TV Comfort Food
Nov. 21st, 2002 09:14 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
sdelmonteAs noted, Batya and I have a backlog of videotapes - Angel, Buffy, two Fireflys, two Smallvilles. And last night we had a night to ourselves during a rather busy stretch. But we have also been coping with a friend in crisis, and found ourselves more than a bit blue. We weren't up for watching the crises on a Joss Whedon show, or Smallville semi-soap. But Enterprise did the trick nicely. And now I realized something a bit strange about this show. It's TV comfort food.
Because it's set before all the other Treks, we go into every episode assured of a happy ending at some point. And because of how it's written, with very little in the way of suspense most weeks, it becomes like that scene in The Hitchhiker's Guide where we are told in advance how things will work out. More often than not, whether an episode of this show is good depends on execution rather than plot, and if you are still watching at this point, you don't mind the derivative and predictable stories that much. Moreover, the acting has steadily improved, the directing is usually good, and the special effects are the best on TV.
So come Wednesday at 8, I can turn on Enterprise and get the equivalent of a peanut butter and jelly sandwich, only with the hope that maybe there's a new kind of jelly or that the bread is an English muffin. In a way, it's like watching a rerun of a beloved show, only it's new, too. This doesn't make for great television. But when you need to unwind, there are worse shows you can pick.
It didn't hurt that hidden in the episode were some interesting bits of character play - the ever-dull Malcolm Reed is getting to be a bit less bland after all, and slowly T'Pol is becoming the most interesting non-human since Worf - and scriptwriting that is nearly subtle. But I now get why I keep watching. This show is that one program I watch to unwind, to get my mind at ease when Buffy and Angel and all those serious dramas leave me (usually happily) tense.
As a certain other Vulcan of note might say, fascinating...
Because it's set before all the other Treks, we go into every episode assured of a happy ending at some point. And because of how it's written, with very little in the way of suspense most weeks, it becomes like that scene in The Hitchhiker's Guide where we are told in advance how things will work out. More often than not, whether an episode of this show is good depends on execution rather than plot, and if you are still watching at this point, you don't mind the derivative and predictable stories that much. Moreover, the acting has steadily improved, the directing is usually good, and the special effects are the best on TV.
So come Wednesday at 8, I can turn on Enterprise and get the equivalent of a peanut butter and jelly sandwich, only with the hope that maybe there's a new kind of jelly or that the bread is an English muffin. In a way, it's like watching a rerun of a beloved show, only it's new, too. This doesn't make for great television. But when you need to unwind, there are worse shows you can pick.
It didn't hurt that hidden in the episode were some interesting bits of character play - the ever-dull Malcolm Reed is getting to be a bit less bland after all, and slowly T'Pol is becoming the most interesting non-human since Worf - and scriptwriting that is nearly subtle. But I now get why I keep watching. This show is that one program I watch to unwind, to get my mind at ease when Buffy and Angel and all those serious dramas leave me (usually happily) tense.
As a certain other Vulcan of note might say, fascinating...
