Category: Television

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What we really should be looking at since the death of Walter Cronkite

Uncle Walter passed away on Friday and so this weekend the press corp have been celebrating the anchorman who set the standard of what the press is suppose to be. It is ironic that as they celebrate the icon of TV news, current TV news is nothing like what Cronkite stood for or broadcast back in the 1960’s and 1970’s.

The current members of the press commented on objective and tough Cronkite was in his reporting. He told us all what we needed to hear and sometimes what we didn’t want to hear. That doesn’t happen today.

Glenn Greenwald at Salon.com says it better:

Despite that, media stars will spend ample time flamboyantly commemorating Cronkite’s death as though he reflects well on what they do (though probably not nearly as much time as they spent dwelling on the death of Tim Russert, whose sycophantic servitude to Beltway power and “accommodating head waiter”-like, mindless stenography did indeed represent quite accurately what today’s media stars actually do). In fact, within Cronkite’s most important moments one finds the essence of journalism that today’s modern media stars not only fail to exhibit, but explicitly disclaim as their responsibility.

Celebrating Cronkite while ignoring what he did

Too bad it is all true.

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It seems one Columbus TV station takes the day off on weekends

I guess I am too caught up in the 24 hour news cycle where I expect either breaking news or at least new stories to show up on my local TV station websites on the day the news breaks. It seems that the WBNS 10TV website takes the weekend off unless the news is significant.

On Saturday some ticket holders for an event at the Palace Theater showed up hours after the event had happened. The time had been changed but some people didn’t hear about it. The story was on 10TV’s 11 PM newscast but still wasn’t posted on their website at that time. The story was on the website for Channel 4 the NBC station.

The only story posted on the website from Saturday was a robbery suspect who was shot in South Columbus in the morning and they had the scores from the Indians and Reds games that afternoon.

10TV sister company, The Columbus Dispatch had 3 more Saturday story links on its front page.

The problem is that on Saturday and Sunday, there are times when the evening newscasts aren’t seen due to sports or other programing. Basically I wouldn’t know any local updates until 11 PM or later if network programing runs over.

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Reality job shows hype the drama a bit too much

A couple of cable channels have shows on that show people doing jobs that can be dangerous. The History Channel has Ice Road Truckers and Ax Men while Discovery Channel has Deadliest Catch. The shows are interesting because you get to see a job maybe you never knew existed and the people who do them. Too bad the shows try to create drama more often than it really happens.

The narrator breathlessly describes the scene and then it turns out not to be as dangerous as hyped. On an episode of a new show Deep Sea Salvage, on the History Channel, the task was moving a beached barge back into the water but it was too long for the standard technique – it could sling shot into the canal, slam into other barges and in the words of the narrator – cause a catastrophic disaster…. or words to that effect.

The salvage crew doesn’t use the usual technique and all goes well – no disaster….. DANG!…..

Most jobs, no matter what they are, lacks drama every day but that wouldn’t support a TV show.

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Sarah Conner Chronicles fans can be strange and creepy

I admit that in some rare cases I can lose rationality when trying to be a fan of whatever I am a fan of. Be it football, a film, TV show, or music, I can sometimes seem stupid. That’s what I faced when reading the official show blog of one of my current favs – Terminator – The Sarah Conner Chronicles. Reading some of the comments from the past few episodes left me gob smacked and I hope if I ever act that way, that someone slap me upside the head. Some fans are strange and creepy.

In case you don’t know Terminator – The Sarah Conner Chronicles (aka TTSCC) is part of the Terminator movie franchise started by James Cameron with his movie Terminator in 1984. Basically humans build a defense computer called Skynet that becomes self aware and attempts to destroy humanity. It sends a Terminator (a human like cyborg) back in time to kill the mother of the leader of the human resistance. Her name is Sarah Conner. The Terminator was played by Arnold Schwarzenegger.

What I liked about the story was the future war and John Conner. The films showed a bit of that war and glimpes of John Conner. The TV show follows Sarah and John roughly in the time period between the 2nd and 3rd film although in the first episode they threw in a time shift to 2008, so it is on its own time line.

There are two other supporting characters. One is Cameron – a reprogrammed female Terminator sent back to protect the teen aged John Conner. The other was Derrick Reese – brother of Kyle, John’s father.

Since the story is so layered and complex I sometimes check out the show’s official website. I read the producers notes and on occasion read the blog for each episode.

Although sometimes the comments from other fans bother me.

There are different views of the show and that is okay.

You have some who want more action and less talking. There are some who want more talking and less action. There are some fans who complain about logical holes in the plot – like how did one of the Terminators make it through the time displacement without being covered with living tissue.

Then some of the fans either tick me off or creep me out.

The actress who plays Cameron – Summer Glau – has her own fan base from her previous role in the TV show Firefly and those fan think that TTSCC should focus more on Cameron. They complain if she isn’t doing anything in scenes or doesn’t have a chance to beat someone up. They seem to forget it is called The Sarah Conner Chronicles so it should focus on Sarah and John with Cameron being a supporting character.

The creepy fans are the ones who crave a relationship between John Conner and Cameron. They think the human and robot should hook up. They also complain when John and Cameron aren’t in the scene. One fan even asked when they would be kissing. Ewwwww…..

I like the show and hope it gets a 3rd season but I have to remind myself not to visit the fan site too often.

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