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Why is the TV landscape so boring?


NickGOT456

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The dominant shows on American TV are sitcoms, reality shows, and cop shows. Compare that to a novel that has space battles, daring military actions, parachute jumps through a planet's atmosphere, and high-stakes politics. Why can't TV be that exciting? Do TV shows not get the budget of CGI heavy adventure movies? Is there something in American life that zaps people of their creativity and imagination?

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I'll bite.

 

The TV landscape is going through a major landscape change.

It went through one in the 80's with the emergence of cable TV and I think this one is even bigger.

The major networks in the 80's had to adjust to not being the only viewing options, this time around they have to adjust to being on the verge of obsolescence. With Netflix, Amazon Prime, Hulu, and even YouTube, all the other streaming services out there beginning to have their own original programing and the cable networks taking chances to bring the most talked about new programs onto the landscape this has become a golden age of television. in the previous decade we had the new Battlestar Galactica, Mad Men, Breaking Bad, The Sopranos, and The Wire all show up amongst other great programs. None of those programs on the main broadcast networks. They had Lost, House, CSI, Grey's Anatomy, and a bunch of sitcoms ranging in quality, but AMC and HBO made their impact with programs that promised to break from the usual formulas and bring a more intense need to see viewing experience than ever before. USA Network, FX, Syfy, TNT and other networks also had their contributions as they tried to get their share of viewers and prestige.

This decade not only are HBO and AMC striving to continue what they began with GOT, True Detective, The Walking Dead, Better Call Saul, and other cable networks with shows like Fargo and The Americans, and even broadcast TV, CW mainly, finding success (for good or for bad) with comic book based series, now Netflix has come into the fray with Orange is the New Black, House of Cards, Stranger Things, plus its own Marvel programs initiative, Amazon Prime with their shows, Hulu with theirs. It's a plethora of viewing opportunities!

So I refute your claim that the TV landscape is not exciting, TV has more to offer now than ever before. It has more of everything than ever before, so yes, a whole hell of a lot more garbage, but also more quality programs than ever.

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Couldnt disagree more ! 

Between Black Sails, Supernatural, Rick and Morty, the Expanse, 12 Monkeys, The Magicians, Mr Robot, Sense8, Killjoys, Orphan Black, The Last Ship, The Strain, Limitless (reneeeeew !), Black Mirror or even Vikings, iZombie or The 100, just among many other (or "lesser but still enjoyable" others such as Damien, Dark Matter, Colony, Legends of Tomorrow; Netfix Marvel, Wynonna Earp, Lucifer, Preacher), I'd say genre-TV is really at a peek... but then again, what do I know ? 

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1 hour ago, MisterOJ said:

This really seems like a troll post. 

no, what makes you think that? The bold font, the seemingly yelling and preaching tone or the insult at Americans?

The funny part is, everything he listed can be found on t.v. somewhere.

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8 hours ago, NickGOT456 said:

The dominant shows on American TV are sitcoms, reality shows, and cop shows.

If you only watch network shows, yeah, that's the case.  If you include cable shows and paid services like HBO and Netflix, that's not the case at all.

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There's less money you can make with a TV show compared to a movie, so you probably also want to invest less, and the market is much smaller, so you're going to have less shows that are good, but those are usually really awesome. I think that at any given point there are usually about 10 shows of exceptional quality running somewhere (on some device or internet) and a whole bunch of CSI-like crap and unfunny Sitcoms. At this point imo, the great shows are, in no particular order:

- GOT

- House of Cards

- Mr Robot

- Rick and Morty

- The Walking Dead (only if it gets better again)

- Better Call Saul

- Vikings

- maybe The Man In The High Castle, depending on season 2

- some others I can't think of right now

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clearly a troll post or some weird marketing bot. Isn't there a thread called "TVs Golden Age" somewhere?

12 hours ago, Channel4s-JonSnow said:

Guess it depends if you just watch mainstream Network TV. If here in the UK if I just watched ITV I'd think all TV was dreadful too.

Very much so. Without the BBC there'd be about 3 shows a year Channel 4 puts out that is genuinely good scripted TV. ITV is about 1 and I usually have to be dragged to it (but Broadchurch season 1 was worth it). At least Netflix, Amazon and Sky Atlantic keep us honest with the US shows. Although I think it says something about the HBO brand these days that Sky Atlantic is the most dispensable of the 3 aforementioned UK channels.

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4 minutes ago, red snow said:

clearly a troll post or some weird marketing bot. Isn't there a thread called "TVs Golden Age" somewhere?

Very much so. Without the BBC there'd be about 3 shows a year Channel 4 puts out that is genuinely good scripted TV. ITV is about 1 and I usually have to be dragged to it (but Broadchurch season 1 was worth it). At least Netflix, Amazon and Sky Atlantic keep us honest with the US shows. Although I think it says something about the HBO brand these days that Sky Atlantic is the most dispensable of the 3 aforementioned UK channels.

Which US networks does Sky Atlantic cover? I know it does HBO and Showtime, but I have a feeling there are others too that I just can't think of right now.

Agree with you, ITV has the very rare good show, Channel 4 one or two per year, and BBC...well they can be hit and miss, but I think they've been a lot better lately, BBC does bring Last Kingdom and Peaky Blinders after all

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12 minutes ago, HelenaExMachina said:

 

Agree with you, ITV has the very rare good show, Channel 4 one or two per year, and BBC...well they can be hit and miss, but I think they've been a lot better lately, BBC does bring Last Kingdom and Peaky Blinders after all

I think Channel 4 :D still makes the occasional good shows, but they are fewer and farther between. But stuff like Humans and Utopia and Misfits are all great shows, as well as Black Mirror. Channel 4 has the ability to make things which are a little bit different and have a bit of an edge, where BBC1 and ITV are pretty mainstream.

Although I hear good things about BBC1 shows like Peaky Blinders or Ripper Street, I find them all a bit dull and unambitious. The last BBC show I was excited about was Dr Strange and Mr Norrell, one of my favourite books being adapted. However despite a great cast and large budget, it felt like it had really lost something by being on the BBC. 

As for Sky, as someone who used to subscribe to Atlantic to watch GoT, I no longer continue to do so. There seems to be very little worth watching on it apart from the occasional John Oliver. 

When you see all the great shows on Amazon or Netflix, you look at what everyone else is doing with a sense of pity.



 

 

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3 hours ago, HelenaExMachina said:

Which US networks does Sky Atlantic cover? I know it does HBO and Showtime, but I have a feeling there are others too that I just can't think of right now.

Agree with you, ITV has the very rare good show, Channel 4 one or two per year, and BBC...well they can be hit and miss, but I think they've been a lot better lately, BBC does bring Last Kingdom and Peaky Blinders after all

They get showtime as well and maybe the odd "other" show but those two are the main source of Sky atlantic. I think Sky does it's own shows but the only one I can think (but at least a good show) is "fortitude". I guess the problem with showing american shows is that it doesn't encourage much investment in their own material but maybe a few successes will push them in that direction. I think that's how HBO and some of the other cable channels got into it.

3 hours ago, Channel4s-JonSnow said:

I think Channel 4 :D still makes the occasional good shows, but they are fewer and farther between. But stuff like Humans and Utopia and Misfits are all great shows, as well as Black Mirror. Channel 4 has the ability to make things which are a little bit different and have a bit of an edge, where BBC1 and ITV are pretty mainstream.





 

 

 

but those are the 2-3 good shows they make a year :P I think they only have "humans" on their schedule now too as netflix got Black Mirror and Utopia was sadly canned (although I blame that on them doing a 2-season story for the second season). I thought Utopia was excellent though. Channel 4 has a very distinct style and demographic in mind with all of their shows. They like to appear edgy.

As for BBC they simply have a lot of variety from their all-ages dramas eg Dr Who and the like to their more serious shows. It means they have a lot of decent and a few excellent shows out there. Line of Duty is still probably one of my favourite shows of the year for example.

I also like it when they do the "British" version of an american show as it's always fascinating to see how different cultures filter the same subject matter. It's one of the big appeals of european drama too. Off the cuff examples is how "the fall" feels like a British take on "Dexter" or "Hannibal" and how "the missing" felt a little like a British take on "true detective". Not a question of them being better just interesting how they differ in style and approach.

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The problem with the Big 3 networks is they refuse to take risks because they have to answer to advertisers (because they charge too damn much for airtime).  All the 'good' shows mentioned in this thread are genre shows and for all the freedom of this and that in America, we're still a very judge-y people.  People who watch genre shows are viewed as 'weird' or 'odd' because we like shows with a deeper meaning than Kim Trashian babbling about her oldest brat not liking the time she spends with her younger brat.

A couple of the people I work with 'don't like to think' while watching tv which says to me they're doing it wrong.  They also think genre shows are weird or too campy; but I think they just have no imagination.

Another issue with the genre shows is that the people giving the awards which are supposedly so important don't really even consider the people making the shows as 'worthy' of their stupid little statues.

 

TL;DR-America is too 'cool' for good tv

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10 minutes ago, Nugget1229 said:

Another issue with the genre shows is that the people giving the awards which are supposedly so important don't really even consider the people making the shows as 'worthy' of their stupid little statues.

Game of Thrones is a genre show and it's currently one of the most popular shows on TV and rakes in awards by the cartload every year.  

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Troll post, but I'd like to address some of it.

Sitcoms and cop shows are cheaper than genre shows for obvious reasons. And a lot of sitcoms and cop shows are derivative fluff like CSI or Big Bang Theory. But The Wire (a cop show, sortof) is quite possibly the best TV show ever made and Jane the Virgin (a sitcom, sortof) is one of the best shows currently on television.

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