By Tac O'Hara
http://theanticritic.com
The Writer’s Guild of America’s strike finally ended this week and they won a portion of the profits from internet media sales. But was it all worth it? How has the world changed while laptops were slammed shut and pens were laid down?
It’s been a good 13 weeks since the Writer’s Guild of America strike started and how has our world changed? Has civilization crumbled? Has literacy waned? Has Jimmy Kimmel become any less funny? These are questions best answered by America’s masses. But wait. America’s masses can’t answer, they’re too busy watching American Idol… and waiting for Paula’s next freakout, Randy’s next “Dog,” and Simon’s next put down.
In truth, like most current media events, the writer’s strike is pretty much a manufactured crisis. Few people have noticed any change on TV, other than a few weeks without late night talk show hosts. But late night talk show hosts takes so many nights off, even their MIA status was pretty much business as usual.
TV has yet to be truly disturbed by the strike because of the lag time between filming and broadcast of most typical shows. Reality shows have less writer input so they aren’t all that affected by the walk out. The true irony of all the hoopla regarding the strike is the fear surrounding the degradation of quality television. Isn’t this like saying we fear that the molded bread in the bottom of the fridge will become more rancid?
Let’s face it, quality writing has long been dead on television. Television has simply become either a clone of itself or a ghost of itself, take your pick. So, are writers today really writers? Or are they just apers? Everything original on TV in the last 10 years has been copied and regurgitated ad infinitum. Law and Order. Need I say more? CSI. Need I say more? This replication phenomenon has even created a new disease among audiences. I call it “clonefusion.” This is the bewilderment among viewers who become perplexed over which “version” of a TV program they are watching. When I hear an opening “Who” song blasting, am I watching CSI or CSI: Miami. And just which darn Law and Order is playing on cable at which time? SVU? Criminal Intent? Trial by Jury?
Undoubtedly all these different versions come from the Coca Cola phenomenon. One successful Coke product spawns Diet Coke, Cherry Coke, Cherry Diet Coke, Vanilla Coke, Diet Cherry Vanilla Coke, Caffeine Free Coke, Coke Zero. No wonder all of us have attention deficit syndrome, not to mention diabetes.
At least we have original comedies such as The Office and 30 Rock. Oops, I take that back. The former is a copy of a Britcom and the latter is a condensed, behind the scenes version of the 30 year-old mainstay SNL.
When TV isn’t copying itself, it’s simply a ghost of it’s former self. There are almost as many sitcoms as their ever were, yet the wives and husbands and kids and neighbors seem to all be nameless and faceless compared to the Sam Malones and Bill Cosbys of yesteryear. Punch lines are weak and laugh tracks are loud. Writers have been on strike long before the picket line was drawn. There are exceptions or course, (How I Met Your Mother, 24) but this is the rule.
So is the writer’s strike a whale or a guppy? Is the wake going to wash us all up on a rocky shore. Or will we even notice a ripple? So far, we’ve just got lots of loud, well-coiffed weatherman reporting on a storm that’s out to sea and may never hit home.