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Tony (Tony)
Username: Tony

Registered: 03-2008
Posted From: 86.130.72.56
Posted on Wednesday, December 11, 2019 - 12:48 am:   

https://gen.medium.com/how-a-tv-sitcom-triggered-the-downfall-of-western-civiliz ation-336e8ccf7dd0
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Protodroid (Protodroid)
Username: Protodroid

Registered: 03-2008
Posted From: 213.233.147.109
Posted on Friday, December 13, 2019 - 03:50 pm:   

Hmm... this is an interesting read so far. I didn't like Ross much after her broke up with Rachel but I was always uncomfortable at how lacking in curiosity his friends were. Learning a new fact seemed threatening to them.
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Tony (Tony)
Username: Tony

Registered: 03-2008
Posted From: 86.130.72.56
Posted on Wednesday, December 25, 2019 - 03:27 pm:   

I was thinking of watching Friends in full as it's on Netflix, but this put me off.
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Craig (Craig)
Username: Craig

Registered: 03-2008
Posted From: 172.112.29.83
Posted on Saturday, February 29, 2020 - 03:22 am:   

For some reason when I think of "Friends," and I've seen pretty much all of them either at the time or in reruns; the image that springs to mind is: dark rooms. They always seem to be in rooms crowded with junky clutter, and it's always dark outside; I get a sensation like claustrophobia, just drawing that show to mind. When they're outside - rarely - it's New York streets, crowded, cold, UN-friendly....

The show is so utterly white and 1st world and un-woke, isn't it, through today's cultural lenses? It sure should be. That it's not considered so (and it's not: they have a vested interest in it not being so, what with all its popularity/stars' credibility/$$$ it generates and will generate - a reunion episode is coming!) says volumes, imho.
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Tony (Tony)
Username: Tony

Registered: 03-2008
Posted From: 86.179.250.140
Posted on Saturday, February 29, 2020 - 10:01 am:   

One did have a black girlfriend, eventually. But yes, it's a dreamworld set inside an unconsciously (and yet not truly, given the opportunity not to be) racist skull, because dreams always seems set in the dark, too. It is funny, and sporadically affecting, but there's a "heck is other people vibe", you're right. But it's done that thing, we moved on, and it's ok, we learned I think.
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Craig (Craig)
Username: Craig

Registered: 03-2008
Posted From: 172.112.29.83
Posted on Sunday, March 01, 2020 - 08:53 pm:   

"Friends," too, if you think back on it Tony - it represents the era before the rise of the "geeks." This is still the mainstream world that ruled until the turn of the Century - the cool kids in the foreground, and the uncool kids off-stage, or be-clowned. Chandler may be neurotic, Ross obsessive, Joey dumb - but they are of the "upper class" - not to mention the beautiful women. That world is fully upended by the time of "Big Bang Theory" - and now, that's the world we almost wholly inhabit - where geek things, geek culture, rules. I'm not overly happy about this, despite being in that second category mostly myself. It was meant to be underground, off the radar - now that it's foregrounded, it's losing its luster, its authenticity. I don't trust any current cultural creations, sadly - I've lost my faith in everything being produced today.

I'm increasingly becoming of the notion authenticity is sheerly impossible - even if you hide under a rock your whole life, the prevailing culture has seeped down there too, to infect you without your knowing it. There's simply too many creators now - "I suppose they all want relevance," Vonnegut sighs, sadly, staring down upon Earth from his airplane seat in SLAUGHTER-HOUSE FIVE. It's because we live in a click-bait world - the entertainment complex is starved for clicks, for eyeballs. No more the world of fat and plenty - books allowed, a few channels on the TV, whole summers where they would free the masses from their unholy chains (i.e., new TV shows/films) - now, they are desperate and mad and starving for every bite, so we will be enslaved every moment of our lives to feed their endless hunger. There's too many of "them" - they're all bedraggled and ravenous - they are the zombies the movies warned us about, roaming the land for whom they might devour.

Yes, I drifted a LONG way from "Friends" there, didn't I? Ha!
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Protodroid (Protodroid)
Username: Protodroid

Registered: 03-2008
Posted From: 213.233.147.85
Posted on Monday, March 02, 2020 - 11:02 am:   

I agree Craig. I feel like John Wayne walking around today. If even *I* feel the world has become too geeky and effete (and also lacking in compassion and humility) then something's gone seriously off the rails.

I like Friends.

I watched the Gold Blend couple ads all together on Youtube and really got into the story. Kubrick used to analyze those ads, fascinated by how they could tell a story so efficiently.
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Protodroid (Protodroid)
Username: Protodroid

Registered: 03-2008
Posted From: 213.233.147.85
Posted on Monday, March 02, 2020 - 11:08 am:   

I think Friends was open-minded. The first or second episode had a lesbian wedding. I just think the goalposts have moved today. Friends was 25 years ago. To give it context, look how far ahead Friends was from 25 years before that, 1970.
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Tony (Tony)
Username: Tony

Registered: 03-2008
Posted From: 86.179.250.140
Posted on Monday, March 02, 2020 - 07:13 pm:   

I've heard of Big Bang described as geek black face.
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Tony (Tony)
Username: Tony

Registered: 03-2008
Posted From: 86.179.250.140
Posted on Monday, March 02, 2020 - 07:16 pm:   

I go in Forbidden Planet and comic shops now and feel totally alienated. I got FP gift vouchers for Christmas and spent an hour trying to decide what to buy. I'm not connected with it anymore. It all got loved to death.
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Protodroid (Protodroid)
Username: Protodroid

Registered: 03-2008
Posted From: 213.233.147.85
Posted on Monday, March 02, 2020 - 10:16 pm:   

Yeah, I hate TBBT so much. It's a single "joke" repeated endlessly to the point of being a parody. It's like a sitcom that you would see in a sitcom, but repeat that regression about 10 times.

Comic shops feel so '90s to me now. There's too much of everything (my favourite aphorism of yours, Tony.) Well, you described the '70s as there being less of everything.
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Tony (Tony)
Username: Tony

Registered: 03-2008
Posted From: 86.179.250.140
Posted on Monday, March 02, 2020 - 11:18 pm:   

It becomes noise, doesn't it? "World hum", to quote Martin Amis.
I've watched a few Big Bangs... it gets easier, once you realise it's like a play by kids and good bits DO pop up now and then. They say the characters aren't autistic but that's autistic people saying that, and they - I mean we (:-() -have blind spots. I think the whole show is autistic. :-(
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Craig (Craig)
Username: Craig

Registered: 03-2008
Posted From: 172.112.29.83
Posted on Tuesday, March 03, 2020 - 07:04 am:   

I, too, like "Friends," Proto - I'm just pointing out, maybe, how woke-woke (woke to being "woke") even I've become! Many "old" (I mean just a decade or so even) films are hard to take, now, because they're so white/un-woke in their world-views. I was watching that terrible Nicholson/Keaton rom-com Something's Gotta Give recently, and I simply couldn't buy the premise, based solely on how effete-elite 1st World white-man-drenched the "problems" of the characters were. I didn't think that when I watched it long before and still hated it - for other, aesthetic reasons; nowadays, I hate things for being unaware of what's nowadays. They invented giant heaps of burning trash just for such work like this.

TBBT was occasionally funny and poignant, but like so much, it went way past its prime and got shrill and stale and irrelevant. I think when it first came on, it had genuine popularity... but it was facing down factors wholly not its own: cable TV was on the wane, cord-cutting accelerating exponentially; not to mention, streaming + social media's spreading zombie influence, enveloping everyone's attention almost exclusively. By the time TBBT made its final debut, the network pretended it was a "big event," a sad moment, everyone showing up to bid goodbye... truth be told, it was probably more like a film showing to a wholly empty theater. Sad and pathetic, its final bow - no one talked about it then (when ending), no one talks about it now. Only after you've died, as a TV show, do you really find out how popular it is. Here in the U.S., "Friends" is like Shakespeare - I mean in that, uber-popular while alive, and long after it died, still so. The American "The Office" shares a huge and vibrant fan base here, too, among many who never watched it when it was on. But so many shows, that they swore to us were hits, were big, were popular... lies, all lies, not even in life were they. In death, they've vanished almost beyond recall. Better so.
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Tony (Tony)
Username: Tony

Registered: 03-2008
Posted From: 86.179.250.140
Posted on Tuesday, March 03, 2020 - 12:49 pm:   

The best stuff appeals and speaks to every walk of life, doesn't it? Look at the best of the Simpsons. Some lines and scenes rattle round inside you forever. More real than your life.
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Craig (Craig)
Username: Craig

Registered: 03-2008
Posted From: 172.112.29.83
Posted on Tuesday, March 03, 2020 - 07:44 pm:   

How true! There's many "Simpsons" moments that have stuck with me for many years, and whole episodes. The episode where Homer buys Lisa the horse, an earlier one, remains with me as being a particularly poignant one; the death of Mrs. Flanders is still a shock, and that episode and watching Ned's subsequent handling of it, moving in its own way. At it's best, it was greast.

Same,too, for "Family Guy," I'd contend. When it returned after being cancelled - the late 00's - those were its golden years. Excellent stuff there, though like "The Simpsons," I think both have foundered and gone past their expiration date. Time to pack it in, guys.
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Tony (Tony)
Username: Tony

Registered: 03-2008
Posted From: 86.179.250.140
Posted on Tuesday, March 03, 2020 - 08:04 pm:   

Oh, definitely. I mean I've seen one or two recent Simpsons that actually succeeded in capturing the old magic, but the *style* actually broke it slightly. As witches say, the more handmade something is, the more magic it has.
I hated Family Guy even though it was funny. I found it cruel. But my son just fixed that; it's Punch and Judy humour, cruel to all, a cart tipper. Now I get it.
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Protodroid (Protodroid)
Username: Protodroid

Registered: 03-2008
Posted From: 213.233.147.110
Posted on Tuesday, March 03, 2020 - 11:06 pm:   

I used to feel dirty after watching Family Guy, even if I laughed. But yeah, the irreverence, the scabrous nature is the very point.

Just watched the old UK Max Headroom drama (not the chat show which I never saw) and it's simultaneously dated and extremely relevant.
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Tony (Tony)
Username: Tony

Registered: 03-2008
Posted From: 86.179.250.140
Posted on Tuesday, March 03, 2020 - 11:15 pm:   

I'm right now watching an incredible film I've wanted to see for ages, The Ninth Configuration. Incredible. More later.
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Protodroid (Protodroid)
Username: Protodroid

Registered: 03-2008
Posted From: 213.233.147.110
Posted on Tuesday, March 03, 2020 - 11:26 pm:   

I watched that a couple of months ago, after I watched Exorcist III again. I really like Blatty as a person, I think. He seems such a straight arrow.
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Tony (Tony)
Username: Tony

Registered: 03-2008
Posted From: 86.179.250.140
Posted on Wednesday, March 04, 2020 - 01:12 am:   

Did you realise the astronaut was the old farmer guy in Walking Dead?
By the way, I had to dog watch at my step son's for two weeks and with nothing to do caught up with the patchy Walking Dead. It got better. I loved it. It had Brexit in there, though it wouldn't have known. Maybe every series about dystopia and people stabbing each other in the back is about Brexit.
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Craig (Craig)
Username: Craig

Registered: 03-2008
Posted From: 172.112.29.83
Posted on Wednesday, March 04, 2020 - 01:25 am:   

"Max Headroom" - you mean that silly sitcom, at least here in the States, was a UK drama?!? I forgot about that show - I literally have no mental image of it beyond that talking head - or maybe it was a drama, and I misremember?

"Family Guy," yes, me too, hated it for a while, then got the humor. It's caustic and dystopian like "Married With Children," also a brilliant early vicious caricature; but it's capable of lyric satire and utter hilarity. Episodes are sheer genius; there's even that moving, poignant one that's like an indie film, where Stewie and Brian get locked in the bank vault all night - it's just them going through a personal cabin-fever drama (predating the similar dynamic in "Breaking Bad's" "Fly" episode). The ones I watched from recent years, they've fallen a long way down the mountainside - there's a change to the very nature of the animation - it became slick, and lost the vibrant jollity of their rougher cartoon selves in their best years (the middle ones). I can't watch it anymore. All good actors should know when the to leave the stage, and they haven't, imho.
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Protodroid (Protodroid)
Username: Protodroid

Registered: 03-2008
Posted From: 89.19.67.84
Posted on Wednesday, March 04, 2020 - 12:20 pm:   

Well, Max Headroom in the UK was a black comedy satire, not really a drama.

Tony, yes I knew that was Scott Wilson, who also played an astronaut in THE RIGHT STUFF and the doctor in EXORCIST III. A friend met him and said he was a lovely kind man.

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