A Vast Wasteland
Posted in Television on September 24th 2006 by Randy Reichardt.: Every fall I review the list of new television shows with a nod towards adding one or two to the list the ones I watch on a weekly basis. Well, not this year. The shows I will watch are ones already established: Rome, The Wire, Law & Order, Law & Order: Special Victims Unit, Law & Order: Criminal Intent, Lost, 24, Saturday Night Live, MAD-TV, Battlestar Galactica, The Daily Show, The Colbert Report, and the occasional MLB, NFL, and/or NHL game. I think I’ve reached a point where I can’t absorb anything more. Shows with completed seasons already viewed in 2006 include Deadwood, The Sopranos, and Brotherhood.
Yes, it’s an addiction, the idiot box, or as Newton Minnow once noted, “a vast wasteland“, but I continue to watch. One reason is that in recent years, some episodic television, especially on cable, has improved to the point where its quality now matches or surpasses most movies. Additionally, most of the shows on cable have much smaller “seasons” than network television, most often clocking in at 10-12 episodes. Keith offers another view with Your New Mean TV (22 September 2006 entry).