Published March 4, 2007 in the Hibbing Daily Tribune
By Aaron J. Brown
Talking or writing about pop culture is a double edged sword. In a year, maybe less, pop culture news is completely irrelevant, if it ever was relevant at all.
For instance, I remember when my wife told me that Brittany Spears shaved her head. At that precise moment I was VERY interested. WOW! I can’t believe she’d do that. Now, after seeing a few dozen news reports and hearing educated people speculate on Spears’ mental well-being, I am no longer interested. It’s the news equivalent of a meat and cheese tray. When a party starts, everyone loves the meat and cheese tray. Later, around midnight, the cheese has that chalky crust on it and the meat is a solid 72 degrees at its center.
Despite the inherent risks, I will raise a pop culture point and hope that this column has a longer shelf life than discount mayonnaise. Has anyone else noticed that many popular television shows have been jumping the shark lately?
Pardon me if you’re not familiar with the term “jumping the shark.” A well-known web site – www.jumptheshark.com – describes the term this way: “It’s a moment. A defining moment when you know that your favorite program has reached its peak. That instant that you know that from now on … it’s all downhill. Some call it a climax. We call it jumping the shark.” The term comes from the moment in “Happy Days” when the Fonz is water skiing and, while doing a jump, avoids a leaping shark. Even for a sitcom like “Happy Days,” the shark jumping moment totally abused the thin layer of trust still held by the audience.
Two highly-rated shows in particular have been shark jumping lately, “Grey’s Anatomy” and “Desperate Housewives.” It is important to note that I don’t watch these shows, but my wife does and I happen to be in the same room. Right.
Anyway, the recent “Grey’s Anatomy” plotline depicts the show’s namesake Dr. Meredith Grey falling off a pier, floating dramatically underwater for what appears to be three hours, before being fished out and given CPR for another three hours, miraculously surviving. All this in a series of episodes so full of implausible trauma scene situations that those nerdy kids who pick out continuity errors on TV shows would have strokes if they paid too close attention. Of course, the “Grey’s” doctors could cure their stroke with witty dialogue at inappropriate times.
Then, on “Desperate Housewives” we’ve recently seen even more murders and accidental deaths on Wisteria Lane. I have but one comment. If Wisteria Lane is such a high class suburban neighborhood, why aren’t people moving away? There have been a half dozen murders on this tiny little cul-de-sac in three years, including an old lady who got run over with a car, a poisoning, a lady falling off the roof, a lady who got strangled and buried, another who was shot at the supermarket. I don’t know what metro area Wisteria Lane is in, but this exclusive suburb would probably be considered its highest crime area. And yet the real estate lady keeps moving properties to new rich people, even though the new ones almost always die first. They’re like red shirts in “Star Trek.”
Is it too much to ask, TV? If you’re going to lull us into a state of stupor, jeopardizing citizen-led democracy and the human development, could you at least make the woes of fictional characters somewhat plausible?
No? Well, OK. But I will continue to make snide comments as you flicker away my brain cells. You can’t stop me.
Aaron J. Brown is a columnist for the Hibbing Daily Tribune.