Monday, January 03, 2005

A Rant about TV Shows:Missing the First 5 Minutes

Whew, what a morning. It was a whirlwind of getting kids and husband off to work and school, and then taking my beloved six-month old puppy to the vet at 7:30 a.m. to get the FUN operation (he really has no idea what he's in for--he just thinks he's getting groomed) and now I've worked out and had breakfast and I'm surfing the net. Bad Lara. It's just so quiet and peaceful (the boys are playing down in the basement) and I am loving the moment's solitude.

But now on to my rant. I have several TV shows that I love to watch, as I've mentioned before in other blogs. Its how my hubby and I unwind at night, and among our favorites are the LAW & ORDER and CSI shows. All of 'em. There is just ONE tiny problem with being addicted to these shows:
If you don't see the first five minutes of the show, you literally have no idea what the hell is going on for THE ENTIRE REST OF THE SHOW! I mean, that is just wrong. I have actually yelled at my kids (and this is a terrible admission) for brushing their teeth too slowly, thus making me miss the very beginning of CSI Miami. I ran downstairs and screamed, beating my head against the TV because it was the commercial break after the snide/humorous comment usually made by Horatio when he happens on a scene (which as all of us CSI watchers know, is the cue to go to commerical).

Okay, so I didn't really scream and beat my head against the TV, but I was QUITE upset and when the show started back up again, I had no idea what they were talking about, and the only part of the show I enjoyed was the Other Plot because the show always has two plots going at the same time, and they usually introduce Plot Two after the initial plot.
So, the producers need to realize that sometimes, people miss the beginning, and the show loses its entertainment value when that happens. All they need is a few sentences after the initial
commercial break, so that us "late arrivals" can know what we missed. For example:

Cut to shot of charred body in lab, being inspected by main characters
MC #1: So, what happened?
MC #2: She was found in the middle of a burned-out basement by a couple of firefighters, and we've identified her as "so and so" and there was also some suspicious white powder at the scene and purple threads in her throat and a burned shoe lying next to her that wasn't hers so we think this is a homicide rather than accidental death.
MC #1: Okay then, let's get started on the autopsy...

There! Bingo! Just so that all the unfortunate souls who missed the first five minutes, can hear what happened, and be "up to speed" on what's going on.

Is that too much to ask?

1 comment:

Lara said...

Thank you, Devon, I never thought of it that way! So I'd better either A) look into TiVo (thanks Brenda) or B)get the children to brush their teeth faster...
:-)