34 CRAP-O-VISION

Ok I am on a rant, so indulge me while I go on a tare. It seems the more technologically advance we become the less creative we are. I swear the standard of television shows has plummeted in the past 10 years, with all the advancement there seem to be a lost for creatively entertaining shows that engages your mind, tickle your intellect, tell a good story and delight your funny bone. I never thought I’d be saying that I miss shows like Will and Grace, Dharma and Greg, the Huxtables, The Odd Couple, Touch By An Angel, Ally McBeal, Sanford and Son, Eli Stone, The Pretender, Nikita, A Different World, Mission Impossible, I Dream of Jeannie and Iron side just to name a few. These days we are so bombarded with the so called “reality” TV that real entertainment seem to have faded into the ether. Everything is excessively excess and the real story, actually what am I saying, what real story? Its pure tasteless, tacky "drama" with no real plot that would employ the mental power for more that five minutes, it’s like one big fat numbfest; too much gratuitous sex to the point of nausea, too much violence for the sake of violence and too much romanticizing of the macabre.

Heavens to Betsy even the cartoons have changed and not necessarily for the better, one expect evolution and all that good stuff but why throw out the baby with the bath water? The cartoons or animes now a days while some are good most are not that interesting at least not to me, I guess it’s the new form of drawing but a lot of those animations looks idiotically like steroid babies with mouths that open to wide covering the eyes and forehead, crying so extreme it just plain stupid and almost every emotion is over exaggerated and overly dramatized, everything to the extreme power. Whatever happened to the beautifully drawn cartoons?

I found that I have lost a lot of interest in watching television except for a few shows that still hold my interest like Medium which has a family dynamic and some great interaction that makes it a really interesting to watch although its no more, a recently refreshing surprise The Good Wife, Brothers and Sisters, and Two and a half men which I have stopped watching due to serial reruns that has left me feeling like I am in an endless loop in the twilight zone. Seriously I have lost track of when the new episodes airs so I have just plain gave up find it. The programming really sucks, Fridays and Saturdays nights use to be two of the best days for watching television, one use to actually look forward to whining down and watching some good TV, now washing the dishes, catching up on laundry and scratching my ass is more interesting.

To make matters worst much to my chagrin, me, an avid movie goer interest has began to wane apart from a few pleasant surprises that really left you thinking and you were not able to predict the outcome (Diary of a Mad Black Woman, Precious) 9 out of 10 times they are churning out the same old crap, its like copycat hell. What’s up with that? What are they saying when the crap makers is now the money makers, the standard if you will, making billions and the quality writers, film makers, directors and thinkers have become the exception, almost exstinct?

I know longer go to the movies like i use to and just pick a movie to watch. Now I am very selective about what I pay my hard earned money to see. I don’t depend on critics to tell me what is good and if I listen I simply take it under advisement because many times what they determine to be crap, I have found very interesting. Perhaps that’s because my bottom line is not in box office sales.

I am still hopeful though as I see some film makers/writers who are marking there own course are taking the bull by the horns and doing there own thing, Tyler Perry, Lee Daniels/Sapphire, etc.... I am keeping my eye on artist like them who understands that its not just about numbing out, its about starting a dialogue to get people's juices in their minds flowing and leaving the movies with something to think about, talk about, to engage on a whole other level of humanness.