Wow. Crappy TV.

[jethrien]

Chuckro found an old tape of Nickelodeon's The Tomorrow People from the early 90's when we were visiting his folks over the weekend. We watched the pilot, which was half decent and also had a bunch of amusingly retro commercials, a few days ago. Since I needed to do some ironing last night, we decided to watch the next miniseries (about five episodes in total for the story arc).

Wow. That sucked. Seriously. By the end of episode three, Emily (the aforementioned houseguest) and I were begging for the next episode to be the last one. It wasn't. The entire thing was what Ebert calls an Idiot Plot - the plot only works if every one is an idiot. If they talked to each other or behaved logically, the entire thing would have been over in less than two episodes. Also, every adult in the series is evil and totally crazy, unless they're a parent, in which case they're just incompetent. I mean, I understand that in a kids' show you have to make it so the adults can't help the kids and the kids have to solve their own problems. But that can be done without making supposedly capable adults totally clueless. Like one father, who's supposed to be this high powered scientist general espionage guy. Who holds a top secret briefing in a room full of windows, and totally ignores the window washer dressed like a painter who sticks a two inch bug in the center of the window and is sitting there with a visible headset and a tape recorder in the bucket, wiping the window with a dry sponge. And then when someone finally notices her, they chase her through the heart of intelligence headquarters, where she gets away by hiding behind a potted fern. Wow. Impressive security there.

In short - we had hoped to discover that we had been clever children who had enjoyed a tv show of quality. We were wrong. Oh so wrong.

Comments

[ivy03.livejournal.com]

Have you rewatched She-Ra lately? Seeing that again made my eyes bleed.

[feiran.livejournal.com]

He-Man and She-Ra: The Secret of the Sword is extra delicious--you should SEE how slashy everything is when watched through adult eyes. I love it!

[chuckro.livejournal.com]

I'm considering acquiring the ten-episode He-Man collector's set, just to see how biased my memories are.

[jethrien.livejournal.com]

I've never seen She-Ra. I was a little too young.

[tigermelp.livejournal.com]

Seriously??? Hmm. Maybe I did watch She-Ra before my brother was born...I'm going to have to think about this...

[jethrien.livejournal.com]

I remember a friend of mine in kindergarten having a bunch of the He-Man toys, but neither of us had really ever actually watched the show. At that age, two years' age difference makes all the difference in the world.

[tigermelp.livejournal.com]

Maybe it was on in reruns, but my little brother DEFINITELY watched He-Man as a child. He's a year younger than you.

[jethrien.livejournal.com]

Entirely possible. I don't know exactly why I didn't see He-Man/She-Ra, but I didn't.

[feiran.livejournal.com]

I loved that show! Though I remember being disappointed and annoyed that characters didn't stay constant. There was one character in the pilot--Kevin?--who ended up vanishing in later episodes of the actual series, and I felt awfully betrayed by the creators (though I didn't like the character much anyway).

[chuckro.livejournal.com]

Well, if you want to watch it at some point, I have the tape.

I remember being disappointed/confused when Kevin barely appeared in The Culex Experiment and disappeared after that, myself.

[feiran.livejournal.com]

I do want to watch it! I will pilfer the tape at some point. :)

[jethrien.livejournal.com]

No you don't. Seriously. Or rather, watch the pilot and then stop there.

[chuckro.livejournal.com]

And I'll be watching "Monsoon Man" without you, I gather?

At least this makes it easier to convince you to watch The Flash with me.

[jethrien.livejournal.com]

How so?

I'll watch the Flash with you, I'm just not going to refrain making fun of it if the rest is as bad as the Mark Hammill episode. I'm sorry, sweetie.

[chuckro.livejournal.com]

This may be related to the fact that of the five miniseries, I only have three on tape, and have no recollection of even watching the last two.

It's kind of a shame--I mean, it's a clever concept and had some potential, but the story got dragged out far longer than it should have, and the idiot plot-ness was very high.

[(Anonymous)]

HA! No longer can you dis my nostalgia for pathetic original Star Trek episodes. I doubt you can even get some of my old favorite shows - "Bearcat", "Alias Smith & Jones", etc. In pre-technology days, my sister and I would use a tape recorder to record the sound only of our favorite shows and listen to them repeatedly. So pathetic.

[jethrien.livejournal.com]

Hey, I haven't dissed your nostalgia for years. When I dissed your nostalgia, I wasn't old enough to understand nostalgia. I'm sorry I dissed you. Original Star Trek kinda sucks, but that doesn't mean it's unworthy of being beloved.