Reality Bites: Confessions of an Irish TV Junkie
As 2006 comes to an end, I find I must come clean. I feel I must admit that, as technically inclined as I am, I still do not own a Tivo, or any other digital video recorder.
But Jonathan, you say. You are so busy performing and crafting your art of songs to drink and dance to. Well, actually, this is exactly why I would time-shift my tele watching. I, like all of us, am quite busy, and would love to have MythTV set up to watch, at my convenience, the few shows I find worthwhile.
Actually, I have another confession. For the past 6 years or so, I’ve ranted about the inanity of reality tv. Now, after watching marathons of “The Biggest Loser” and “Project Runway”, I find that this is my new guilty pleasure.
In many ways, most actually, there’s really nothing new about reality shows. They’re really just overgrown game shows. It’s a phenomenon that seems, on the surface, to have sprung up in the past six years or so. It’s easy to point out, however, that The Real World had already spawned this genre, peeked, and jumped the shark long before anyone at CBS got the idea to vote losers off the island.
That said, as of 2006, Jonathan is now hooked on a few steaming piles. It’s growing more difficult for me to continue my indignation over the loss of quality scripted shows. I would have to argue, now, that shows like Gilmore Girls, Veronica Mars, House, Bones, and a few others, have grown up among the weeds of reality shows. And these shows are better than a lot of the scripted shows of the past.
Or, maybe, reality has just lowered my expectations.
Tech tags: reality+television
