I Like to Watch

Dec. 2, 2007 | It's official: Major network TV is seriously boring. I've strained to put a cheerful face on it, but now it's time to be honest. Golden age of television be damned, this fall's TV season has been a big disappointment. Outside of a few standout shows ("30 Rock" and "Friday Night Lights" are my personal favorites), the network offerings have been totally lackluster lately. What's worse, the writers' strike is starting to sink its teeth into the schedule, with nothing but reruns on every major channel. What's a poor, semiliterate, imagination-less American to do once they're done reading the latest Mitch Albom tear-jerker?

It's time to shake things up, man! I'm not a big fan of the dirty hippie, but sometimes you have to think like a dirty hippie to snap yourself out of a rut. The thing is, I get piles and piles of screeners and recommendations on what to watch every week, but sometimes it all gets to be too much, man, to the point where I can't, like, breathe! All those publicists at the networks, with their neat little hairdos and their dry-cleaned outfits, they just want to keep me working for The Man! But The Man is a Pusher Man, hustling product while he tramples on the little guy. I'm not gonna work for the Pusher Man, man!

Besides, I just want to roam, man, with no shackles holding me down! I want to wander through the hinterlands of cable television, unfettered! I don't want some stinking map either -- keep those TV Guides and Entertainment Weeklys away from me! I want to drift around from channel to channel, out in the real wilderness, not some state park of regulated TV viewing. Sure, maybe I'll get lost and I'll starve out there in the snow all alone, even though a rest stop with a vending machine is just a half-mile away that I didn't know about because I didn't bring a map. I don't care, dude! I'll pay that price for being truly free.

If I can get far enough away from the oppressive hustle and bustle of the major networks, I might just find true inspiration. After wandering in the backwoods of cable TV for long enough, I'll know just how that guy in "Into the Wild" felt ... well, except that I'll be warm and dry and well-fed and there won't be any hungry bears pacing nearby.

Alphabet soup
But how might I meander through the cable wilds in a way that would honor the vastness of the televised realm? Personally, I decided to start by picking "Find Programs" on my TiVo, then scrolling down an alphabetized list of every program on TV, starting with the letter A.

I was using this method, in fact, when I stumbled on a strange and intriguing show called "ABC News With Charles Gibson." Now, I only watched this show once, so I can't tell you that much, but apparently it's a little bit like "The Daily Show," except it's much less funny. This guy Charles Gibson really needs to work on his joke delivery.

In the episode I watched, there was a decent sketch on President Bush trying to get the Israeli-Palestinian peace process jump-started. It was pretty amusing -- the guy who played Bush was great! -- but it could've been a lot funnier if Gibson had made googly eyes or grasped his hands together and said, Do tell! like Stewart always does.

I did love the absurd graphic where we see that 78 percent of "Israelis" and 67 percent of "Palestinians" firmly believe that the Annapolis summit will fail. But when the "reporter" called the two leaders "unpopular" and "weak," it could've been funny, if his delivery weren't quite so deadpan.

Discovering this odd show inspired me to continue exploring the list for more oddities. And let me tell you, I didn't get very far, because the A's of the TV dial turn out to be a rich and varied lot indeed, from the provocatively punctuated "Accessorize!" ("Eclectic accoutrements for everyday!") to the provocatively titled "American Black Butt" ("Sexy women make their lovers happy"). There's also a wealth of shows about amateurs, strangely enough, with cooking titles such as "Amateurs: Cream Pies" and nature shows, such as "Amateur Coeds: Jr. College Beavers." Sadly, for some reason none of these shows were free.

As I continued to peruse the A's for quality programming options, I can't say that I stumbled on the next "Six Feet Under," but I did get a better grip on the various hobbies and interests of the American people. Read on, and learn about your fellow patriots!

"American Misfits" Skateboard comedy? Believe it, dude! This show consists of very short comedy sketches that are difficult to understand and, to employ the native tongue, totally random. In between the comedy, we're treated to footage of a bunch of guys doing tricks on their skateboards in public places. There's a guy named Slam whose main goal is to injure himself (he succeeds at bloodying a knee and cracking a rib by the end of his segment), and later there are these guys who build a skateboarding obstacle course, then one of them falls on his head and bleeds all over the place, which for some reason makes everyone laugh and say Dude! a lot. Later, he's back from the hospital with 14 stitches above his eye. One can only assume that this is the sort of show that those scrappy, ne'er-do-well skate rats watch whenever they're not out breaking their arms and making old people cringe at their noisy derring-do in the Chili's parking lot. Even so, it does kind of get you in the mood to get stoned and watch TV with a bunch of 13-year-olds. (Fuel TV)

"Ask the Pastor" After announcing that "Ask the Pastor" is "the best thing on television right now," our host introduces a panel of pastors from North Carolina who are available to answer call-in questions. Five pastors face the camera and respond to such scintillating viewer inquiries as "How does one become born again?" (The answer: Repent your sins and confess that Jesus is Lord. They make it sound so easy!) and "Can you lose your salvation?" (You bet your sinning ass you can! See also: Lucifer, damnation and some Bible passage about how "the dog has returned to its vomit"). Sadly, though, no one calls to ask the pastors to prove the existence of God or to grapple with complicated ethical dilemmas. In the end, watching this show feels a lot like that bad dream you have where suddenly you realize that you're a Presbyterian and you're not wearing any pants. (TCT)

Next page: The peculiar joys of "Nimrod Nation"