As I age I become more hesitant to watch anything new that comes on my television. Work, love, family; these are just a few real-life factors that force us all to have less time for TV as we get older.
But there's another factor at play here: TRUST. Years and years of withering trust in the shows I watch to give an ending to building story-lines has made me very unwilling to give a new show a chance. Why should I waste my time on anything if they're not going to finish the story?
I don't stand alone here. There's not a single person out there who hasn't had this happen to them on multiple occasions. It usually happens in the form of struggling shows film a huge, game-changing finale, complete with cliffhanger ending, all in the hopes of drawing enough interest to save said show. Then the show gets cancelled. This is infuriating, but usually some time passes, the weather heats up, trips to the beach are taken and I've quickly forgotten about it.
Problem is, that's all fine and dandy the first few times it happens, but sooner or later, trust in the television industry to do right by me and all of the people who invested their time falls apart completely.
For some reason, when a show is cancelled a few episodes in, it feels even worse. Maybe it's because there's no summer to wash away the hurt, I don't know, but it feels worse nonetheless. Recently, a coworker invested her time in Zero Hour, and I begrudgingly invested my time in Do No Harm. Both of these shows were cancelled after only a couple of episodes. We can quickly and easily look back at the two, three hours we wasted and think of all the things we could've done instead, or all the other shows we could've put our time into instead. I still have four episodes of Shameless to catch up on. Damn, wish I would've done that instead.
I believe all of this is causing anger amongst the fans of television, and I'm pretty sure this is playing a role into lower-than-expected ratings for some of the network's biggest debuts. The networks were expecting big things from the previously mentioned Zero Hour and Do No Harm as well as the earlier debuts of 666 Park Avenue and Last Resort. All of them failed. But even in failure, at least 10 to 20 million different people invested some of their time in at least one of these shows, and stuck with them past their first and second episodes. That adds up to a lot of pissed off people who want to know what happens next.
To solve this problem, I propose that television networks do the following: first, if a show has failed in a prime spot in your schedule, burn off the remaining episodes on Saturday instead of four to six months later in the summer. Second, if a show gets cancelled without a chance to wrap up story-lines, allow the show to film a two-hour TV movie to please the fans and give them some closure. There is no third. This is simply about building that trust back, and if these two steps are followed, the fans will again have trust that their time won't be wasted because the stories they decide to invest in will be guaranteed to have an ending.
Tuesday, March 5, 2013
Wednesday, January 9, 2013
Saving Magazines
I have always been a lover of magazines. At one point in time, I subscribed to a dozen of them, and right now I have six subscriptions. I'm aware that the internet has decimated the magazine industry, but I also know there are other people out there that still love opening their mailboxes to find the new issue of whatever they are subscribing to. This blog is not intended to bring back all the people who have abandoned their love of magazines, nor is it intended to bring in all those youngsters raised on the internet that have never experienced the joy of reading a magazine on the toilet. This blog is intended to give suggestions to the magazine companies to not further annoy the people who still currently love the forum.
1. Many of us love to fold our magazines in half to read them. For the first half of the magazine, it's easiest to fold the left side, and for the second half, it's easiest to fold the right side. Advertisers have taken note of this and have demanded advertising on the half that doesn't get folded, making it impossible for the reader to easily fold their magazines in half. Let's stop this, it's annoying.
2. Some advertisers have decided it is best for them to use really thick construction paper stock to print their ads. The only way around this for the reader is to tear out the whole page and throw it away. It is annoying, so let's stop this.
3. Some magazines have decided that shorter articles are what the reader wants, so they then decided that the way around this was to cut the articles up in a "choose your own adventure" style format: to continue reading, turn to page 87. This is annoying, so please just print the whole article and put it in one place.
4. I don't know a single person who still subscribes to a magazine through those little cardboard mailers that the magazine stuffs into their issues, so why do two or three of them fall out of each issue I receive and another two or three are attached to the inside? Why is my bathroom floor littered with these things? If magazines are looking for any way to cut costs, how about just ONE in each issue, located in the first page.
If these four easy suggestions are followed, I promise that I would be less annoyed when reading a magazine. I promise that most people who still read magazines will have a much more enjoyable experience, so please, listen to my words and get it done.
1. Many of us love to fold our magazines in half to read them. For the first half of the magazine, it's easiest to fold the left side, and for the second half, it's easiest to fold the right side. Advertisers have taken note of this and have demanded advertising on the half that doesn't get folded, making it impossible for the reader to easily fold their magazines in half. Let's stop this, it's annoying.
2. Some advertisers have decided it is best for them to use really thick construction paper stock to print their ads. The only way around this for the reader is to tear out the whole page and throw it away. It is annoying, so let's stop this.
3. Some magazines have decided that shorter articles are what the reader wants, so they then decided that the way around this was to cut the articles up in a "choose your own adventure" style format: to continue reading, turn to page 87. This is annoying, so please just print the whole article and put it in one place.
4. I don't know a single person who still subscribes to a magazine through those little cardboard mailers that the magazine stuffs into their issues, so why do two or three of them fall out of each issue I receive and another two or three are attached to the inside? Why is my bathroom floor littered with these things? If magazines are looking for any way to cut costs, how about just ONE in each issue, located in the first page.
If these four easy suggestions are followed, I promise that I would be less annoyed when reading a magazine. I promise that most people who still read magazines will have a much more enjoyable experience, so please, listen to my words and get it done.
Thursday, January 3, 2013
New Year's Resolution
As a fan of horror movies, friends and acquaintances are often recommending titles they enjoyed. About a month ago, V/H/S came highly recommended by an extremely reliable source. I've been saving the viewing of it for just the right moment. Two days ago that moment came.
And now for my New Year's resolution: for one year, I will do absolutely everything in my power to avoid any movie that includes "found footage," is filmed in a "shaky cam" style, and all films where one of the characters in the movie is filming the footage.
We can all trace the scourge of this style back to Blair Witch and the phenomenon that followed. Studios fell in love with the low cost of making these movies and people flocked to see them (and even when they didn't, the low cost of making the film was quickly made back).
Mind you, not all of these films were bad. Project X, Chronicle, Cloverfield, Quarantine and more than a few others were enjoyed by me. But here's the kicker: all of those films, and all films made in this style would've been better if not made in this style.
I'm sick of the character running away and being forced to endure the picture bouncing around ferociously for way too long. I'm tired of the moment when the cameraman inevitably drops the camera and we're forced to see a sideways shot of nothing.
In case you haven't guessed by now, V/H/S sucked. It wasn't the worst movie of this genre though, that belongs to a movie so bad, I can't even remember the name of it. But here's the rundown of that movie. The shaky cam in this movie was the recorder mounded on a police car. An hour and a half of a police cruiser driving around on woodsy roads. That's it. There was one moment, after about an hour and fifteen minutes of fast forwarding when the police vehicle stopped, the policeman got out to investigate some sort of monster or alien. All action took place off-screen, and I was rewarded for my patience with nothing.
V/H/S was the straw that broke the camels back. It's the movie that made me finally want to stand up and say "Enough. No more found footage! No more shaky cam! No more!"
And now for my New Year's resolution: for one year, I will do absolutely everything in my power to avoid any movie that includes "found footage," is filmed in a "shaky cam" style, and all films where one of the characters in the movie is filming the footage.
We can all trace the scourge of this style back to Blair Witch and the phenomenon that followed. Studios fell in love with the low cost of making these movies and people flocked to see them (and even when they didn't, the low cost of making the film was quickly made back).
Mind you, not all of these films were bad. Project X, Chronicle, Cloverfield, Quarantine and more than a few others were enjoyed by me. But here's the kicker: all of those films, and all films made in this style would've been better if not made in this style.
I'm sick of the character running away and being forced to endure the picture bouncing around ferociously for way too long. I'm tired of the moment when the cameraman inevitably drops the camera and we're forced to see a sideways shot of nothing.
In case you haven't guessed by now, V/H/S sucked. It wasn't the worst movie of this genre though, that belongs to a movie so bad, I can't even remember the name of it. But here's the rundown of that movie. The shaky cam in this movie was the recorder mounded on a police car. An hour and a half of a police cruiser driving around on woodsy roads. That's it. There was one moment, after about an hour and fifteen minutes of fast forwarding when the police vehicle stopped, the policeman got out to investigate some sort of monster or alien. All action took place off-screen, and I was rewarded for my patience with nothing.
V/H/S was the straw that broke the camels back. It's the movie that made me finally want to stand up and say "Enough. No more found footage! No more shaky cam! No more!"
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