• Top 10 Problems with Modern TV

  

  Written by Zeromage 16 Comments
  Last Updated:: November 6, 2008

  TV really angers us here at Old-Wizard these days. We remember growing up and watching all those great cartoons and even “real life” sitcoms like Seinfeld that were both unique and entertaining. The TV medium today is an utter disaster. It seems that more TV programs are produced and directed by marketing departments than by professional writers. No wonder why there was a writer’s strike just a few months ago. Creativity has once again suffered at the hands of those who have no creativity but like to meet with other “professionals” at fancy restaurants convinced that their lives have any meaning whatsoever. In this list we will go through the problems with the era of Modern TV in hopes of raising awareness to an entertainment medium that could be much greater.

  10. No real-life looking people

  Remember the X-Files? Remember looking at Mulder and Scully? Sure they were attractive, but they were attractive in a way that you would see on a day to day basis. They were real people with real acting skills. If Dana Scully was cast today, she would look like an over glossed bimbo with no character, which is probably the reason why we don’t see someone with her talent on modern TV. Look at all the girls and guys from a shows like Heroes or the nauseating and sentimental Grey’s Anatomy. They are models lacking in substance except for always falling in love with someone across from an operating table. There’s no reality in these shows, just an idealism that overtly tries to strike emotional chords. What is humanity anymore anyways? No one knows. It’s just conveniently romantic and mawkish sitcoms. When will the camera be turned on itself when no one is watching?

  9. Soap Opera Story Lines

  The Soap Opera story lines in modern TV are enormously unrealistic, which will be a consistent theme in this article. Who’s on who’s side? Who’s a hero and who’s a villain this week on Heroes? The same goes for Lost. Who’s with Jack this week and who’s with Locke? Does this apparent unpredictability really amuse the modern TV viewer? Does the modern TV viewer not recognize that next weeks episode of the show will obviously make friends into heroes and vice-versa? And when this is recognized, why continue watching? Wouldn’t the show become boring. Hmm. Guess not, if it’s still on the air. Guess no one recognizes the obvious nature of the marketing their watching. With a tired and dumbed-down audience, creativity has nowhere to flourish but to subterranean spaces always lacking in appropriate backing.

  8. Bad Concepts

  The amount of poor concepts for modern TV shows is uncountable. Making a sitcom based on the cavemen from that non-funny Geiko commercial proved to be an utter disaster. Who didn’t know that this show would be unbelievably poor on first sight when they saw the promotional trailers? When I first heard of this attempt to put cavemen into more modern contexts, I knew it would be off the air in a matter of weeks, and it was. Why would anyone think this was funny? This is just one example among many of concepts that lack all humor and creativity. Instead, all we see are doctor and cop dramas because great ideas no longer broach the popular TV medium.

  7. Bad Commercials

  Commercials now are a perfect example of a complete lack of creativity in modern TV. What happened to all the cool mascots? What happened to the Noid? What happened to the California Raisins and the 7-Up Spot? Even if you weren’t amused by these mascots, you knew that some unique thought went into their creation. Commercials now are simply a marketer’s dream, with blaring music and sound enveloping the whole space for any creativity. It’s all immediate effect and no nuisance with the modern commercial. Sometimes you have to turn down the TV or just turn it off completely because of how loud they are in comparison to the show your watching. This “louder is better” attitude is analogous for a complete lack of creativity. There is one exception. The Coors light commercials are genius.

  6. Too many Doctor Dramas

  Every season there’s a new doctor show that tries to spin “House” in in many different ways, to the more tamed down, to the more “real life”, and worst of all to the more mawkish and sentimental. Grey’s Anatomy represents the later as a show that seems more interested in developing stories of absurdly tragic romantic affairs then developing any story lines with patients or anything to remotely do with the Doctor profession. While House found it’s acclaim in exaggerating the techniques used to cure patients, the other shows found their acclaim by completely de-emphasizing the practice in general making these shows into repetitions of Days of Our Lives except with people who are dressed in hospital attire and sometimes disputing their own personal affairs over a surgeons table. It’s worrisome to see home many people in western culture are now aspiring to the nursing and doctor profession (You will find people literally walking around in public with their scrubs on). It’s worrisome because the popular reasons they may be getting into the profession in the first place.

  5. No Good Comedies

  What kind of comedies did we used to have? How about Cheers? How about Perfect Strangers? How about Seinfeld? The days of original and talented writing are gone in the modern comedy medium. Instead we have the Mind of Mencia and 2 and a Half Men. When watching a show like 2 and a Half Men, you have to work hard to try to find laughs. If you actually sit on the couch long enough and let yourself become immersed by this totally uninspired piece of modern TV, then you might actually find yourself laughing at some of the dumb predicaments in the show. Of course, having to try to laugh at a comedy defeats the purpose. Where have all the good writers gone?

  4. Everybody Loves Raymond

  Everybody Loves Raymond is a huge problem with modern TV. Just turning on the TV and having to see this poor excuse for an already poor and boring idea makes you cringe. In a previous article called “The top 5 reasons why you watch Everybody Loves Raymond“, we discuss the reasons why anyone would want to watch a show as austere as this show. It’s at the height of an overly self-satisfied culture that this show could become popular. If all goes well though and the culture is forced to look back down to the ground with the loss of it’s big house family luxury, then this completely unartful excuse for a TV show will be off air and appropriately deemed as grotesquely average in future commentary.

  3. Re-Running the same Episodes

  Whether it be Seinfeld, Family Guy, or even the dreadful Sex in the City, the same four or five episodes get rerun every day on multiple channels. We all know that they were the most successful episodes in these series, meaning the marketer’s graph that was presented to him showed a line going up on the graph. That doesn’t mean that we as TV watchers want to see these same episodes over and over again. We want to see them in the context of all the other episodes in the series and enjoy the better ones rather than having them shoved down our throats on multiple channels on the same days. Great episodes themselves become increasingly dull because of this. Modernity’s spirit for instant gratification finds itself hopelessly clinging to new shows because of this.

  2. Too many Cop Dramas

  How many cop Dramas are on TV now? Whether it be ABC, CBS, FX, HBO, ect. There is always the same type of cop show wearing its toughness on its sleeve. I really don’t know which one to watch with so many on TV. I started to get into The Shield for awhile, and then that became shit. I tried watching a full season of The Wire before it became almost the same show as the Shield. This duplication of a successful concept makes the future repetitions mere copies of the first idea in general, and usually always is less in quality than the first idea. The prevalence of marketing departments control over TV programs this can be blamed for this.

  1. Reality TV

  Reality TV is an obvious signifier of the ruin of modern TV. Everywhere and on all channels, these reality TV shows are loud, obnoxious and full of more unnaturally scripted actors than a bad Van Damne movie. But they’re reality TV shows you say. It can’t be scripted because everyone is just being themselves. The entire concept of reality TV negates this supposed acquisition of reality because all the reality actors are aware off their being filmed. How naturally would you act if you knew that there were 8 cameras following you around everywhere you went? The reality actors of these shows are probably not aware of this always and already distance from reality when being under the context a multitude of cameras. What we get instead of reality, is a pseudo-reality where what is normally considered to be normal becomes exaggerated because of the unconscious recognition of being filmed. The concept can’t work in itself and it shows in the pitiful characters that are cast in these banal shows.

16 Comments

1. #1 Chris says:
   November 20th, 2009 at 2:58 pm

   I couldn’t agree more, my biggest problem with tv these days is that there’s just no originality left anymore, or I guess really just that writers can’t make stories interesting. Two of my favorite shows, Twin Peaks and The Sopranos, used very run of the mill ideas. When’s the last time you saw a show or movie about a murder investigation, or the mafia. But it was the way that the plots were presented that made them different from anything I’d ever seen. And they also cohered to your first point, there were some very attractive people on these shows, but they always seemed like someone you would meet everyday. Overall, a very good list.
2. #2 TheMountain says:
   November 20th, 2009 at 3:52 pm

   Great list. Couldn’t agree more
3. #3 George says:
   November 20th, 2009 at 3:58 pm

   Oh god their are so many problems with modern T.V., I don’t even know where to start. To answer your questions, their are at least 8 cop dramas currently on T.V., and at least 5 doctor dramas. Whatever happened to non complete bullshit cop shows and medical shows like Scrubs and Barney Miller. Right now I have 4 shows I watch that I’m not beating my head against a wall for watching (Good Eats, Lost, The Colbert Report, and the Daily Show), but the bullshit shows are everywhere. I hate so much about T.V.

   Personally, what gets me is that the moment a show becomes a hit, the clone shows come in. Lost, one of the best shows ever, comes on and suddenly every season a new ensemble show or conspiracy Sci Fi comes on and sometimes becomes a hit itself. There’s Heroes, and I’ve seen previews for at least 5 other series’ with the same format. The clones are everywhere these days, or worse yet, clones of hit reality shows.

   I’m so fucking angry now I want to go down to these studios and force the producers to read the scripts for this bullshit. Fuck! Fuck! Motherfucker!
4. #4 Weekday Warrior says:
   November 20th, 2009 at 4:10 pm

   “reality TV” makes me hurt myself…

   for no reason at all. then i go to a booth and talk about it with complete strangers. i love reality.
5. #5 FullMetal says:
   November 20th, 2009 at 7:10 pm

   @ George – i hate lost -my fiancee loves it but i dont hate people that like the show , however, i 100% disagree about lost being one of the best show ever…it’s not even close. do you really think that is going to do be held up with tv classics like i love lucy, simpisons, seinfeld, friends, mash, cheers, etc, etc… – im sorry it is nowhere close to those shows and will not be remebered like the shows i just mentioned
6. #6 George says:
   November 20th, 2009 at 8:49 pm

   Yes it is FullMetal, it’s well written, well acted, engaging, and did something new with television that every show seems to be copying, yet missing everything that made the original show great. If that’s not the mark of a good show, I don’t know what can be called a good show. Yes, several terrible shows everyone seems to like get cloned; but Lost has almost no flaws if your willing to watch the whole thing. And if you can watch the whole thing through, and hate it, you have no taste for anything on T.V.

   Just watch it all through and then see if you can affirm your statement. If you still hate it, I weep for your future.

   However, modern T.V. has one advantage, DVR’s. Their the best thing to happen to T.V. since Full House went off the air, and will remain the best thing until American Idol and Mind of Mencia are canceled.
7. #7 Nant14 says:
   November 20th, 2009 at 5:25 am

   Some points from this list are rather confusing to me.I mean Re-Running the Same Episodes isn’t bad or something.But what’s really ruins modern TV is a complete lack of creativity and great artwork.And those tries to fill the shows like Heroes with something of a romantic relationships? Come on, I’m really tired of seeing the same “crying like a baby” Claire every week.And reality shows for me are awful (please don’t hurt me reality shows fans).And, what’s going on with modern cartoon industry?I remeber those great shows like Duck Tales or Chip n’ Dale, or Darkwing Duck.Now, they are trying to show us their sarcastic humour about modern mainstream personalities(like Paris Hilton), making them more popular than just forget about them.TV is going the same way, that music have gone.Showing more cheeks than ideas.And that’s what really disturbs me.Thank you!
8. #8 David says:
   November 20th, 2009 at 7:56 am

   No good comedies? what the f are you guys Smoking? The Office and 30 Rock anyone? f’n Hilarious both!
9. #9 RonaldLI says:
   November 20th, 2009 at 3:58 pm

   ??????? ?? ?????! ????? ???????????
10. #10 ErvinTW says:
    November 20th, 2009 at 3:08 am

    Thanks! Nice post.
11. #11 Alexx says:
    November 20th, 2009 at 7:39 am

    Yah right on with Everybody loves Raymond that shows horrible ditto with reality shows. Both MTV and Muchmusic show that trash. Not that the music is anygood nowadays but youd think theyd play music vids on a consistent basis.
12. #12 ogrezilla says:
    November 20th, 2009 at 11:55 pm

    Agree with most of this, but not good comedies? Always sunny in Philadelphia and How I met your Mother disagree.
13. #13 Brian V. says:
    November 20th, 2009 at 8:01 pm

    When Hallmark channel becomes better than all TV simply because of MASH and Cheers, then something is wrong.
14. #14 UP2IP2 says:
    November 20th, 2009 at 2:22 am

    Agreed on the re running but this the real problem they are RE RUNNING THE OLD EPSODES!!!!!!!
15. #15 gidi says:
    November 20th, 2009 at 1:27 am

    reruns kill me theres nothing good to wach and then you see your faveirit show on and its a rerun and youve seen it 10000 times
16. #16 Delta says:
    November 20th, 2009 at 1:42 am

    What about when a good, new show comes on, it’s lucky to last a season? THE UNUSUALS was great, and they end it on a cliffhanger. SURVIVING SUBURBIA was really good too, and the show MIGHT get saved for a second season, but it’s not looking good.

    And Nant14’s right about no good cartoons anymore. Same with live-action shows, there’s almost nothing remotely like the stuff I grew-up watching.