Click here for Part 1

I love The 40 Year-Old Virgin for the same reason Shoshanna Shapiro quickly became my favorite character on Girls: not because of her personal virginphobia, but because in a world threatened with terrorism, hunger, and the pending threat of Obamacare, virginity remains one of the greatest crises of our time.

Thanks to the goddess feminist revolt of the sexy sixties, bedroom activities have risen to the top of the pops when it comes to ratings-driven conversation. As a result, virgins have become stigmatized as uncool goods. It’s no wonder, then, that pop culture-obsessed Shoshanna is neurotic enough to spend an entire season trying her best to lose her virginity so she can catch up to her “adventurous” female counterparts like Jessa (who came to the states for an abortion) and Hannah (who has recently been diagnosed with HPV).

How did feminism come to embrace promiscuity as a form of empowerment? Is the “adventurous” woman treating her HPV really happier than the biblical feminist who resisted the culture and waited until marriage to have sex?

In the 1970s, feminists revived goddess worship. Their reasoning: to Jews and Christians, God is male so we’re going to start our own She-ra, Man-Haters Club and have our own goddesses instead. Far be it from me to criticize someone for starting their own clique, but their disturbing lack of logic has rained on the chick parade ever since.

Compare the following Biblical account:

Now Deborah, a prophet, the wife of Lappidoth, was leading Israel at that time. She held court under the Palm of Deborah between Ramah and Bethel in the hill country of Ephraim, and the Israelites went up to her to have their disputes decided.  She sent for Barak son of Abinoam from Kedesh in Naphtali and said to him, “The Lord, the God of Israel, commands you: ‘Go, take with you ten thousand men of Naphtali and Zebulun and lead them up to Mount Tabor.  I will lead Sisera, the commander of Jabin’s army, with his chariots and his troops to the Kishon River and give him into your hands.’”

Barak said to her, “If you go with me, I will go; but if you don’t go with me, I won’t go.”

“Certainly I will go with you,” said Deborah. “But because of the course you are taking, the honor will not be yours, for the Lord will deliver Sisera into the hands of a woman.”

…with the following historical account:

The foulest Babylonian custom is that which compels every woman of the land to sit in the temple of Aphrodite and have intercourse with some stranger once in her life. …most sit down in the sacred plot of Aphrodite, with crowns of cord on their heads …Once a woman has taken her place there, she does not go away to her home before some stranger has cast money into her lap, and had intercourse with her outside the temple… It does not matter what sum the money is; the woman will never refuse, for that would be a sin, the money being by this act made sacred. So she follows the first man who casts it and rejects no one. After their intercourse, having discharged her sacred duty to the goddess, she goes away to her home… There is a custom like this in some parts of Cyprus.

Prophetess or prostitute — there’s a million-dollar question. Why represent the Living God when you can enslave yourself to unknown men in service of a sculpted woman?

The irony deepens when one continues to read (not stereotype) the Bible to find that Israelite women didn’t need to waste their time fighting to be equal to men; they were busy fulfilling their own unique role in society. Created with an intrinsic spiritual link to God, women were the first teachers of Torah to their children. They managed their homes, families, and finances. While other women served gods and goddesses by sacrificing their bodies and their children on pagan altars, Hebrew women were called by their God to birth, raise, educate, build, and prophesy to their nation. Long before American women decided they needed equality, Israelite women were divinely empowered.

Yet it’s this revived goddess theology, not biblical feminism, that has trickled down from yesterday’s second-wave feminism into today’s pop culture to the point where the term “goddess” has become a compliment slung about among women anxious to buy t-shirts, mugs, and jewelry encrusted with a term of ancient slavery. Nowhere is the pop-goddess trend more evident than on television, where women continue to be defined and glorified through sexual acts. Paris Hilton, Kim Kardashian, and the “Backdoor Teen Mom” have all reached stardom through cut-and-dry video prostitution, while fictional shows like HBO’s Girls provide more high-brow, intellectual goddess-fodder, which the graduate school-educated critics crave.

An excellent article by John Stonestreet at Breakpoint led me to an excellent article by Philip G. Ryken at The Gospel Coalition. Ryken asked Christian artists how the church discouraged them and they gave him some very precise and, I thought, accurate answers. Here’s Stonestreet’s summary:

First, they said, treat the arts as window dressing for the truth rather than the window into reality it’s intended to be. Second, embrace bad art just because it’s “Christian.” Third, value artists only for their artistic gifts, but not for the other contributions they can make as thinkers and servants with a unique perspective. Fourth, demand that artists only give answers in their work, but never raise questions. Fifth, never pay artists for their work—take advantage of them in ways we would never do with plumbers or accountants. And finally, only validate art that has a direct salvation application.

These complaints seemed to be highlighted and exemplified by a well-intentioned but, to my mind, utterly wrong-headed essay by David Gibson of the Religion News Service entitled, “Can A Christian Watch Game of Thrones?” (which happens to be my favorite show at the moment):

Is there anything morally redeeming about “Game of Thrones”? Does the hit HBO series even have a moral vision…?  The appeal of the series seems bound up in the senseless violence and amoral machinations – not to mention the free-wheeling sex – that the writers use to dramatize this brutish world of shifting alliances and dalliances.

I call this wrong-headed not for its description of the show, but for its inherent concept of Christians as delicate flowers who have to be protected from a vision of life as it is. Gibson says GOT may be “depicting how the world would look if Christ had never been born – or what it could look like if Christianity disappeared tomorrow.” But that’s just silly. Does he mean now that Christ has shown up, people live long and prosper in honesty and evil never thrives? Is he demanding to be lied to about the nature of this world?

The very power of Game of Thrones derives from the fact that the author of the source novels, George R. R. Martin (an atheist, I believe), treats his characters as harshly and heartlessly as the real world treats the rest of us. If Christians can’t look at that without losing their faith, they better not watch the news either, or look out their windows, or leave their rooms.

Most Overrated: The West Wing

I have to confess I didn’t watch much of this show, after the first episode featured a group of antisemitic “conservative” teachers (as though that’s a bigger problem with conservatives) and President Martin Sheen, I mean Josiah Bartlett, telling a bunch of conservative pastors (in real life, Israel’s best friends) to “get your fat asses out of my office.” That easy, clichéd slander was enough for me.

This show was constant liberal wish fulfillment throughout its run, like any production from the much-overrated Aaron Sorkin that directly deals with politics. Knock down straw men that represent liberal nightmares about conservatives, then be all self-congratulatory for taking on the “tough issues.”

In 2002, President Bartlett’s campaign was against the typical Republican candidate, a stupid, Southern right-wing governor, so it was an easy victory — despite the fact that the most recent president was someone that Hollywood considered a stupid, Southern right-wing governor. And a year after 9/11, the central issue seemed to be green energy; and, of course, liberal goodness and farsightedness won the day because the president had the good sense to embrace it.

In 2005, the show presented the “ideal” Republican candidate. The one that liberals supposedly fear the most. A pro-choice moderate played by… wait for it… Alan Alda!

His most triumphant moment is his refusal to go to a conservative mega-church and a declaration against religious tests. But, alas, he is a Republican, so of course he is most afraid of a dynamic Latino candidate on the Democrat side, the idealistic Jimmy Smits, and uses immigration as a wedge issue to hurt him in his own primary, leading to this slapdown by a close aide:

But aside from the constant liberal fantasy, there are two things that anyone who has ever worked for — or even with — government has to find laughable. First, the idea that government at any level doesn’t move with the speed of a glacier.

And second — adding to the ponderous pretentiousness of the show — did the White House not pay its light bill? The noirish atmosphere may be dramatic, but government buildings are anything but dimly lit, and their favorite type of lighting tends to be fluorescent.

During the run of The West Wing, every successful Republican for president in a generation had run as a conservative, while every successful Democrat had run disguised as a moderate. Of course, 2012 changed all that…

GRADE:  The Show Overall — C, the Campaign — D

Here I provide you with a seven word refutation to this speech from HBO’s new show The Newsroom.

“Which way are all the rafts going?”

Discuss.

***

Related at PJ Lifestyle: Critics Hammer Aaron Sorkin’s Newsroom: ‘So Naive it’s Cynical’

via 10 vicious reviews of ‘The Newsroom’ – Patrick Gavin – POLITICO.com.

The critics have weighed in on Aaron Sorkin’s new drama, “The Newsroom,” starring Jeff Daniels as a news anchor struggling to put together a successful news program despite the obligatory pressures and obstacles.

The consensus? It’s not Sorkin’s finest work.
Here are the 10 harshest reviews of “Newsroom,” which debuts Sunday on HBO:
1. “‘The Newsroom’ had me contemplating that which is so feared in my industry: changing the channel. And I was watching it on DVD.” — ABC’s Jake Tapper, The New Republic
2. “…an exponentially tedious undertaking for the viewer…” — Hank Stuever, Washington Post
3. “It’s so naive it’s cynical.” — Emily Nussbaum, New Yorker
4. “…it all feels over-overwrought.” — Joanne Ostrow, Denver Post

Commentary’s John Podhoretz with an enthusiastic write-up of HBO’s Girls at The Weekly Standard:

HBO’s much-discussed new series Girls is just concluding its first season, and it’s extraordinary. Girls offers the most interesting and original televised portrait of upper-middle-class American angst since thirty-something went off the air in 1991.

Like thirtysomething, it is simultaneously an infuriatingly self-referential thumbsucker and an extraordinarily intelligent dissection of infuriatingly self-referential thumbsucking. But it is, thankfully, far more the latter than the former. And it is one of the most prodigious media stunts since the heyday of the very young Orson Welles, given that it is largely the work of a 26-year-old who created it, wrote most of the episodes, directed a few of them, and stars in it to boot.

Her name is Lena Dunham, and two years ago she did the same triple duty on a do-it-yourself movie called Tiny Furniture that I actively disliked because it was purely a self-referential thumbsuck. Something good happened to Dunham in the interim between the movie and the TV series, because Girls takes the world of Tiny Furniture—post-collegiate types with no marketable skills wandering aimlessly around New York City—and gives it heft and shape and dimension.

It’s often very funny, and given that each episode runs a half-hour, I guess you’d call Girls a sitcom. But it really comes across more like a loosely linked collection of Ann Beattie stories updated from the post-1960s anomie of Beattie’s characters to the media-soaked seen-it-all world-weariness of Generation Zynga.

Read the whole thing. And let’s consider this post the conclusion of the Girls vs Women and Boys vs Men discourse for now. (Though don’t be surprised if more articles on the subject of growing up show up at PJ Lifestyle. It’s one of Kathy Shaidle’s specialties.)

Seeing the promotions for Girls, two impressions emerged:

1. Looks like they nailed the Millennial “post-collegiate types with no marketable skills wandering aimlessly.”

2. Therefore, I have no interest in watching it right now.

Just the previews alone reminded me of myself and too many people I’ve known over the last decade who were in the same limbo zone in life: just emerging out into the “real world” and wobbling between being a girl and a woman, a boy and a man, struggling to find their path to a happy, satisfying life of meaning, worth, and dignity.

With only so many entertainment hours in the day, why spend them being reminded of all the people I care about who were making themselves miserable by refusing to grow up?

The Obama 2012 campaign is panting to give first dog Bo a starring part in its re-election bid, prominently featuring the handsome Portuguese water dog in official campaign advertisements and fundraising efforts in an effort to court the canine-loving contingent. One of those efforts is “Bark for Obama,” a cute collection of designer dog apparel; consulting on the collection was none other than Obama’s most fashionable fundraiser, Vogue’s Anna Wintour (who is known more for her love of fur coats than live animals, but whatever).

It’s all a sad reminder of how the president missed a golden opportunity to help a tragically under-represented American demographic. In 2009, after winning many dog lovers’ hearts by hinting at the possibility that his family would adopt a shelter mutt, the president instead accepted the gift of a purebred pup from Sen. Edward M. Kennedy. Had he made good on his promise to scoop an underdog from one of the country’s many overburdened animal shelters, the gesture would have gone a long way toward reversing the nation’s crushing homeless-dog crisis. The all-American mutt would’ve gained overnight celebrity as a status hound. But instead of casting their vote for the all-American mutt, copycats bought … Portuguese water dog puppies.

Now, a new documentary reveals, in graphic detail, just what that missed opportunity has cost the dogs of America. It’s called One Nation Under Dog, and it airs tonight at 9 p.m. on HBO, as the opening film of the annual HBO Summer Documentary Series.

There’s no question that we Americans love our dogs. There are 78.2 million owned dogs in the United States, and statistics from the American Pet Products Manufacturing Assocation show that we spend some $50 billion per year on their care, feeding, and other amenities. If we love dogs so much, then how come so mind-bogglingly many of them — a conservative estimate puts the number at about 4 million — are killed at our country’s animal shelters every year? That’s the hard-nosed question posed by One Nation Under Dog.

Subtitled “Stories of Fear, Loss & Betrayal,” it presents, in anthology format, stories of individual dogs and people that will haunt you. One Nation Under Dog is rated TV-MA (for mature audiences) because, among other things, it reveals in graphic detail what happens to unwanted dogs at animal shelters when they’re not adopted.

Season 5 of True Blood premiered tonight with an episode called “Turn! Turn! Turn!” — and it’s as appropriate to describe new vampires as it is to describe this mid-stop in the annual run of HBO’s better series. Last week was the season 2 finale of Game of Thrones, ending with a bang as the White Walkers procession headed toward the wall to Death Star-esqe music. And before True Blood tonight we got a look forward at the third season of Boardwalk Empire, which will begin after the vampires finish their season. It looks like Boardwalk is going to jump ahead a couple of years additional development of some of the more intriguing characters, like a young Al Capone, and Nucky will have his demons from having killed Jimmy.

True Blood seems to be an either love-it-or-hate-it series. For some, it’s a fun way to unwind before the work week. For others, it’s just trampy vampy vampire porn. OK, both sides admit it’s vampire porn. HBO Sunday night has long been detox for overworked, overstressed journalists (which is why we have no need for that new Newsroom series), so I go with the fun way to unwind — it definitely doesn’t require as much concentration as what’s often needed to keep up with the characters as GoT, and I don’t stay up afterward checking the history vs. Boardwalk mobsters. And for those who have kept up with the other seasons of True Blood, one of its apparent strengths this season is bringing back a couple of characters from seasons past: Rev. Steve Newlin, who’s now a shady vampire, and Russell Edgington, whose vampire version of Howard Beale created one of the more classic moments in the series.

A lot was packed into the season opener. Tara was shot defending Sookie at the end of last season, and Pam happens along to the house after it happened. Lafayette and Sookie desperately beg Pam to turn Tara into a vampire to, well, “save her life,” if you can call it that, even though Tara hates vampires. Into the ground they go. Newlin shows up at Jason’s house, tricks Jason into inviting him inside, then admits he’s a gay vampire and in love with Jason. “This dog don’t bark that way,” Jason says as Jessica shows up to claim him and scare off Newlin. Sam took the fall for killing the pack master — and those dogs do crazy things with their dead — but Alcide showed up to save the day. Alcide also tried to save Sookie from Russell, but again the only normal guy to speak of gets spurned.

True Blood: The Complete Season 4 Special Features:

Digital Copy of True Blood: The Complete Fourth Season (expires 05/31/2014)

Blu-ray & DVD:

Inside the Episodes (12 Clips)

Get the backstories on each of the episodes with revealing interviews with the show writers.

True Blood The Final Touches– Join Alan Ball as he reveals an exclusive never-before-seen glimpse in the post production process of True Blood.

6 Audio Commentaries with the cast and crew including Executive Producer and Creator Alan Ball, Anna Paquin (Sookie), Stephen Moyer (Bill), Alexander Skarsgard (Eric), Deborah Ann Woll (Jessica Hamby), Sam Trammell (Sam Merlotte), Fiona Shaw (Marnie Stonebrook) and more!

Blu-ray Only:

True Blood Lines: Uncover secrets from relationships past and present in this engaging fully interactive guide and archive.

Character Perspectives PiP: Find out the backstory of what happened in Bon Temps while Sookie was missing in Faerieland, and get the inside scoop on all the comings and goings from your favorite characters including: Andy, Arlene, Crystal, Debbie, Don Bartolo, Godric, Jason, Lafayette, Luna, Maxine, Melinda, Nan, Pam, and Tara.

Flashback/Flash Forward (Jumpout Video): Move through time in the world of Bon Temps. Flashback to relive pivotal moments or Flash Forward to reveal the significance of a certain scene.

Vampire Histories / Character Bios / Hints / FYIs – Get the background stories on your favorite characters.

Last week at his Spengler blog here at PJM David Goldman commented on the discussion of Barack Obama’s time eating dog meat while growing up in the third world:

Globalization — which ultimately is a good thing — may be unspeakably destructive for traditional societies in its path. Tens of millions of people are forcibly torn out of their roots. In Thailand, farmers become construction workers in the big cities, and the girls they would have married in their villages become prostitutes. Education and income and health all improve, on average, but the disruption of lives produces immeasurable hurt.

We laugh about it, but people in some Third World countries eat dog meat because they are poor — not only so poor that they will consume almost any source of protein, but so poor that they cannot afford to enjoy the natural bond between human and canine that began almost 15,000 years ago. For a billion or so people, life is a daily struggle to survive. People who are that poor also sell their daughters into prostitution. Female flesh is almost as cheap as dog meat in parts of the Third World, and for the same reason.

It used to be that Americans watched TV fantasies and dramas to escape the world’s most painful evils. Now we’re so comfortable that we need to dive into them head first for entertainment. Screen Rant sanitized their description of my least favorite scene in the new episode of HBO’s Game of Thrones last night,  a stomach-turning depiction of Marquis de Sade-style sexualized torture from the young totalitarian King Joffrey:

Speaking of the poster boy against inbreeding, Joffrey has taken to punishing Sansa (Sophie Turner) for her brother’s victories in battle, having his betrothed beaten for little more than his own pleasure. Thankfully, Tyrion steps in, refers to his nephew as a half-wit and eloquently demonstrates the difference between educating someone and threatening to end their life. For her part, Sansa seems to be one of few in King’s Landing capable of learning any sort of lesson that may ensure a longer life. When Tyrion offers her an out she brushes it aside, professing loyalty to Joffrey.

Curious as to how Joffrey could have turned into such a – well, let’s just say, sadist – Tyrion and Bronn (Jerome Flynn) come to the conclusion that it must be teenage hormones and decide to send two prostitutes to his bedchamber, as a little belated nameday gift. Unfortunately, King Joffrey only likes seeing pain inflicted on others. This time, however, Joffrey knows that his actions will also serve as a message to his uncle.

Other horrific acts last night included multiple torture sequences reminiscent of Bret Easton Ellis’ American Psycho. Jailers strapped a basket with a starved rat onto a man’s chest and then set a fire, prompting the poor creature to turn to the prisoner’s soft flesh as the only exit.

Memo to HBO and Game of Thrones writers: disgust is not excitement.

The triumphant return of HBO’s blockbuster series Game of Thrones has put the cable network back in the spotlight.  As Scott Meslow wrote in The Atlantic,

No network makes bigger gambles than HBO, and Game of Thrones was a high-risk, high-reward gamble that has paid off bigger than anyone could have imagined. The grim, dense HBO fantasy series overcame its not-inconsiderable barriers to entry to become an unexpected phenomenon: In the year since Game of Thrones premiered, it’s been referenced in everything from The Simpsons to Major League Baseball, earned Peter Dinklage an Emmy Award, and set HBO records for DVD sales and digital downloads.

The success of HBO over the last two decades reaches back in Hollywood history to when the studios were all-powerful, vertically integrated companies that wrote, financed, produced and released films to theaters they owned.  Known as “the Studio System,” the Big Five companies (MGM, Paramount, 20^th Century Fox, Warner Brothers & RKO Radio Pictures) signed actors, writers, directors and producers to long-term (usually 7 year) contracts and simply ordered them to work together on various projects. An actor or director “under contract” was basically an indentured servant with little or no choices as to the films they made. The major studios were a monopoly; the talent could either take their contracts or find another profession. Richard Zanuck, the son of legendary 20^th Century Fox boss Darryl, described how the old Studio System put together films:

I remember as a kid, under my father’s desk, under the glass on the top of his desk, was a big chart.  And it had everybody that was under contract there.  All the producers, and the directors, and the writers and actors and actresses.  And it was so simple.  I used to sit in on casting meetings, which would take all of about ten minutes.  Not only casting, but putting the whole picture together.

While the Studio System mistreated the talent – major stars like John Wayne and Henry Fonda made millions for the studios, but didn’t share in much of the profits – great films emerged because of the organized production process.  Talented writers were assigned to sit in a room and bounce ideas and dialogue off each other until the script was just right.  Studio heads assigned actors and directors to appropriate material. For example, John Wayne made Westerns and war movies, Henry Fonda and Jimmy Stewart made earnest dramas, and Katharine Hepburn played smart career women, while Marilyn Monroe was the sex symbol, and so on. This was the “Golden Age” of Hollywood that produced such classics as Gone with Wind, Casablanca, The Maltese Falcon and the Bob Hope/Bing Crosby “Road” comedies.

I was really excited about the new HBO show Luck, starring Dustin Hoffman and created by the brilliant Deadwood scribe David Milch.

But since the show’s debut I’ve been mostly quiet about it, trying to figure out how best to articulate my objections to the series premiere.

***SPOILERS FOLLOW***

I knew of course the show would be dark and feature plenty of evil people doing evil things. Deadwood is filled with horrific scenes and degrading circumstances. But Milch painted his canvas with many colors. Yes, there were some cruel people in Deadwood, but individuals at least struggled with moral questions. Good people did bad things, bad people sometimes redeemed themselves, and by season 3 the enemy of my enemy becomes my friend.

But with Luck Milch seems to have limited himself to varying shades of black. Watching the first episode ALL of the characters struck me as unlikable and too broken to inspire me to spend time with them in their seedy world. Only in the glorious racing of the horses did a sense of grace and beauty brighten the degenerate world of compulsive gamblers and career criminals.

And then what do they do? At the end of the pilot a horse breaks its leg on camera and has to be put down.

My wife — who has first hand experience in horse rescue and animal abuse — immediately started screeching in horror. Now it turns out that my attempt to remind her that it’s just a TV show and no animals were harmed was wrong. Two horses died in the filming of the first season of Luck:

Luck production chiefs rescinded its American Humane Association stamp of approval – which certifies no animals were harmed during the making of the programme – following the show’s pilot episode after a horse was euthanized on location.

Prior to filming, network executives at HBO assured officials at People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA) that experts would be on hand to ensure all “necessary safety procedures” were in place, however reports of a second fatality have again prompted activists to worry.

I’m not an animal rights fanatic or anything. PETA is a terrible, hypocritical Marxist organization as Penn and Teller demonstrated in this legendary episode of Bullsh*t (language warning):

But this news now casts even greater darkness over the show.

This Sunday, January 29, is my 28th birthday and there are three parts of the plan to make it a success: a morning trip to DisneyLand, homemade sushi for dinner (April just got this sushizi sushi maker thing — expect a write-up about it here on PJ Lifestyle sometime next week,) and in the evening on HBO it’s the premiere of Luck, the new drama from Deadwood creator David Milch starring Dustin Hoffman. (Also expect my review Monday morning here at PJ Lifestyle.)

There are few TV shows I’ve enjoyed as much as Deadwood over the last decade. The reinvention of the Western mesmerizes with its unique dialogue, vivid characters, twisting plot, unique setting, and startling action. I’ve probably watched the whole series at least twice and should watch it again. (If nothing else so I can compare it with The Wire which I’m almost finished watching.)

Will we now get that same intensity and drama only at a horse track?

So far so good. Check out this preview of the show at The Atlantic:

When it comes to luck, and the new HBO series Luck, there is no in-between. There is only good luck and bad luck. And the nine-episode-long morality play brought to us by creators Michael Mann and David Milch–not brought to us, more like thrown in our faces–doesn’t pretend to argue otherwise. The low are raised high in this dark work about human vanity and vice. And the high are laid low. Good things happen to bad people. Bad things happen to good people. And then bad things just happen. It’s a dramatic series, and a powerful paean, for all you people out there who don’t believe that shit just happens.

About the only thing about Luck—which premieres on Sunday at 9 pm Eastern—that comes directly and honestly at you is the title. The title–and of course the horses, the magnificent animals, who grace the screen in every episode as brilliant props.

Read the whole thing. It looks like we’ll have a show that could deliver some potent, serious moments:

At the bottom end of the spectrum, we are introduced to a group of four diehard gamblers, led by the brilliant Kevin Dunn as the disabled, breathless, cranky Marcus. At the other end of the line is Dustin Hoffman, as Ace Bernstein, the mobbed-up guy just out of prison who has eyes for a special horse, the racetrack, and for California racing itself. The only thing they have in common, aside from wanting to spend a lot of time at the track, is that they both have a dim view of human nature. And why not? One is scarred on the outside; the other on the inside. One expresses it in virtually every sentence. The other hides it behind a rich mask

Yes, I’m thinking it’s going to be a good birthday (even though 30 is now starting to get a bit too close for comfort.)

Over the years I’ve had the misfortune of falling head over heels for a new TV show only to see brilliant network executives cancel it before an audience could appear. It seems to be an issue more often these days. New series come and go, shattered by the network hammer long before they have a chance to garner fans and viewers.

It wasn’t always this way. Shows like Seinfeld and Taxi took years to develop a following, while networks often keep “prestige” shows like 30 Rock on the air despite poor ratings. Recently in The Hollywood Reporter, columnist Tim Goodman posed an interesting question: “Do TV Series Get or Deserve Second Chances?” Before basically answering “yes and no,” Goodman noted:

The fact is, it’s getting harder and harder to cultivate a hit series on television and keep the numbers steady. Already the mythological 500-channel universe is rapidly becoming a reality, diluting the available audience. It’s a wider, not deeper world now. Consequently, the definition of a hit, particularly for network television, continues to nosedive. Any series above 10 million total viewers is a massive hit – when, in the not-too-distant past, that was a number that could get you canceled.

Here are five shows that didn’t get the chance they deserved. I’ve limited myself to the last 20 years in compiling this list. The nice thing is that, with modern technology like DVDs, Netflix, and YouTube, people can become fans of these shows all over again.

We’ll start with a show that tackled one of the most divisive eras in our nation’s recent history…

5. I’ll Fly Away (1991-1993)

The networks rarely choose to portray the civil rights era on series television, but one drama tried in the early ‘90s: I’ll Fly Away. Much of the show, which ran for two seasons on NBC, was filmed in and around my hometown, so I have a bit of a personal connection with it.

I’ll Fly Away tells the story of the nascent civil rights movement through two parallel stories. Small town attorney Forrest Bedford (Sam Waterston) is a widower raising three children. His law practice is successful, but when he begins to take on civil rights cases, his view of the world changes. Meanwhile, his black nanny (Regina Taylor) also sees the sea change taking place in the South, inspiring her own political activism.

Filmed on location in small towns in Georgia, the show’s Southern details hit the mark (as did the accents). The writing and directing were excellent, in spite of an earnest, left-leaning bent. The children on the show were precocious and thoughtful without being saccharine. Both Waterston and Taylor played their roles with a quiet intensity that contrasted with the stormy nature of the times.

The cast of I'll Fly Away

I’ll Fly Away won two Emmys and several other awards in its short run. After NBC cancelled the show, PBS made a TV movie to tie up the loose ends. PBS also reran the entire series one time. I’ll Fly Away has never been released on DVD, and it seemed as though it would be a series lost to the past. However, one YouTube user has made all of the program’s episodes available in a playlist. Thanks to modern technology, viewers can seek out I’ll Fly Away again.

Next we’ll look at a heartfelt comedy set in the world of sports media…

Click here for #10 — Dr. Doom — and the introduction to this project.

Click here for Part #9 — Justice League.

Click here for Part #8 — The Riddler.

Click here for Part #7 — Transmetropolitan

Click here for Part #6 — The Silver Surfer

Click here for Part #5 — Rorschach

Click here for Part #4 — The Invisibles

Click here for Part #3 — PIGMAN

Click here for Part #2 — Testament

1. Sandman

Really Neil Gaiman’s comic masterpiece The Sandman shouldn’t be a film but an HBO series.

The 10-volume epic tells the story of Morpheus, the King of the Dreams, and his family the Endless (who are other embodiments of human experience: Destiny, Death, Desire, Despair, Destruction, and Delight/Delirium). It’s the comic world’s crowning jewel – the most literary, sophisticated work ever. Gaiman incorporates stories and myths from cultures around the planet and sets his narratives all throughout history. (After all, as long as there have been stories there has been the King of the Dreams.) Perhaps with the success of Game of Thrones there will be more interest in exploring long-form fantasy projects?

I’m not even sure where to begin with casting…

Larry David, the leftist creator-star of HBO’s Curb Your Enthusiasm has pulled a Homer. In the third season of The Simpsons, the episode “Homer Defined” introduced the expression “to pull a Homer” and defined it as “to succeed despite idiocy.” That’s last night’s episode of Curb perfectly summarized. With a premise that I feared last week would be unwatchable, David has crafted one of his show’s greatest, most important episodes — and all apparently by accident.

(Warning – plot spoilers of course follow. For a fuller summary of the episode check out the AV Club or Hollywood Life. There are other plot threads in the episode that I won’t discuss here.)

The premise of the episode: Larry and his friend/manager Jeff discover a new “Palestinian” Chicken restaurant and decide to go in spite of knowing that their fellow Jews would disapprove. Once there they chow down on the best chicken they’ve ever eaten, indifferent to the anti-Semitic posters on the walls. Larry also discovers a new object of lust: the sexy “Palestinian” woman who manages the restaurant. He confesses:

You’re always attracted to someone who doesn’t want you. Well, here you have someone who not only doesn’t want you, but doesn’t even acknowledge your right to exist, who wants your destruction. That’s a turn-on.

But how does Larry win the affections of the dark-haired Muslim beauty?

Later in the episode Larry and Jeff return to the restaurant with their friend Marty Funkhouser who has recently converted from Reform Judaism to Orthodox. He wears a yarmulke that’s more attention-grabbing and ostentatious than any Orthodox Jew I’ve ever known. Before they enter Larry tries to force Marty to take it off. A fight ensues, attracting the attention of the Muslims eating inside. When the fight is over Larry has ripped off Marty’s yarmulke and frightened him back to his car. When he and Jeff enter they are applauded and embraced as fellow anti-Semites. (One imagines that this is a comparable reaction to what Noam Chomsky got when he visited Hezbollah.) The “Palestinian” manager, Shara, then approaches Larry, sexually aroused by this act of a secular Jew tormenting an Orthodox Jew.

The inevitable sex scene between the two of them follows. Shara is the sexual aggressor, dominating over Larry as he lies on the bed. She shouts anti-Semitic slogans all the while. It apparently isn’t just Larry’s fantasy to have sex with a Muslim woman; rather, he wants to be degraded in the process.

I have very, very mixed feelings about Curb Your Enthusiasm.

On the one hand the show can often be uproariously funny and deviously clever in the way it juggles its plots. Almost every episode is going to be entertaining or provocative in one way or the other. I will laugh more at Curb than most other comedic efforts on TV.

On the other, there’s no way to really get around the show’s drawback: it’s really a celebration of evil and narcissism. The Larry David character in the show is perpetually getting into trouble simply because he’s a horrible human being who can never resist an opportunity for viciousness. Almost every episode is him trying to lie his way out of his problems. Seinfeld had this quality too but Larry’s influence was offset by the more upbeat, fun spirit of Jerry Seinfeld and the other actors. The classic sitcom achieved a certain level of Zen balance between good and evil. But with Curb it’s all Larry unfiltered all the time and in a premium cable environment in which there are no boundaries to just how much evil will be put on display each week.

So watching Curb is always a conflict: yes, I want to laugh and appreciate a clever plot, but no, I’d rather avoid having to be reminded of the the blackhole of human nature. (I get more than enough of that in my work researching and writing about anti-Semites and the Hate-America Left. Those perhaps curious as to why I’ve drifted toward G-rated entertainment choices in recent years need look no further than what dominates the rest of my time.)

But if the new season of Curb Your Enthusiasm continues to be as lousy as the first two episodes so far then I won’t have to worry about this conflict much longer. The first episode of this season of Curb aired on July 10. The plot was too unbelievable and farfetched even for Curb and it had squirm moments that seemed to be inserted just for shock value — just to poke at “bourgeoisie” morality.