of the most controversial television shows, an animation tackling current events, social and political issues all through the eyes of 4th graders.
Created by Trey Parker and Matt Stone for the Comedy Central television network, South Park looks at the world through the eyes of Stan Marsh, Kyle Broflovski, Kenny McCormick, and Eric Cartman. Stan and Kyle are best friend and are essentially the straight men of the show. Kenny is the token poor kid, coming from a lower class family and dies in nearly every episode in the first five seasons, returning the next episode with little or no explanation. Cartman is crude, loud, obnoxious, and racist. For the first three seasons, the boys were in third grade. In season 4, they moved up to 4th grade where they have remained ever since. The gangs favorite words are fag, douche, and various other curse words.
South Park is currently in it’s 13th season, with 195 episodes since 1997 and has already been contracted to produce 14 episodes in 2011. The show can be summed up by Cartman’s personality; crude, loud, obnoxious, and racist. South Park tackles political and social issues, always poking fun of both sides, portraying the subject of the week with mockery and satire. How do they get away with so much?
The original animation was created by animating construction paper cutouts with stop motion animation. With this technique, the pilot took 3 months to complete. Now, with computer animation emulating the original hand-drawn graphics, an episode can be completed in 1 week, allowing the show to keep up to date on all the latest socio-political issues. Though they have switched to a higher technology with a computerized television show, they have preserved the original simplicity of characters and landscapes composed of basic geometric shapes and primary colors, giving the audience the same cheap cutout look that has been there from the beginning.
Being a cartoon that is cheap and quick to make, the writers have much leeway with what they can make the characters do. Because it is a cartoon, a trip to space or to the past or to the future is not out of the question and can be accepted as believable. Anything is believable; nothing need be questioned as to whether or not it is realistic. Reality is shaped in a different way, through humor poking fun at current events utilizing over the top humor to the extreme.
Let’s look at a few examples of how humor has been used effectively to boost the show from a group of fowl-mouthed children to a social commentary.
Britney’s New Look
An episode in which Britney Spears is driven to the point of insanity where she takes her own life. Funny, but haunting. The episode is a comment on celebrity, if you will. First Britney is pushed by the paparazzi to shoot herself in the head, except she fails and ends up walking around with half a head. The paparazzi still pushes despite her fragile state and soon everyone in South Park surrounds her in a field with their cameras, snapping photos of her until she drops dead. Then, they are satisfied and finally leave her alone. While it is a bit of a stretch, a bit gruesome, to portray a celebrity with half a head spewing blood brain remnants, it’s not such a far cry from the truth that we push celebrities, and people in general, to a point so far that there is ultimately nowhere for them to go.
Douche and Terd
“Douche and Terd” came out during the 2008 elections, making a laugh of the Vote or Die campaign. The episode revolves around school mascots and the need for children to vote for a mascot.. Their choices? A douche or a terd. Kyle is shunned from the community because he doesn’t think it matters whether the mascot is a douche or a terd and is kidnapped by Peta. The episode kind of encapsulates the absurdity of the campaign to vote for someone even if you don’t feel stronger either way.
Wallmart
The “Wallmart” episode documents the Wal-mart craze and the irony of people hating it so much, yet shopping there anyways. Ultimately, the only thing they can do to get away from Walmart’s discounts and low prices is to destroy the “heart of Wallmart, which happens to be a mirror, reflecting the thing that actually needs to be destroyed as the consumer. And then they burn it down…
With simple yet outrageous stories, South Park has this way about it that makes you laugh and makes you think at the same time. The controversy surrounding it revolves mainly around the notion of fourth graders being so foul-mouthed and crude, which the show addresses with The Terrance and Philip show, a controversial show within a controversial show that the South Park kids become enthralled with and the adults see as nothing more than a show about a group of foul-mouthed children.
The aesthetics of the absurd utilized in many contemporary comedy shows reflects the way in which consumer-content interaction has changed. If we look back at more conventional comedy forms – Friends, The Simpsons, or even SNL, we see that they operate on a sort of joke and punchline formula. An inclusive joke that the whole family can laugh at. What makes the aesthetics of the absurd so appealing to today’s jaded audiences is that they can’t exactly pinpoint the humor in it. The aesthetics of the absurd seems to be ubiquitous in the media: Burger King and Starburst commercials, MTV bumpers, late-night comedy shows. My aim is to articulate not what Tim and Eric’s specific visual language consists of, but to discern how their adoption of this absurdist aesthetic reflects a larger social change.
Tim and Eric’s success mirrors how technological changes have altered the way in which we interact with our media objects. More specifically, the Internet allows for multiple ways for a “base object” (the television show itself) to permute into new, media-traversing content that can be created by producers and consumers alike. Before the Internet, the only way we could interact with our favorite television shows was through the delivery technology of the actual television. The relationship between content and consumer was a one-way street. Comedy shows could only convey its humor through the actual show itself. The laughtrack rolls when the actor delivers the punchline, and the humor is delivered to us on a plate. There’s nothing behind the box. But with the Internet and new media technologies, there’s a whole world behind the box, a world that might make sense of or even enhance the humor on-screen.
I want to argue that today, the aesthetics of the absurd in television comedy is made possible by the multiple points of entry and multiple platforms that a show like Tim and Eric lends itself to. Contemporary comedy shows that utilize the aesthetics of the absurd fulfill an inherent need for union and separation, a need cited in Simmels’ “Fashion”, an essay which describes how trends thrive, and how they’re essential to our nature. So much of the humor inherent in Tim and Eric depends on being “in” on the overall joke of its absurdity and inventiveness. The only way to be “in” on it is to do your research. In the same way as anything “cool” (Chuck Klosterman, pop culture theorist, would describe this as anything that “embraces semioriginal, semielitist cultural artifacts that remain just out of reach to those who desire them”), Tim and Eric’s inaccessibility, and thus, exclusivity.
Tim and Eric could not exist in the Golden Age of Broadcast television because it’d simply be written off as stupid or disturbing, and that would be the end of it. Content in the broadcast age, by the economics of scarcity, could not be weird or absurd, there simply weren’t enough channels. Today, it can. There are a million channels to access our content. The first time I saw Tim and Eric on TV, on Adult Swim, I did not laugh, I had nightmares for days. Intrigued by the sheer weirdness of it, I searched them on the Internet and discovered that they had already amassed a large grassroots following. I also stumbled upon a large collection of their sketches on YouTube. I slowly began to make the connections, find the clues. It was through these snippets of information I gleaned from the Internet that validated the laughability of it– I felt as if I had joined a secret society of people who got the joke. And it was the most glorious joke of my life.
In a way, Tim and Eric, by adopting an aesthetic that has no rhyme or reason (excessive video glitch, real-life schizophrenic actors, random crying mustached babies, recurring poop and puke visual motifs), are capitalizing on our inherent need to feel as if we’re a part of an exclusive society who “understands” the humor by alienating the “losers” who don’t. (Tim and Eric can be a very alienating dark experience indeed) This would be impossible if it were not for the way that the duo take advantage of how boundaries-less our society has become in the age of the Internet. Their story evolves and uncovers itself not only through it’s television segments, but through their live comedy shows, their internet viral clips, their DVD supplements, their collaborations with other artists, etc.
Season Cinco, which is to air in March 2010, is said by Eric Warheim to be influenced by the creepiness of David Lynch. I am a huge David Lynch fan, and if I analyze the reasons why I enjoy a Lynch film (and to an equal degree, Twin Peaks – WKLM?), they are very similar to the reasons why I am in love with Tim and Eric – because I “get” and accept the weirdness, and they (the general “they”) don’t! “The last thing we want people to do while watching the show,” Wareheim says, “is relax.” That means, for fans of the show, it’ll be up to us to find the new humor in anti-comedy.
an example of quintessential T&E aesthetic — low-quality composite of mismatched items, dark and creepy transformations and morphs
Firefly was a terrific show from the mind of Joss Whedon, it followed the crew of a spaceship through the future human civilization, spreading out into space through a never ending frontier. After a brilliant but ill received thirteen episode half season, Fox decided to cancel the show. Due to a cult fan base Whedon was able to finish out his concept as best as he could through the movie Serenity. If there is one thing that the firefly experience show me, it is that television is a far superior medium to create a sense of genuine family connection than a movie can ever hope to be. While this may seem obvious with TV taking up much more time than a movie, the example of Serenity shows how the movie format looses much of the familial sense, even when it has been created before hand by a television series.
The crew that makes up this family like most doesn’t always agree and most certainly does no not share the same beliefs and views. While they are all a little different, the crew members can be placed into two separate groups. The first consists of the more rag-tag, back planet, raw members, Captain Mal, Zoe, Wash, Jayne and Kaylee. The other group is made up of the more cultured, refined members that have a little bit more civilization in them, Inara, Simon, River and Book. In the show itself it is this second group who are the new comers and must integrate into the family, except for Inara who has been with the crew for some time but is separated due to her legitimate profession as a companion.
We can see in the clip below from the pilot episode Serenity that the new members do have to go through some rough housing and prank pulling to become a member of the family. Simon, one of the new members of the crew is told by the captain that Kaylee has died (Simon is inadvertently responsible for Kaylee getting shot). While this seems like a cruel joke to play, this is Whedon’s way to show that he isn’t going to make it easy for these groups to join together.
It quickly becomes apparent that the Captain, Mal, is the member that keeps everything together. He takes it upon himself to protect his crew and in turn his crew stands by him. On multiple occasions he goes out of his way to play the paternal role and do what is right. In this clip from the episode Safe, a fairly early episode, Mal comes back to a planet after Simon and his sister River get captured. At this point it is still clear that they are not full members of the crew/family. That aside, mal comes back and asserts with the line “yeah but shes our which” that they have fallen under his wing and are on their way to becoming members of the family.
By a little past the midpoint of the series, Mal shows that the new members have become a part of the family. When Mal finds out that Jayne took money to turn in Simon and River, he is willing to take Jayne’s life for his betrayal. There are two great points that can be taken from this clip, first that Mal respects and protects the family unit as a whole over all else. The other point is that even after selling his “family” out to the alliance (the central big brother-esque government, that represents one of the villains of the show), Jayne has accepted death and just wants to make sure that the other crew/family members don’t know what he did, that they remember him as one of them and not for turning against the group.
One of the greatest moments of the series in terms of the solidification of the family is at the end of the episode Out of Air. During the episode there is some catastrophic damage in the engine room, Mal forces every one to leave and save themselves while he stays behind and tries to save the ship. He ends up getting the parts he needs from a scavenger ship but he also gets shot. The idea of the family is constantly built through this episode as the stories of each member joining the crew play as flashbacks. Mal is always the one who is protecting his family but this is a rare example of the family coming back to save and protect him. The real beauty comes through when Mal fading back to sleep sais “you’all gunna be here when I wake up?” We can see that It is not just the family that needs Mal but Mal himself that needs his family.
Unfortunately film cannot provide the time needed to create these incredibly strong family units. Television has the unique ability to be able to satisfy episodic story arcs as well as far reaching arcs at the same time. In one episode you can feel satisfied that the crew has done their heist and has moved the goods successfully and be satisfied, while during that same episode you can see that Simon has gone out of his way to make a small gesture to be a part of the group, a small step but a step along the way indeed!
In Serenity, the film conclusion to the series, there is something lost between the crew/family members. So much time must be devoted to the plot of a movie and to the introduction of these characters to viewers unfamiliar with the television show, that there is relatively little time given the relationships between the characters. The relation ship that Mal and Simon have created over the thirteen episodes of the television series is reverted and then thrown together in a three minute fight that occurs in the beginning of the movie. For anyone who has watched through the show it is a bit disturbing to move from the slower, more detailed way of story telling into this fast paced glazed over sampling.
In the end I am left with a plea to art makers and art critics, USE TELEVISION AS A LEGITIMATE ARTFORM. Through the example of Firefly we can see how massive and complex a story can be told through TV and how much better it can be than film, yet it is still considered a lesser medium. Hopefully through the technological advancements of DVD box sets and DVRs critics will embrace television as a higher form of storytelling.
The series Firefly, a space western, is set in a time where Earth has been abandoned for a new solar system far away. Constantly switching between genres, and heavily dependent on futuristic technology, travel, language, fears, and culture, the series needed to find a way to reach mimesis for its viewers. In other words, the show needed to be effortlessly believable and comfortable, and with visual or verbal cues that would allow audience members to assume certain things about characters, locations, cultures, actions, and the outcomes of those actions. One of the ways Firefly did this was through the construction of a social hierarchy based on a planet to planet differentiation where the classes were literally separated by planet.
Society in Firefly is broken down into four main groups: high, middle, low, and drifters. The homes of these classes are denoted by the core planets, middle reaching planets, far reaching planets, and those who live on ships, respectively. Each class has its own type of dress, different level of technology, different cultures, and differing opinions about the Alliance, or the solar system’s government.
High culture is found on the core planets and some smaller areas. They are the wealthiest planets and are lush in super advanced technology. Buildings are extremely futuristic, cars hover and race through huge skyscrapers, and large houses are guarded by invisible fences and sensors at every door. Their clothing is either extremely futuristic or has heavy 19th century influences, and no expense is spared at their dress, food, parties, housings, etc. In the following clip, three of the ship’s main characters, Simon, a doctor, River, his sister, and Jayne, a crew member, break into a high level medical center on the central planet Ariel. Here, Simon is able to use the futuristic and amazing technology to do a full body and brain scan of his sister. Take note of the technology and clothing.
Because of the lab’s location on Ariel, which is explained to be a central planet of great wealth, this level of amazing technology does not surprise the audience. Instead, all of the technology, and the amount of medicine available to be stolen, seems obvious to the viewer, and mimesis remains strong.
The middle planets are a happier mix between the high technology and futuristic genre of the central planets and the minimal or non-existant technology and western genre of the outer rim planets. In the following clip, the ship Serenity, lands in a port of Persephone to restock and take on passengers. This middle planet has some technology, and the port is well stocked and busy. However, as it is a middle planet, the port is still dirty and jam-packed with people of all different races, creeds, and cultures. Technology does play a huge part in their lives, but, as you will see, they still cook and sell food out on the street or from tents.
Horses and spaceships ride next to each other, computers stand next to cloth covered tents, and little boys sit on space-safe storage bins. The fashion is mixed, but not wealthy, and cannot be easily described by one era or another. The sci-fi futuristic and western genre mix sets the audience’s expectations for what types of things would be available on such a planet, and sets expectations for behavior. For example, one would expect to find parts for a ship here, but not the high tech medical center that was found on Ariel. Also, as this port sets up mimesis for the audience, we are not surprised to find the crew getting shot at by a trader, and then picking up a pastor and a wealthy traveler as passengers.
Following the line of technology, the low planets are the most poor with the least amount of technology and comfort. These planets often have no technology whatsoever, and rely heavily on horses, wagons, and other ranching, farming, and cooking implements that one would have seen on the Oregon Trail, or in the Wild West. The following clip shows a planet that is a huge producer of mud, and follows the crew around as they get a short tour from the foreman as he describes the status of the workers.
The view is pathetic, especially in comparison to the first video of Ariel’s medical center. The indentured servants work knee deep in smelly mud, mixing dirt and water with the most basic of tools. Their clothing is raggedy, their food consists of a liquid bread/beer, and they worship a statue of a thief made out of, that’s right, mud. These surroundings, while unfortunate for the mudders, set the audience’s expectations for the rest of the episode. From this scene, we expect and accept the dingy bar area, the group signing around a guitar, and the hope that was given to them when a thief dropped a bag of money while fleeing the scene of his crime.
The final social group is made up of those who live on the ships, drifting, not calling any planet home. Many of these captains and crews are, like Mal, soldiers from the wrong side of the rebellion against the Alliance, fugitives from the law, or those who don’t really quite fit in. While this group is often made up of those from other groups, many of whom retain their dress and cultural habits, they are treated differently by those with whom they interact. For example, these groups tend to be a bit more rough and tumble than those found living on the middle planets. Take the following clip, for example, where Inara, a high class companion, is attending a ball with a client on a high planet.
Atherton, a high class gentleman, points out that Inara, a high class woman, should not be living on “that flying piece of gossa”. While it does not detract from her appeal or manners, per say, it is not considered a place for a high class woman to be living, although she does choose it. The episode then continues, creating mimesis through our past experience and expectations of groups from different “worlds”. For example, when Kayle enters the ball wearing her store-made dress, Inara curses. We understand her sentiment immediately as the show, through its construction of social hierarchy, shows us how to react when two classes mix. It is then no surprise later in the episode when Mal, protecting Inara’s honor, punches Atherton in the face, as we would expect him to do, even at a fancy ball. As Atherton is of the high class society, it is then no surprise to the audience when Atherton reacts by stating “I accept,” and Mal is then bound to a duel with swords. While this may seem fantastic or strange in the audience’s sense of reality, because of the mimesis created by the show, the audience understands Mal’s surprise but also accepts it as a cultural necessity.
I think that it is also of great importance that Firefly is indeed a television series. While in the movie, Serenity, they did briefly describe the cultural difference between the planets, I think that it takes the length and freedom of a television series to really create the mimesis that makes this show really work. Take, for example, the following clip from the first episode of Firefly, where the crew is sitting down to dinner.
Mal and Zoe explain to a passenger how the outer moons have such a difference in the level of technology. Mal explains that “they”, aka the Alliance and the central planets, dumped settlers on the outer planets with the bare minimum of technology. This is an interesting moment, that built up over the series, really helps to explain why the classes are separated onto different planets, and probably helps explain the economy of the system. Furthermore, it helps create mimesis in the series and give the audience their expectations.
Typically showcasing stereotyped personalities, such as the Jock, the Cheerleader, the Homecoming Queen, the Science Geek, and the Outcasted Rebel, teen dramas have been the outlet for teen angst, over-active hormones, emotions and unease since the early 1990’s. These shows internalize the “typical” high school experience and project an amplified version onto our television screens once a week so that we may all relive the embarrassment, and awkwardness of high school. Utilizing the medium of television as a unique storytelling platform, teen dramas facilitate an intense and climatic character and plot development that unfolds over the course of multiple seasons. In this way the audience becomes emotionally invested in the viewing experience. However, we see that in many cases, the character development and plot line often unfold in the framework of each character’s investment or a group of character’s investment in a particular hobby. By looking at the new television series, Glee we can see how the role of hobbies in teen dramas dictates a character’s personality, social status and interactions with others. We also see that a change in hobby serves as a signpost of a character’s evolving emotional needs and they are often aspirational hobbies that empower the audience.
Glee is an American musical comedy-drama television series that centers around a high school glee club that is dubbed “New Directions!” Set within the fictional William McKinley High School in small town Ohio, Glee broaches the archetypal incidents we see in classic teen shows: unrequited love, teen pregnancy, cheating, revenge, girl fights, fist fights, etc. etc. Drawing on inspiration from their experiences in glee clubs and theater in suburban high schools, creators, Ryan Murphey, Brad Falchuk, and Ian Brennan originally conceptualized Glee as a film but later decided the storyline was more conducive to a television format in which each character could be fully-actualized over the course of multiple seasons. Although only thirteen episodes have aired thus far, the musical style monologues and myriad intimate moments have already begun to shed light on the true colors of each character’s moral standing, interests and personality. Using song as a vehicle, the role of Glee club as a hobby becomes central to each character’s development over the course of the first season. By looking at the characters of Cheerleader Quinn Fabray, “Superstar” Rachel berry, and jock and closet glee-aficionado Finn Hudson in the context of their leisure pursuits we see that this is the space in which the audience witnesses the true nature of each character.
In the first half of season one, cheerleader Quinn Fabray prides herself upon her position as head “Cheerio” and devious cheerleading coach, Sue Sylvester’s pet. During her reign as head cheerleader, Quinn is for lack of a better word, a complete bitch. She looks down upon any and all fellow peers who do not maintain an equivalent social status, and she applies a conniving and deceitful nature to all of her endeavors. She often serves as Sue Sylvester’s spy and accomplice to the inevitable take-down of the Glee Club, and she will stop at nothing to preserve her position as queen bee. Pious and pure, Quinn is also a member of the school’s chastity club, where students participate in absolutely outrageous activities to promote abstinence until marriage. She is a daddy’s girl who is the embodiment of all the wholesomeness and lady-like attributes of a young mid-western girl. However, upon discovering the connection between her long-term boyfriend, Finn, and school loser, Rachel, Quinn decides to mediate their interactions by joining the Glee Club. It is at this point that Quinn’s entire life goes awry. Breaking her chastity vows, Quinn sleeps with school badass, Puck, who in typical teen drama fashion, impregnates her. From this point forward Quinn’s life spirals downwards and we see her fall from queendom. Her expulsion from the Cheerio squad due to her pregnancy is a major turning point for Quinn’s character whose most salient trait was her association with the squad. This is detrimental to her social status and self-concept. Without her identity as a “Cheerio” Quinn is forced to redefine who she is and she must discover her new place on the social ladder. Outcasted from the cheerleading squad and the chastity club, Quinn finds solace in the glee club who accepts her regardless of her social standing and moral dilemma.
“Superstar,” Rachel Berry is the over-confident loser, who is obsessed with the idea of fame. Placing a gold star next to her name every time she signs something as a metaphor for her being a star, Rachel indulges in the incredibly aspirational hobby of becoming a famous vocalist. Her overbearing nature, ignorance for high school social norms, and self-obsessed drive to become a star often lands Rachel with a 60 oz. slushie in the face. Considered the low of the low on the social ladder, Rachel’s hobby becomes her obsession and source of identification. She outcasts herself from the real world in order to live the fantasy of stardom whether it be in her self-made YouTube videos, or singing on the stage. Rachel is in constant need of attention, and is enraged when she is outshined by anyone. So when she becomes a member of the Glee club, we see her grapple with the notion of sharing the stage with others. Rachel’s character, although remains pretty staunchly the same throughout the first season, subtly moves from a highly independent and introverted one to that of a more collaborative individual. We see Rachel slowly begin to recognize the value of friendship and social networks and how these can become sources of joy in one’s life. Although the ambitious attention-seeking aspects of her personality continue to prevail, as her associations with Glee Club become stronger Rachel begins to understand that sometimes there are forces greater than oneself.
Finn Hudson, boyfriend to the almighty Quinn Fabray is a character that is also deeply affected by his willing participation and bribed participation in school activities. As quarterback of the shittiest football team in the state of Ohio, Finn is hailed by his classmates as a source of admiration and a role model to his fellow teammates. His quirky character is masked by his hobby and a herd of men blindly follow Finn due to the social status awarded to him as football captain. Finn is a kind and caring boy, but hides behind his football façade to portray himself as a Man’s man. Although we see acts of Mercy, like when Finn tells his teammates to remove Kurt’s new Marc Jacobs sweater before tossing him in the dumpster, Finn is often the leader of painful high school pranks and mockery. He is the leader at his high school but he manages to walk the fine line between playing the role of the dumb jock and following his own dreams and ambitions. He has a jock-ish authority mixed with an appealingly square naiveté. However once he is forced to join Glee club by Mr. Schuester due to false allegations of marijuana possession, Finn risks alienation from the popular crowd to pursue the less glamorous route of Glee Club. At first Finn is rather resistant to the idea of joining the highly-bashed club, but he begins to warm to the idea when he realizes it is an outlet for his alter-ego. As Finn becomes increasingly involved in Glee club we see his social status begin to rapidly decline. Finn goes from the slushie thrower to the one being slimed with the ultimate McKinley High diss. Over time, participating in Glee club becomes not just a hobby but a way to define himself. We see the dichotomous relationship Finn has with himself develop in the context of both the Glee club and as the quarterback of the football team over the course of season one which causes audiences to wonder which aspect of Finn will become his predominant means of association when the first season picks up again in April.
Often times we forget how central the role of hobbies are to the development and maintenance of a character over time. Because teen drama characters are so stereotypically defined as the “jock,” the “homecoming Queen,” or the “Science Geek” their hobbies and leisure interests become the main form of identification. Not only is it what they do, it’s who they are. However, because of the long-term format of television series, we are allowed to see how characters develop within the confines of their stereotype and how no character really upholds all of the traits classically attributed to each stereotype. However we do see that each character’s identity, personality, and social standing is guided by their participation or lack of participation in certain activities. Without the application of conventional archetypes as defined by hobbies, relating to, and deciphering each character becomes a more involved task, one which television viewers often do not want to participate in. Thus hobbies are attributed to each character as an easy means of identification for the viewer and a way to understanding the evolving role of each character as the season develops.
A television series exploring drugs and the drug trade isn’t anything new to the small screen. A half-hour comedy revolving around it is. Premiering in August of 2005, Weeds was initially met with great critical acclaim, and its success has certainly not been short-lived – the show has since won 1 Golden Globe award and has garnered an impressive 10 Golden Globe and 19 Emmy award nominations[1]. Many critics saw and still see the show about a newly widowed housewife (Nancy Botwin, played Mary Louise Parker) selling marijuana in suburbia to make ends meet as a breath of fresh air not only into the ailing Showtime network, but into the half-hour comedic structure itself. But as innovative and “daring”[2] as the show’s first season may be, Weeds derives almost all of its comedy from tropes and socio-economic stereotypes that have been played with in film and on television for decades. What makes Weeds different is the way in which it plays with those ideas – rather than turning a stereotype on its head, the show finds both comedy and commentary in passionately committing to those stereotypes and taking them to their absolute extremes.
The most blatant trope utilized in the series is also a major pillar of the show’s premise: the idea that something sinister lies beneath the idyllic setting of the modern suburban development. Blue Velvet, American Beauty, Desperate Housewives and countless other film and television productions have explored this territory, however few have depended so heavily upon the setting as does Weeds. This suburban setting is no less important to the show than any one of its characters. In fact, each major character on the show seems to be in some way a personification of stereotypical suburbia – consumed with maintaining pristine appearances while always plagued with something dark.
Additionally, when it comes to the idea of false appearances, Weeds isn’t really that interested in any moral ambiguity, and the suburban backdrop ensures that there is none. Where all appears to be “right”, it’s pretty easy to pick out what’s “wrong”. The clean-cut scenery of Agrestic highlights the extreme behavior of its residents and heightens the comedy of the show. The single white mom selling pot in suburbia gets a lot more laughs than the single white mom selling pot in the projects.
There’s no mistaking that the creators of the show consciously recognized the importance of the suburbs within the reality of Weeds. Their thoughts and feelings on “just-add-water” communities such as Agrestic are in fact made very clear from the get-go with the use of this opening sequence and theme song:
Written and performed by 1960s activist Malvina Reynolds, this song while played over a montage of upper-middle class settings and activities truly does speak for itself. Within minutes of the show’s start, even the first-time viewer of the show gets that Weeds aims to expose that which isn’t meant to be exposed, and thus they should understand the comedy of Weeds instantly as well.
The series’ writers comment on the absurdity of suburbia in far more subtle ways too. “Agrestic”, the small town in which the show initially takes place, is a joke in and of itself. A word meaning “rural” and “unsightly”, it seems to poke fun at the fantastical names of so many upper-middle class community developments.
Celia Hodes, the show’s resident frenemy of the main character, is an obvious character-based extension of the upper-middle class white suburbs as well as one of the shows main sources of comedy. Absolutely consumed with appearances, she is that stereotypically perfection-obsessed soccer mom that everyone loves to hate times ten. In true Weeds fashion, both her words and her actions go above and beyond what one would expect to see in a standard archetype. Take this clip, for example, of Celia talking to her daughter about homosexuality:
This lecture is rather tame for Celia’s character. It is repeatedly made extremely clear that she is willing to go to any length to maintain her and her family’s pristine appearance – even if it means replacing her daughter’s chocolate with laxatives, for example.
Nancy Botwin and her coffee
Nancy Botwin, the show’s main character, also exhibits the hallmarks of a suburban mom. Though not psychotic in quite the same fashion as Celia, it still takes a person of a questionable mental state to turn to drug dealing as a way to support a family when it appears as if a legitimate job could just as easily be found. The show’s writers can again be seen commenting on suburban values through the examination of Nancy’s drug-dealing motives. She claims that she sells pot in order to maintain her life-style, however one has to question just how necessary it is to maintain such a life-style. She drives a Range Rover, has a live-in house keeper and always has an iced coffee in hand. She views what most would call luxuries as necessities, and is willing to put her family, her reputation and her own safety on the line to keep these “necessities”.
Sharply contrasting the stereotypical suburban landscape is the African American family that supplies Nancy with her weed. The family, led by the matriarchal figure Heylia, is portrayed every bit as stereotypically as the characters of suburbia. Heylia is a large, angry black woman that’s good at cooking and a mother to an unwed daughter with a new-born. Once again, these stereotypes are taken to extremes for the show’s comedic purposes, as in this clip:
Though the scene is arguably successful in it’s comedic intent, it’s really no wonder why some groups have criticized the show for its perpetuation of black stereotypes. Despite the fact that Nancy and all of her customers are white, she still finds herself going to African Americans for supplies and dealing advice.
As the first season progresses, though, it seems as if parallels are drawn between the various socio-economic groups. Nancy speaks to and treats her family in much the same fashion that Heylia interacts with hers. The poker table that Nancy’s customers gather around closely resembles the kitchen table that the dealers are always pictured sitting at. In one episode, Nancy’s son calls someone a “poor schmuck”. Immediately after this, Heylia’s daughter is shown saying the same words about a similar person. Weeds would be a much more superficial show if it kept it’s stereotypical worlds self-contained. It is the interactions between the stereotypes that give the series its unique comedy.
Heylia's kitchen table
Doug's poker table
Tonye Patano, the actress that plays Heylia, has some interesting commentary on the show’s use of racial stereotypes:
Though I am obviously in absolute agreement with her comments about the show’s use of exaggerated stereotypes, I’m not sure that as the season progresses and the layers of each character are peeled back the characters become all that more real. In fact, I think they generally become more psychotic. But I don’t think that’s a problem – it’s what has attracted me to the show. On a superficial level it appears as if Weeds is perpetuating stereotypes, however in grossly exaggerating such characters the absurdity of stereotypical ideals is seen. The show exaggerates flawed thinking to the extent that it’s impossible for the viewer to overlook it. This gives the audience the opportunity to look inward and examine their own lives for similar though most likely much less pronounced patterns. Weeds offers an escape from what’s normal, and in doing so makes us think about what normal even means.
I have an affinity for coming-of-age stories. Some of my all-time favorite films are the perfectly executed teen narratives of John Hughes. I guess my love for the genre comes from the empathy I feel for these stories. Typically, coming of age stories in film are set in high school, which I certainly experienced. I think the other part of the reason why I like these stories so much is because so many things that take place in them I never experienced, and still haven’t experienced, even in college. I think it’s funny that though, for example, the stories of John Hughes and “My So-Called Life” are so seemingly authentic and mimetic, they seem a bit unnatural sometimes. Maybe that’s due to the subjectivity of experience. Maybe I had an inauthentic high school experience. I didn’t experience cliques in the extreme, segregated sense that appears in both film and television and I didn’t ever randomly start hanging out with the “wrong crowd.” But I believe that these things did, and do, happen to people in high school so I choose to set aside my critical questioning and go along for the ride. Besides, “My So-Called Life” is a fictional series, so I’ll suspend my disbelief at what I feel are inauthentic events. In any case, I feel that “My So-Called Life” is the most authentic coming-of-age show that has ever been on television. Additionally, I feel that what makes it successful in terms of its perceived authenticity is the fact that its platform was television. Though I find a film like John Hughes’ The Breakfast Club to be a highly successful portrayal of teenagers in high school, what it lacks is its complexity beyond a ninety-seven minute timeframe. As good as it is, imagine how complex the narrative could be if it was a television show. This is a fairly stupid point as, how could we determine if this hypothetical The Breakfast Club television series would be any good? Just as My So-Called Life probably wouldn’t be a good film. But it’s important to examine the role of narrative complexity in television as the reason that an authentic coming-of-age story can be told. I’ll be looking at the pilot, as it provides a very solid foundation for an examination of the series as a whole.
First, one must look at and understand the main character of the series, Angela. In the first moments of the show, Angela and her friend Rayanne are facing the camera, asking strangers for money, acting silly and making up stories for why they are doing this (though they aren’t speaking directly to the audience, I think this kind of shot ties into a general theme of awareness that exists in the series). Angela looks fairly innocent, with straight blonde hair, a pink shirt and a lace vest. Rayanne looks slightly less plain. She’s wearing a plaid shirt, long earrings and bracelets. This could be any other kind of television show, until the voiceover begins. Angela says, “So I started hanging out with Rayanne Graff. Just for fun. Just cause it seemed like if I didn’t, I would die or something. Things were getting to me. Just how people are. How they always expect you to be a certain way, even your best friend.” All this happens within the first minute. Already, the audience knows that Angela has started doing something new. Just before the three-minute mark, Angela says, “So when Rayanne Graff told me my hair was holding me back, I had to listen. ‘Cause she wasn’t just talking about my hair. She was talking about my life.” The image that is seen at that moment is Angela pulling her newly-dyed, wet, crimson hair from the sink. In the first three minutes of the series we have already witnessed the pivotal moment of Angela’s identity formation and have entered into her head, the most private of places. The main symbol of the series, her crimson hair, is established and can now act as a touchstone for the remainder of the show. The first three minutes is more emotionally complex than most standard television episodes can get in a half-hour.
The voiceover is the single element that defines the authenticity of “My So-Called Life.” This is the kind of thing that makes a film like Ferris Bueller’s Day Off so successful, the idea that the protagonist’s personal thoughts are being made available to the audience (though in the case of that film, Ferris only breaks the fourth wall, speaking directly to the audience, instead of in a voiceover). With Angela’s voiceover, it acts like a diary, providing an intimate vehicle for her thoughts and emotions and seeming to be a never ending force. Once the audience accesses Angela’s true thoughts, we trust her more and her actions appear more believable. We see the way she acts from an objective perspective and also a subjective one, creating somewhat simultaneous, parallel narratives. It makes sense why voiceovers aren’t always used like this on television. It becomes too difficult to control what the audience makes of both perspectives. Maybe my thinking on this is a bit abstract but it seems so much easier to comprehend a storyline when there is an objective or subjective perspective. Isn’t it easier to listen to a friend’s opinion on whether to buy a particular kind of car than to take their advice and also read what Consumer Reports has to say about it? What is most striking about the narrative is the way it portrays Angela’s personality. There is a kind of Hughesian self-awareness that seems to be inclusive in a lot of Generation X film. This is effective because it allows the characters to exist with a particular depth that just can’t, and doesn’t, exist in a typical film or television environment that thrives on creating and subscribing to specific character archetypes. One of my favorite voiceover lines in the first episode is when Angela says, “My parents keep asking how school was. It’s like saying, ‘How was that drive-by shooting?’ You don’t care how it ‘was,’ you’re lucky to get out alive.” This kind of self-awareness is largely responsible for the perceived authenticity of the series, and this kind of monologue is what makes characters like Angela believable.
Also, what makes the show so complex is how many characters are able to exist on the show. There is a much larger combination of storylines (mathematically speaking) that can exist because of this. We understand the relationships between Angela and her sister, her mother, her father, Ricky, Rayanne, Jordan, Brian and various other more minor characters that exist in and around the high school. Though, having not seen the entire series, I am uncertain that every single one of the characters has had explicit interactions with the other, it can be inferred that in Angela’s world, these characters have all probably come across one another. More precisely, Angela’s closer relationships ,with her parents, and Rayanne, Ricky and Jordan, are all trajectories that can be followed and understood independently. These narrative paths coupled with subjective voiceover commentary on these individuals create an incredibly rich story. I think the most fascinating relationship is that between Angela’s parents. These roles which are usually untouchable, authoritarian and “perfect” archetypes in episodic television, are flawed and imperfect. About midway through the Pilot, Patty and Graham start fighting (http://www.hulu.com/watch/87991/my-so-called-life-pilot?c=1368:1483):
Patty: Why do I always have to be the mean one? Why can’t you be the mean
one every once in a while?
Graham: I can be!
Patty: But you never are. Look… I’m calm, okay? But you can’t keep
letting.. I mean you know she loves you more …more anyway …
Graham: She doesn’t love me more!
Patty: She does. Come on. She loves you more. I accept that. But, that’s
not enough for you. You have to… I don’t want to fight… Actually…
I’m not even that upset…
What’s so fascinating about this exchange is the doubt that both characters feel about their identities. In a way it could be seen that the parents are coming-of-age, just like Angela is. They know they are parents, that is certain, but they are still unsure of how they are supposed to be/feel. Patty, the mother, feels like she always has to be the mean one because her husband is passive. She believes this causes Angela to like her less and him more.
What’s so interesting to me about examining “My So-Called Life” is that coming-of-age stories are typically told via film. Because of this, film is always a touchstone when thinking about coming-of-age television (though this is generally true anyway). I think it’s fascinating that a show like “My So-Called Life” was executed so well on television (artistically, anyway) and that a teen show of a similar design/caliber hasn’t existed since. I’m sure some would argue otherwise but I just don’t see the same real artistic or authentic value in a show like Degrassi: The Next Generation. It’s puzzling to me because of how perfect television is, as a platform, for delivering coming-of-age stories. The potential for complex narrative and modes like intimacy accesses a kind of authenticity that just can’t be achieved in filmic narrative.
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