Radiation by Fiona Rae

Did you see Nip/Tuck come over all Six Feet Under last week? Just when I thought N/T was merely a series of comeuppances for dastardly Dr Christian, a corpse’s head started talking to Sean.

The whole scene had that Space Odyssey nothingness about it: an almost empty white room, a neat row of corpses’ heads on trolleys, a neat row of surgeons breaking the coprses’ noses in unison. No wonder Sean started hallucinating.

But Nip/Tuck’s a funny programme. After the initial sex-death-disposing of the body in the Florida swamp opening, it’s settled down to become a series of moral dilemmas for the characters and those aforementioned small comeuppances for Christian, who never learns from being tied to the bed for a couple of days by his mad ex-girlfriend, or whatever else.

He’s never going to be right until he gets the woman of his dreams, Julia, although why he wants that tearful, nasal hysteric is a mystery. You’d think she would have stopped crying by now.

There’s only three episodes left in the current season; reportedly, Famke Janssen (Jean Grey in X-Men) will play Julia’s life coach in season two, and Vanessa Redgrave will play her mother. The show has been looking for a woman in her early 40s-50s with a good bod to be a nude double for her. Guess it’s impossible to go on Nip/Tuck without getting your gear off.

Flea comments:

Has anyone else commented on how great Maori TV is? We are really enjoying it as an alternative -- we have been turning to it randomly when there is nothing else to watch on the other channels -- which is quite often -- and are always pleasantly surprised but what we see!

Yes! Peter McLennan loves DIY Marae:

It’s genius. Same theme as DIY Rescue, but with cultural values added. Some landscaping, gardening, painting, but also getting the kids to clean and repaint the carvings and panels. At the start of the show, they send the old kuia off while they do up the marae. Then they come back at the end, visibly moved, crying ... its amazing. One old fella talked about doing in four days what they’d been trying to do for the last 30 years. He said Some of the koro and kuia who are no longer with us would’ve loved to see this -- you can almost hear them, not turning in their graves, but dancing in them!
It was so choice. Catch it if you can. Its taking an incredibly played out TV idea and giving it new meaning, hell, giving it some meaning beyond vacuous entertainment. Tu meke!

Meanwhile, Rose couldn’t understand why I liked Serial Killers:

Oh Fiona, what on God’s green earth could possibly move you to surmise that “Serial Killers was great ...”? I watched it with, admittedly, fairly high expectations (why, oh why was it billed as the new The Office? The comparison was cruelly misleading -- the only similarity being a poor imitation of the jittery camera work. I thought the characters were half-baked, cringe-worthy stereotypes and the comedy was seriously lacking. In fact about half way through I started to wonder if it was really intended to be comedy at all, it was just so safe and conventional and flat. I don’t blame the actors for this, I thought Robyn Malcolm was good and I love Oliver Driver and John Leigh. I’m sure that given the right script they would have the capacity to be funny, and in fact I reckon both Driver and Leigh had better comic moments in their roles on Shortland Street than they did in the first episode of Serial Killers.
The whole situation depresses me. I just think it’s lamentable that we as kiwis have such a natural feel for the irreverent, subversive, risk-takingly humorous, and yet very rarely does that translate into good television comedy.

What can I say? I laughed, which is generally an indication that I’m amused, although the second episode on Friday wasn’t quite as good as the first – except for the excellent exchange between Oliver Driver’s character and Sara Wiseman’s annoying hippie: “You’re so angry …”
“I am now.”

In other news, this link takes you to the Two and a Half Men website, where the video tour “Angus T Jones (Jake) gives a tour of the set!” features our own Melanie Lynskey, who plays Rose on the show. Entertainment Weekly thought she “makes mild insanity adorable” in its recent appraisal of the sitcom, giving it a B-, pretty high praise in the current US sitcom wasteland.

Check out the new website for TVNZ, which was officially launched last week. Shamefully, there is no separate info for Serial Killers. Also, this NZ TV website, which covers the local TV sites -- although not Idol blog.

Quotes:
“You know why iron’s like a woman don’t you? The hotter you get her, the easier she is to handle.” – A blacksmith on a One News item.
“It was an outside job.” – Gil Grissom, referring to a bee that killed a guy. Even Sara smiled at that one.

Further to what we were saying about the relevance, or not, of David Beckham's private life, TV2 is screening Rebecca Loos -- My Story tomorrow night (Tues 27th) at 9.35pm (replaces Alias), followed by The Real Beckhams at 10.35pm. The press release can barely contain itself: "Catch Rebecca Loos when she reveals all the sordid details of her alleged affair with David Beckham -- from steamy hotel room romps -- to the details of those infamous sex texts."

Lastly, we’re getting The Apprentice, guys, the one with Donald Trump. Lucky us.

Many thoughtful and considered emails have flooded into Radiation since its inception. Okay - more like a babbling brook, but we love them all in their own special way.

I’ve already excerpted many in blogs, but it’s time to see some in their full, raw, unexpurgated, Rachel-Hunter-naked-in-Playboy and with only minor grammatical corrections glory.

C’mon down Nic Igusa,

What is up with Holmes? I thought it was supposed to be a show about NZers, not some vapid celebrity-worshipping twaddle. I'm not normally in front of the TV at 7pm, but happened to put on Holmes last night to be bombarded with Susan Wood alternating between tripping up on her words and gushing breathlessly about Beckham's biography. I mean, in a country where we see more of Beckham on the Vodafone ads that on a football field, why must the lead segment (all 10 minutes of it) be taken up with an English professor humming and hahing about the whole ‘he said she said’ affair debacle? Who cares?? Is that really the NZ angle that Holmes' producer is always looking for?

I had to turn the TV off when we got to the human interest story. A barely coherent child talking about some adventure that the family's golden retriever played a part in. Hard to distinguish what the story was between giggles and childish muttering.

I was going to watch The Simpsons instead but couldn't stomach all the ads in between ...

That was my rant, this morning!

I was thinking the same thing the other night when both channels screened lengthy news pieces about the marital infidelities, or not, of a football player on the other side of the world. Just how is this relevant again? I suspect it’s more to do with the amount of footage the networks get from Britain than with relative news value.

The violence on TV survey had y’all going. Kyle Matthews writes:

A few years ago -- quite a few even -- I did some research work for the NZ police into violence in the Wellington region. The police were looking for an answer that said ‘less alcohol, bars closing earlier, less licenses’ etc.

One of the questions that I found myself looking at as I did the research was what made people violent. Specifically, why do thousands of people go out and get drunk regularly, and not end up in a violent situation, and why do some people, when drunk, commonly end up either assaulted or assaulting. Clearly there’s nothing inherent to alcohol which causes violence, or everyone that drunk would be violent. I found it difficult to provide the answer that the police wanted, even though most violence is committed under the influence of alcohol.

However we also know that our society can make proven links between those people abused when they were young becoming abusers when they are adults.

One of your writers said that they had watched many violent cartoons as a child and they weren't violent. That's great. And indeed, maybe there is no link between seeing violence as a child and being violent -- either as a child, or later in life.

However we don't make laws for non-violent, caring, sharing people who would never hurt another person. If we only made laws for those people there wouldn’t be laws against rape and murder and those sorts of things. Laws are made for the small proportion of society that do anti-social behaviour.

Maybe there isn’t a link between violent TV (or music, a la Marilyn Manson) and violent behaviour. If there is a link however, which we can prove, then I don't think the argument that ‘I went through that situation and I am fine’ is valid, even if it’s for 90 per cent of people. We make laws for the other 10 per cent, and if we can change our society, particularly the way we raise children to make those 10 per cent turn out better as adults, then that’s something that surely we should look at?

In the paraphrased words of a famous equestrian, it’s a curly one. Can we argue for censorship when a small portion of society who may have been affected by a whole range of events and/or abuses is violent? If there was no violence on TV would there be no societal violence? Should the warnings before violent shows be extended to read “we advise discretion especially if you were abused as a child or are living with violence on a day-to-day basis”?

The lovely Andrew writes,

As a 32-year-old news and current affairs glutton I found Flipside to be a great source of topical info delivered intelligently, irreverently and, I suspect, most importantly for the demographic I assume they were pursuing, honestly.

Comparing the fantastic on-screen presence of Evie and Mike with the bumbling goons on the patronisingly vapid Headliners, and the duo on One’s other late bulletin, makes one wonder why the Flipside team are being shafted. Too successful? I hardly think that their audience is going to return to the lonely Judy Bailey.

Flipside was a valuable source of news, social issues and artistic goings on (bands, theatre and so forth) that is simply not present on our Charter broadcaster. They were even scheduling some one-off docos I believe, made, God forbid, for people who have no desire to watch some of the tepid DNZ ones.

Re the burying of Serial Killers, for goodness sake, 9.45 Friday night?! Who on earth will see it then? Yet another example of the “whoever they ares” failing to support local initiatives. Shame on them. Still comedy is the bugbear for The Network, due I suspect to them insisting on inserting their clumsy little fingers into the comedy making pie. When their fingers curdle said pie they then have the audacity to blame the pie maker.

Great example of this was the fascinating doco about the BBC’s El Dorado on Trouble at the Top, more quality programming (judging from the one ep I happened upon) buried late at night. No problems with that so much as the fact that they could damn well promo stuff so we know it is on. Oh sorry, that would be too easy.

Serial Killers was great too. Made me laugh – especially the journo who had written a bad review of the soap in the morning and was asking for a job in the afternoon. Hee hee. I’m sure that’s happened, hasn’t it? Shortland Street secret squirrels: we await your call. Remember, Flipside isn’t dead yet, you just have to be home at 5pm to see it.

Okay, enough of you, back to me. In the Buffy/Angel fanverse (the rest of you can go away now if you want to), here’s a story from Ain’t It Cool News about Alyson Hannigan’s new sitcom, Americana. The actor formerly known as Willow was also performing on stage in When Harry Met Sally, along with Luke Perry, on the West End. Here’s a Guardian interview.

For us Angel fans, the dream is over (although we’ve got the rest of season four and all of season five to go here). Angel’s been cancelled in the US, despite an incredible fan campaign and website. Buffy/Angel creator Joss Whedon is developing a feature film based on Firefly, his short-lived space Western series. Reportedly, Whedon would like David Boreanaz to appear in the film (wow, Angel in space!).

It’s not all bad though. If you ever wanted a nearly life-sized Spike of your very own, and let’s face it, who wouldn’t, here’s a downloadable 32-page poster to print out (in Adobe Acrobat) and assemble.

It’s Camillia all the way, don’t you think? She’s the one you’re waiting to see, she’s the one you can imagine standing on stage at the end, perhaps with her arm over Michael’s shoulders, and she’s the one that Paul Ellis could make a record with.

She’s also the one who really looks like she could hold an audience for a whole performance (“Purple Rain”!!). I think we’re ready for our own booty-shaking Beyonce, she should get her own version of the “Uh-oh” dance now.

There’s a lot of singing, crying and padding out the hour before then though. As the NZ Idol numbers get trimmer, so the “backview” items, or whatever they’re called, get fatter. It’s hard not to see the Idol factory as a spin-off training ground for prospective new TV presenters – Jesse looked quite good.

Yes, I’ve surrendered to the Idol experience. Bring it on. Awesome. My family keeps me humble and strong, etc. I had been in two minds up to now -- on the one hand, all the gains that have been made in New Zealand music have been by original artists, unique to us, performing their own songs. You can thank NZ On Air’s Kiwi Hit Discs as well, and the involuntary radio quota, for getting programme directors at radio stations who were too stupid or lazy to find local music for themselves onto the bandwagon. NZ On Air brought the music to them on a platter, you might say. The discs are now up to number 64, plus they’ve had to split them up into Indie Hit Discs, Iwi Hit Discs and A/C Hit Discs – that’s Adult Contemporary -- such is the breadth of music now being made in Aotearoa.

On the other hand -- what the hell? If our music industry is buoyant enough to sustain an Idol artist, and if there’s money to be made here and overseas, why not? The winner, Camillia that is, will still have to work her booty off and be that person. It’s not a free ride, as you might remember if you saw John Safran’s Music Jamboree last year.

One song we’d like to see on Sunday: Big Dave singing The Stylistics’ “Betcha By Golly Wow”. Someone should have done “Sometimes When We Touch” for the ballad show too. It’s not too late.

Chris McKay wrote to say that he and his wife are enjoying widescreen episodes of Alias on DVD via Amazon.com because they were sick of TV3 dicking around with it, and:

The episode you referred to the other day has a voiceover from the cast. All very amusing, but the interesting thing is that the show was broadcast in the US just after the SuperBowl at 11pm and JJ Abrams quite merrily chats about the opening shot being ‘fortunate’ to have Jennifer Garner in her underwear so as to grab drunk sports fans’ attention before they switched channels or fell asleep.

Ah well, quelle surprise and all that. US online reviewer Catharine Tunnacliffe at Eye Weekly has referred to Jack and Sydney Bristow as “TV’s most intriguing couple”. It seems it’s getting a bit weird there in the third season. That’s not a link to the story, as it contains a massive spoiler which you may not want to know. (I’ve also just seen the March 13 issue of New Idea at the doctor’s and it totally gives away the cliffhanger for season two. I guess that’s the trouble with being an Aussie mag publishing in a NZ market.)

The story can be reached via TV Tattle if you must, which also carries a story about Quentin Tarantino being US Idol’s latest guest judge. No word about whether contestants will be wearing yellow tracksuits and carrying swords to curry favour, although “Kung Fu Fighting” might be a popular song choice.

Sally recommends popcultablog, “A new blog from Dave Pell, the guy behind davenetics, nextdraft and the (now essential for me) electablog.” Man, that guy is funny. And concise too. Ahem.

Matt Heath and Chris Stapp, who you may remember from such programmes as Back of the Y are now doing Thursday Drive on bFM. In between the Deja Voodoo songs and the relentless self promotion, they’ve had plenty to say about television violence -- get violence off the streets and back on television where it belongs seems to be the gist of it -- and some thoroughly scurrilous things to say about Sue Kedgely too. They should thank her, really, for providing them with so many jokes, and I’m sure all the “What a Pig” kids who ate a cup of fat and four day’s worth of sugar over the weekend would like to thank her too.

Jake Pollock writes that he watched Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles as a child,

and was probably involved in a bit of ninja kicking and nunchuk action thereafter. I also watched Voltron, Super Ted and the Gummi Bears (all of which are rather disturbing and violent in their own right). I am now, I like to think, a well-adjusted and thoroughly non-violent individual. I remember the cartoons of my youth with fondness, but they don't inform my day-to-day actions -- at least, not in any way that I'm aware of.

I asked, but TV One can’t say when they’ll be starting Six Feet Under again.

Lastly, here’s something to make your day. Sky has just announced it has started filming its first local reality series. The Player features 10 guys holed up in an apartment who are assigned certain tasks to test their sex appeal and general ability to be a playa, y’all. It will be fronted by (who else?) Nicky Watson. Produced by (who else?) Touchdown. Something to look forward to in May.

Does TVNZ even like its own local programmes? Unless they’re cash cows like DIY Rescue or The Zoo, it seems some shows are only there under sufferance. Mercy Peak? Sorry, we’ve cancelled your show and we’re not going to bother with any advertising for your last 10 eps and, oh, by the way, here’s a reasonably crappy time slot.

The latest casualty is Flipside, the so-called youth news show that’s been steadily building its audience at 6pm, and doing rather a good job of covering the issues. When a One News reporter completely failed to explain what Low Power FM broadcast licences are all about, Flipside interviewed Andrew Dubber about them.

Flipside is to lose its 10.30pm show, Flipside Late, and its 6pm show is being moved to 5pm from Monday the 12th. Rumour has it that it will be replaced altogether, just as it has become established and recognised by the audience. Presumably, it’s a victim of its own success – taking viewers from TV One, maybe, both from the 6 o’clock news and the relentlessly unhip Tonight.

Another local show that’s getting a rough time slot is the new comedy Serial Killers, which will go to air at 9.45pm on Friday nights (starts on the 16th). It’s written by James Griffin, based on his play about behind-the-scenes of a soap opera (he’s a former Shortland Streeter). It works well in the TV format, I hear, with a slight Office vibe.

Are we believing Ian Fraser when he said that “the Charter encourages us to invest in talent and imagination, to take creative risks and to provide a more diverse menu, particularly in prime time”? Not yet.

Regarding the violence on television survey, Andrew comments:

Once again we have hysteria about children’s cartoons. How many of the adult commentators actually watch these? As a parent I try to know what my kids are watching. Sometimes I really enjoy the programme (Spongebob), some I tolerate, and some I discourage. But my decisions are based on time with the kids and participating in what they are doing/watching myself, not because a committee has watched TV for me and the kids. It is not surprising that violent kids TV is bad when associated with “negative clusters”. But is it the TV or lack of attention to the kids?

If we have kids we must take responsibility for them, guide them etc, and not just trust that TV and teachers will raise them for us.

Quite right. Andrew, you are clearly, like me, the perfect parent. Here’s that hysteria you were talking about from the Herald and Sue Kedgley.

This also from Stephen Walker:

I just thought it is was worth noting that children under three years cannot differentiate between fantasy and reality. And since a lot of people seem to use children's videos as well as TV as their default babysitter, prolonged exposure to this stuff (which may be totally innocuous for older kids) for very young children may not be a good idea, and could have long-term effects.

Yes, and aren’t we all feeling really guilty after the story that too much TV for children under two interferes with brain development? Eek. I don’t remember my kids watching that much telly back then. Too busy sleeping and pooping, that sort of thing. But isn’t it freaky that your 2 or 3-year-old thinks that two very large bananas wearing blue-and-white-striped pyjamas could walk around the corner at any moment?

Another point: I do think the networks have to be more circumspect when advertising their murder-as-entertainment shows. A promo for SVU (do they drive SUVs?) played during the news a couple of nights ago. It was a dead guy this time, but it’s usually murdered women, with the voiceover guy excitedly purring “Murder ….” I’m a muter, but even the visuals are nasty.

The Letterman list is in:
Monday 12: Viggo Mortenson and Sting
Tuesday 13: Sara Jessica Parker and Nelly Furtado
Wednesday 14: Billy Crystal and Yankee Alex Rodriguez
Thursday 15: Chris Rock
Friday 16: Senator John McCain and Damien

Lastly, from our Programmes We’d Like to See Here file: MTV’s Pimp My Ride, presented by rapper Xzibit, where dowdy, uncool cars get the ultimate pimp makeover! The site also has a game, The Ride Pimper, that’s a fun five minutes’ worth.

Hey, have a gorgeous and relaxing Easter you guys.

Incredibly, the recent study into television violence found that nine of the top 10 shows featuring the highest incidence of violence were cartoons. Who would have thought? One of them is Rugrats, another is Classic Cartoon, which features the stretch-and-squeeze exploits of Mickey, Donald, Goofy and Pluto. That means that children have been exposed to a high level of violence on TV for around 50 years.

You’d think that 50 years was long enough then to measure the effects of television violence, but the 285-page study, which is downloadable via the Herald site (it’s in Adobe Acrobat), points out that after something like 4000 studies into television violence over the past 50 years, no-one can actually agree on the potency and seriousness of television’s influence.

The report says:

While television is but one factor in children’s lives and development, there does seem to be some connection between children who have had a violence-saturated media diet and aggression in later life. In addition, television is more likely to have a negative impact on children who grow up with a cluster of negative influences such as poverty, domestic violence, truancy, etc. The ‘replacement effect’ of television may also be detrimental to children.

The top 10 TV shows featuring the most graphic violence (as opposed to violent incidences) were nearly all AO programmes – except for another cartoon, Pokemon. It’s interesting to note that Pokemon is one of the kids’ shows that the Parents Television Council of America has actually endorsed. This website features a mom who outlines all the reasons she thinks the wildly complex Pokemon is good for kids.

Okay. So I don’t think children should see lots of violence on TV. I certainly don’t think they should be watching CSI, SVU, Nip/Tuck or 24. That’s why they’re on after 8.30pm. I don’t think kids should be playing excessively violent video games or watching Seven. Not until they’re … not children. But I have a problem with blaming cartoons.

Cartoons exist in an entirely fantastic world, where things happen that children know are outside the realms of possibility. (Btw, novelist and mythographer Marina Warner said something similar in her interview with Kim Hill on Saturday. She’s giving a lecture at the university tomorrow night.) In the current Japanimation shows that dominate kids’ afternoon telly – like Yu–gi-oh! and Megaman, or Digimon on Saturday, bizarre digital beings battle each other in duels that may or may not have real consequences for their owners. The shows are extremely moral, with a heavy emphasis on being true to yourself and trusting your friends. In Yu-gi-oh!, aside from being true to your friends and supporting them, it’s trusting in “the heart of the cards”, another way of saying trust your choices and your learning. Cheaters never prosper, bad guys always lose.

In Megaman, three kids rush about a futuristic Japanese city battling virus attacks that the authorities are apparently powerless to resist. One is the daughter of a rich mayor who shares her wealth. They are good citizens. Even good old Spongebob Squarepants is the most pure and trusting soul in all of Bikini Bottom.

In my experience, that “cluster of negative influences” the report mentions is probably the key aspect. The most violent, or saddest, child in the school is the one most likely to see, and be on the receiving end of, violence at home. Boys might fantasy play that their toys are battling with all manner of weapons, Action Man might kill Dr X over and over with his new turbo surfboard with firing torpedo action, but that doesn’t necessarily lead to violence and aggression in real life.

Sue Kedgley’s comment that “It appears that some of the cartoons our children are watching are little more than animated thuggery” is bizarrely ignorant. It appears? Doesn’t she know? She is the Greens spokesperson for broadcasting.

Phew. In other news, TVNZ in good idea shock: Chris Knox is introducing a series of classic noir movies every Friday night around 11.15pm. Murder My Sweet screened on Friday, others in the series are: Out of the Past (Jacques Tourneur, 1947, starring Robert Mitchum, Jane Greer and Kirk Douglas), Journey into Fear (Norman Foster, 1942, starring Joseph Cotton, Dolores del Rio and Agnes Moorhead), Deadline at Dawn (Harold Clurman, 1946, starring Susan Hayward and Paul Lukas), Born to Kill (Robert Wise, 1947, starring Claire Trevor, Lawrence Tierney), The Big Steal (Don Siegel, 1949, starring Robert Mitchum and Jane Greer) and Berlin Express (Jaques Tourneur, 1948, starring Merle Oberon and Robert Ryan).

Although keep it quiet won’t you, or else TVNZ might realise they’ve done something good and immediately take it off.