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T.V hold a special place in people’s lives.
There is an old saying which goes, ‘They don’t make them like they used to’, but with regards to television today it is sadly true.
Perhaps, like many other people of my generation (aged 20 & upwards) I see older t.v as the golden age of programming, with too much reminiscence on good days gone by.
But with the sad state of t.v today, what are this generation of couch potatoes going to look back on?
Sure, there is still good t.v being made, award-winning shows like The West Wing, The Sopranos & The X-Files show that modern t.v can have pedigree.
However, I’m talking about the real memorable shows of years ago.
These cult t.v shows can be separated into distinct categories: kids/cartoons, action/adventure and comedy.
Firstly then, the kids t.v/cartoons:
Fact: kids t.v today is rubbish (apart from the odd Japanese anime) and it’s not just because I have grown out of cartoons because I haven’t.
I regularly watch anime, and I have younger brothers & sisters who watch lots of today’s shows, so I’m still in touch. (And I’ve never really grown up!)
Remember the cartoons of yesteryear? Transformers, G.I.Joe, He-Man, Thundercats, Cities of Gold & the hundreds of others I could reel off.
Many of those cartoons, He-Man especially, had strong moral messages & lessons, teachings that today’s t.v sadly lack. Where is the 21st century equivalent of He-Man?
What good cartoons are there today? None spring to mind. L
Where have all the funny puppets gone?
We had The Muppets in their prime, Fraggle Rock, ALF, Gordon The Gopher, and who can forget the Rainbow crew?
Take Rainbow for instance, it was such a simple concept: a man, Geoffrey, his three puppet friends (Bungle the camp bear, George the even camper hippo and Zippy the??? whatever), and his musical buddies Rod, Jane & Freddie (who always seemed to have matching clothes). They told stories, sung songs, played games and learnt important moral lessons about things like sharing & caring, but most of all, they had a lot of fun. (Thank God for the new Rainbow dvds eh.)
Why can’t we have this format again?
There was an attempt to revive Rainbow a few years ago, but it was awful.
People on t.v these days are too interested in their image and their so-called street-cred.
Was Geoffrey from Rainbow ever image conscious? No, he was always dressing up & playing the fool in his pink shirts and yellow trousers, talking to puppets.
The only kid’s t.v personalities around today who aren’t image conscious are the Chuckle Brothers. (But I do have a soft spot for Paul & Barry Chuckle and their accident-prone capers.)
Action/adventure:
We had The A-Team, Magnum P.I, Knightrider, Miami Vice, Starsky & Hutch, Minder and even older shows like The Persuaders, The Man From UNCLE, Batman and The Prisoner.
These shows all had great quirks and interesting characters.
The A-Team: Four Vietnam veterans wrongfully accused of robbing the bank of Hanoi, fight crime and injustice, while on the run from the U.S Army and Government officials.
Hannibal, the leader, chomps on cigars, master of disguise who always loved it when a plan came together.
B.A Baracus, tough talking (& acting) sucka, who drank milk, wore vast amounts of gold and could make anything out of a few pieces of scrap metal and told kids to go to school and choose education over drugs.
Face the suave ladies man and con artist.
And Murdock the mental pilot, who lives in the nut house.
They had a cool van and always got out of a tight scrape by using ingenuity and resourcefulness.
Magnum P.I: Set in Hawaii, cool Ferrari, Tom Selleck’s moustache, mysterious benefactor (Robin Masters) who lets magnum stay in his luxury mansion, butler called Higgins who owns two killer dogs called Zeus & Apollo. (And heh, Tom Selleck was the first choice to play Indiana Jones!)
Knightrider: More crime fighting, cool talking car and David Hasslehoff’s leather jacket & wonder head of fuzzy brown hair.
Miami Vice: Two charismatic leads in Don Johnson as Sonny Crockett who had designer stubble, wore no socks and had an alligator named Elvis, and Philip Michael Thomas (the man with 3 first names!) as Ricardo Tubbs.
They wore designer suits (with the sleeves rolled up) and drove cool sports cars.
The Persuaders: Another two charismatic leads, Roger Moore as the upper crust Lord Brett Sinclair, and Tony Curtis as the Brooklyn born tough guy.
Chalk and cheese, globetrotting, crime solving playboys.
Together with another two cool cars (pattern developing) and there was always loads fisty-cuffs.
All these shows had great theme tunes and fairly similar formulas.
I was unlucky enough to see Team Knightrider a couple of years ago, and I’m still in therapy trying to get over how bad it was!
Why can’t we have some good new adventure series? A charismatic lead or two, cool cars, comic book violence, hammy villains and a sense of humour and fun.
Finally, Comedy:
We had Fawlty Towers, Monty Python, the best years of Only Fools & Horses, The Young Ones, Blackadder, Cheers, Happy Days, ALF and Different Strokes etc.
There has been some good comedy over the years, Father Ted, The Fast Show (but the last couple of series have been a let down) & of course One Foot in the Grave, but apart from that, today’s comedies are unfunny scripts acted by unfunny people.
Most of the sitcoms ITV & BBC have churned out over the last couple of years have been pathetic, and an insult to people who like funny comedy.
Take Friends for instance, huge success, but it’s not funny. Smarmy, annoying morons who think they’re hilarious, I’ve never laughed at Friends at all, the only people that do are probably 12 year old girls who love Pop Idol or Big Brother.
My family would prefer to watch thing like Fawlty Towers or Blackadder on dvd instead of trash like Friends.
I know this post may sound a little bleak towards t.v today, but that’s how I see it.
Thank heavens that most of the old shows have been or going to be released on dvd.
I do feel sorry for the t.v loving kids of today, because they will never have it as good as we did. In ten years time, when they look back at their childhood t.v memories what will they have to look back on? Not as much good stuff as we did.
Is it just that t.v 10 or 20 years ago was so good, or is that t.v today is so bad?
Has it lost its innocence and it’s sense of fun?
Thanks for reading my rather long t.v rant.
I’d like to hear other peoples ideas/opinions or if you disagree, and think t.v today is good.
There is an old saying which goes, ‘They don’t make them like they used to’, but with regards to television today it is sadly true.
Perhaps, like many other people of my generation (aged 20 & upwards) I see older t.v as the golden age of programming, with too much reminiscence on good days gone by.
But with the sad state of t.v today, what are this generation of couch potatoes going to look back on?
Sure, there is still good t.v being made, award-winning shows like The West Wing, The Sopranos & The X-Files show that modern t.v can have pedigree.
However, I’m talking about the real memorable shows of years ago.
These cult t.v shows can be separated into distinct categories: kids/cartoons, action/adventure and comedy.
Firstly then, the kids t.v/cartoons:
Fact: kids t.v today is rubbish (apart from the odd Japanese anime) and it’s not just because I have grown out of cartoons because I haven’t.
I regularly watch anime, and I have younger brothers & sisters who watch lots of today’s shows, so I’m still in touch. (And I’ve never really grown up!)
Remember the cartoons of yesteryear? Transformers, G.I.Joe, He-Man, Thundercats, Cities of Gold & the hundreds of others I could reel off.
Many of those cartoons, He-Man especially, had strong moral messages & lessons, teachings that today’s t.v sadly lack. Where is the 21st century equivalent of He-Man?
What good cartoons are there today? None spring to mind. L
Where have all the funny puppets gone?
We had The Muppets in their prime, Fraggle Rock, ALF, Gordon The Gopher, and who can forget the Rainbow crew?
Take Rainbow for instance, it was such a simple concept: a man, Geoffrey, his three puppet friends (Bungle the camp bear, George the even camper hippo and Zippy the??? whatever), and his musical buddies Rod, Jane & Freddie (who always seemed to have matching clothes). They told stories, sung songs, played games and learnt important moral lessons about things like sharing & caring, but most of all, they had a lot of fun. (Thank God for the new Rainbow dvds eh.)
Why can’t we have this format again?
There was an attempt to revive Rainbow a few years ago, but it was awful.
People on t.v these days are too interested in their image and their so-called street-cred.
Was Geoffrey from Rainbow ever image conscious? No, he was always dressing up & playing the fool in his pink shirts and yellow trousers, talking to puppets.
The only kid’s t.v personalities around today who aren’t image conscious are the Chuckle Brothers. (But I do have a soft spot for Paul & Barry Chuckle and their accident-prone capers.)
Action/adventure:
We had The A-Team, Magnum P.I, Knightrider, Miami Vice, Starsky & Hutch, Minder and even older shows like The Persuaders, The Man From UNCLE, Batman and The Prisoner.
These shows all had great quirks and interesting characters.
The A-Team: Four Vietnam veterans wrongfully accused of robbing the bank of Hanoi, fight crime and injustice, while on the run from the U.S Army and Government officials.
Hannibal, the leader, chomps on cigars, master of disguise who always loved it when a plan came together.
B.A Baracus, tough talking (& acting) sucka, who drank milk, wore vast amounts of gold and could make anything out of a few pieces of scrap metal and told kids to go to school and choose education over drugs.
Face the suave ladies man and con artist.
And Murdock the mental pilot, who lives in the nut house.
They had a cool van and always got out of a tight scrape by using ingenuity and resourcefulness.
Magnum P.I: Set in Hawaii, cool Ferrari, Tom Selleck’s moustache, mysterious benefactor (Robin Masters) who lets magnum stay in his luxury mansion, butler called Higgins who owns two killer dogs called Zeus & Apollo. (And heh, Tom Selleck was the first choice to play Indiana Jones!)
Knightrider: More crime fighting, cool talking car and David Hasslehoff’s leather jacket & wonder head of fuzzy brown hair.
Miami Vice: Two charismatic leads in Don Johnson as Sonny Crockett who had designer stubble, wore no socks and had an alligator named Elvis, and Philip Michael Thomas (the man with 3 first names!) as Ricardo Tubbs.
They wore designer suits (with the sleeves rolled up) and drove cool sports cars.
The Persuaders: Another two charismatic leads, Roger Moore as the upper crust Lord Brett Sinclair, and Tony Curtis as the Brooklyn born tough guy.
Chalk and cheese, globetrotting, crime solving playboys.
Together with another two cool cars (pattern developing) and there was always loads fisty-cuffs.
All these shows had great theme tunes and fairly similar formulas.
I was unlucky enough to see Team Knightrider a couple of years ago, and I’m still in therapy trying to get over how bad it was!
Why can’t we have some good new adventure series? A charismatic lead or two, cool cars, comic book violence, hammy villains and a sense of humour and fun.
Finally, Comedy:
We had Fawlty Towers, Monty Python, the best years of Only Fools & Horses, The Young Ones, Blackadder, Cheers, Happy Days, ALF and Different Strokes etc.
There has been some good comedy over the years, Father Ted, The Fast Show (but the last couple of series have been a let down) & of course One Foot in the Grave, but apart from that, today’s comedies are unfunny scripts acted by unfunny people.
Most of the sitcoms ITV & BBC have churned out over the last couple of years have been pathetic, and an insult to people who like funny comedy.
Take Friends for instance, huge success, but it’s not funny. Smarmy, annoying morons who think they’re hilarious, I’ve never laughed at Friends at all, the only people that do are probably 12 year old girls who love Pop Idol or Big Brother.
My family would prefer to watch thing like Fawlty Towers or Blackadder on dvd instead of trash like Friends.
I know this post may sound a little bleak towards t.v today, but that’s how I see it.
Thank heavens that most of the old shows have been or going to be released on dvd.
I do feel sorry for the t.v loving kids of today, because they will never have it as good as we did. In ten years time, when they look back at their childhood t.v memories what will they have to look back on? Not as much good stuff as we did.
Is it just that t.v 10 or 20 years ago was so good, or is that t.v today is so bad?
Has it lost its innocence and it’s sense of fun?
Thanks for reading my rather long t.v rant.
I’d like to hear other peoples ideas/opinions or if you disagree, and think t.v today is good.
Page:
It's not just tv either, the quality of todays toys are terrible.
We had Transformers, He-Man, MASK, Star Wars and the best of the lot, G.I.Joe.
Most of the toys today are cheaply made, over priced film cash-ins or WWF stuff.
Take G.I.Joe for instance; loads of figures, well made & painted, cool weapons & accessories, vehicles and a good cartoon series & film.
We had Transformers, He-Man, MASK, Star Wars and the best of the lot, G.I.Joe.
Most of the toys today are cheaply made, over priced film cash-ins or WWF stuff.
Take G.I.Joe for instance; loads of figures, well made & painted, cool weapons & accessories, vehicles and a good cartoon series & film.
Small Frog wrote:
> They can watch He-Man? Woah! When I was a little kid, my Mum wouldn't let me
> watch stuff like He-Man and Thundercats. They were too 'violent'. Hah.
We've only got one old He-Man video, but i'm currently downloading a few episodes from Morphius.
I knew someone at school years ago who wasn't allowed to watch The Real Ghostbusters cartoon because his mum thought it was too scary!!
> They can watch He-Man? Woah! When I was a little kid, my Mum wouldn't let me
> watch stuff like He-Man and Thundercats. They were too 'violent'. Hah.
We've only got one old He-Man video, but i'm currently downloading a few episodes from Morphius.
I knew someone at school years ago who wasn't allowed to watch The Real Ghostbusters cartoon because his mum thought it was too scary!!
They can watch He-Man? Woah! When I was a little kid, my Mum wouldn't let me watch stuff like He-Man and Thundercats. They were too 'violent'. Hah.
But i really do feel soory for people who like tv and missed the golden age.
My younger brother (11) & sister (6) love Fawlty Towers, The A-Team, He-Man etc. More so than most of todays tv.
My younger brother (11) & sister (6) love Fawlty Towers, The A-Team, He-Man etc. More so than most of todays tv.
It was John Cleese's decision that only 12 episodes were to be made. He knew the quality of the series, and had seen what had happened to his contempories, who were fading slowly in to obscurity because they had kept going too long. I think FT is probably the best British sitcom ever made.
Sometimes tv companies need to know when to stop milking a successful show.
Fawlty Towers is the example. How many of those were made? 12 or someting like that, each one is genius, but what would have happened if John Cleese & Connie Booth had of let the success & lure of money go to their heads?
The show would have got watered down until it got boring as they ran out of ideas. But thankfully that didn't happen.
Fawlty Towers is the example. How many of those were made? 12 or someting like that, each one is genius, but what would have happened if John Cleese & Connie Booth had of let the success & lure of money go to their heads?
The show would have got watered down until it got boring as they ran out of ideas. But thankfully that didn't happen.
I would be inclined to agree with this thread, even though I'm only 16, and therefore too young to have seen most of the great TV programmes the first time they were shown.
However, whilst the quality of TV is ever falling, the quality of movies is always going up, as shown by recent films like Matrix and Lord of the Rings.
However, whilst the quality of TV is ever falling, the quality of movies is always going up, as shown by recent films like Matrix and Lord of the Rings.
Same with The League of Gentlemen.
2 series and they're working on a 3rd which they say will be the last one before it gets old.
Reece Shearsmith was saying that BBC1 wanted to put the show on, but they refused because they would have to censor the material and they didn't want to see L.O.G alarm clocks in Woolworths.
The Office seems to be another cult show, I've only just discovered it but it rules.
Partridge is still the king though.
"You're so...dirty.."
2 series and they're working on a 3rd which they say will be the last one before it gets old.
Reece Shearsmith was saying that BBC1 wanted to put the show on, but they refused because they would have to censor the material and they didn't want to see L.O.G alarm clocks in Woolworths.
The Office seems to be another cult show, I've only just discovered it but it rules.
Partridge is still the king though.
"You're so...dirty.."
Flogging a dead horse happens too much with comedy today.
The Royale Family for instance, was very funny and original when it first appeared. But, because it got too popular too quick, the BBC threw millions of pounds at it and the writers got lazy. It just dragged on & on until it became quite stale.
Now it's just Jim Royale scratching his large bum, farting alot, saying "Wah-hey lurky" or "my a*#e", anthony going to make a 'brew' or venturing into the kitchen to find a Wagon Wheel or a Kit-Kat.
All the merchandising, like alarm clocks etc.
Ali-G, original at first, then just going through the motions and soon there's going to be a film for Christ sake.
Alan Partridge was one show that didn't get annoying. Every series was great, and his career moved on, from talk show host to radio personality & living in a travel inn. The show stayed fresh because of Alan's different situations.
The Royale Family for instance, was very funny and original when it first appeared. But, because it got too popular too quick, the BBC threw millions of pounds at it and the writers got lazy. It just dragged on & on until it became quite stale.
Now it's just Jim Royale scratching his large bum, farting alot, saying "Wah-hey lurky" or "my a*#e", anthony going to make a 'brew' or venturing into the kitchen to find a Wagon Wheel or a Kit-Kat.
All the merchandising, like alarm clocks etc.
Ali-G, original at first, then just going through the motions and soon there's going to be a film for Christ sake.
Alan Partridge was one show that didn't get annoying. Every series was great, and his career moved on, from talk show host to radio personality & living in a travel inn. The show stayed fresh because of Alan's different situations.
(cont!)
Where woz I, oh yes - when I was a wee sprat, my one ambition was to marry Face when I grew up. Mrs Tallulah Face, heehee. But the A-Team ruled, have fond memories of me & bruv sitting in front of the telly singing the A-Team tune like a couple of spanners - "Do do do dooo, do do dooo".
Cartoons I watched - Batfink, Dangermouse, Count Duckula, Trapdoor, Inspector Gadget, Ghostbusters, City of Gold, Dungeons & Dragons ('Uniii!), Button Moon('and hello, Mr Spoon'), the Moomins, Fraggle Rock, Ulysses, Lets Pretend (when very young), Rainbow, He-man, She-Ra, Rainbow Brite & the GetaLong Gang. And Care Bears. God there's so many.
But my absolute fave was shown on the '100 top kids TV shows' on Sat. Night on C4 - it was 'Knightmare!'. That was so cool, I always wanted to go on that with my buddies, but the presenter scared me a bit. It made kids think, they were in control of their friend (wearing the virtual reality mask, I might add), so ultimately, they had to use their brains or they wouldnt last very long in the game.
Nowadays all we get is Pokemon & Teletubbies - need I say more.
Where woz I, oh yes - when I was a wee sprat, my one ambition was to marry Face when I grew up. Mrs Tallulah Face, heehee. But the A-Team ruled, have fond memories of me & bruv sitting in front of the telly singing the A-Team tune like a couple of spanners - "Do do do dooo, do do dooo".
Cartoons I watched - Batfink, Dangermouse, Count Duckula, Trapdoor, Inspector Gadget, Ghostbusters, City of Gold, Dungeons & Dragons ('Uniii!), Button Moon('and hello, Mr Spoon'), the Moomins, Fraggle Rock, Ulysses, Lets Pretend (when very young), Rainbow, He-man, She-Ra, Rainbow Brite & the GetaLong Gang. And Care Bears. God there's so many.
But my absolute fave was shown on the '100 top kids TV shows' on Sat. Night on C4 - it was 'Knightmare!'. That was so cool, I always wanted to go on that with my buddies, but the presenter scared me a bit. It made kids think, they were in control of their friend (wearing the virtual reality mask, I might add), so ultimately, they had to use their brains or they wouldnt last very long in the game.
Nowadays all we get is Pokemon & Teletubbies - need I say more.
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