Agree on Ugly Betty - although I think its structure and writing is actually better than we give it credit for. It's designed as a mock satire of the Spainish telenovela soap. It even has a Spainish Telenovela soap shown in snippets within it for comparison. Betty is in some ways a better and far more subtle satire of the soap form than Desperate Housewives, because it comments on something that never occurred to the creator of Housewives, maybe because he's a man, which is - the looks of all the people in soap operas and telenovelas. They are how we think men idealize women. Thin super-models. Betty is curvacious, sweet, and fashionably challenged. Not interested in fitting in. A true fish out of water.
In Betty, the writers deftly combine the over-the-top soap with Betty's family. Watching makes me feel at times I'm watching a soap opera that has been melded with an old school sitcom. Rather fun. Oddly comforting. And sort of sweet. Most innovative thing ABC did this year. Everything else on it's menu is well copies of other shows.
NBC did sort of venture into reality show land, but I give it credit for taking a different tact than the other shows. It introduced "Project Runway", "Queer Help for the Straight Guy " (okay got that title wrong...), "The Apprentice", "Deal or No Deal" ...which tend to be more of a how to do it, contest format. Remember NBC owns Bravo. It also owns the Sci-Fi channel. But it got stale and began to rest on its laurels for far too long - West Wing, ER, Law &Order, Friends, Will and Grace...all these shows first aired in the early 90's, and all lasted well into 2005. I think CSI and ABC's hit sensations: Grey's, Desperate, and Lost scared it a bit. Not to mention Fox's out of left field "House".
It wants a repeat of those glory years. I'm sort of rooting for it, but partly because ABC has pissed me off this year and I think needs a bit of smack-down. Still watching the hit ABC shows, although like you am disappointed in Housewives and Lost, both are annoying me at the moment. Will most likely be missing Lost this week unless I can grab it on the net.
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In Betty, the writers deftly combine the over-the-top soap with Betty's family. Watching makes me feel at times I'm watching a soap opera that has been melded with an old school sitcom. Rather fun. Oddly comforting. And sort of sweet. Most innovative thing ABC did this year. Everything else on it's menu is well copies of other shows.
NBC did sort of venture into reality show land, but I give it credit for taking a different tact than the other shows. It introduced "Project Runway", "Queer Help for the Straight Guy " (okay got that title wrong...), "The Apprentice", "Deal or No Deal"
...which tend to be more of a how to do it, contest format. Remember NBC owns Bravo. It also owns the Sci-Fi channel. But it got stale and began to rest on its laurels for far too long - West Wing, ER, Law &Order, Friends, Will and Grace...all these shows first aired in the early 90's, and all lasted well into 2005.
I think CSI and ABC's hit sensations: Grey's, Desperate, and Lost scared it a bit. Not to mention Fox's out of left field "House".
It wants a repeat of those glory years. I'm sort of rooting for it, but partly because ABC has pissed me off this year and I think needs a bit of smack-down. Still watching the hit ABC shows, although like you am disappointed in Housewives and Lost, both are annoying me at the moment. Will most likely be missing Lost this week unless I can grab it on the net.