imooredb

In which a man blethers about stuff he has seen.

Wednesday, September 06, 2006

Break dancing on the ceiling

So, what's been going on in TV land over the last two weeks. the answer is, of course, not a right lot. During the close season I watch virtually no TV at all. I have detected a bit of a theme to what I have seen though, and it worries me slightly.

Oceans of TV analysis has already been devoted to the shared Channel 4/Channel 5 phenomenon of the medical shock show. You know the ones, "The Man/Boy/Woman/Girl/Dog who's arms/legs/breasts/stomach/spleen exploded/fell off/turned green/" etc etc etc. I'd been blissfully unaware of these shows until the last couple of weeks, but have now been fortunate enough to catch a few. As with all unscientific studies, results vary. Firstly, on a rare night in at home, my flatmate and I sat down with great excitement to watch Cheel 4's "The Man who's Arms Exploded". We like things that explode you see. Particularly things that aren't really supposed to, such as arms. Imagine our disappointment then to end up watching an hour long lecture on the dangers of taking steroids. Guess what folks? Taking drugs to boost your muscalature can fuck you up. This was news to us, as the steroids went straight in the bin. The eponymous man was obviously very fucked up, and yes, had problems with his exceedingly large arms. However, did they explode? Did they fuck. They bled a bit, he had an operation, and now has a bit of a scar. I call foul Channel 4. the trades descriptions act should apply to TV programmes. I feel robbed, and I want my hour back. I can only imagine how I might feel if I'd watched 10,000 hours of Big Brother and then realised it was utter wank.

Having careened down the trough of medical reality TV, I was fairly surprised to find myself a few days ago unexpectedly riding a crest. By complete accident I ended up watching "Too Ugly for Love" on BBC3. I'd expected it to be a documentary featuring a good number of my friends, but it was actually about something called "Body Dismorphia". The poor unfortunates with this condition are utterly convinced they are physically hideous to the point where they become recluses, and can't look at themselves in a mirror. One chap, who is certainly no uglier than, for example, you, had been wearing opaque sunglasses for years under the false belief he had massive bags under his eyes. Another featured spacker was a girl who was so convinced her teeth were ugly that she'd filed them down to stumps at the age of 14. As we looked on, she made preparations for her 7th nose job (on a proboscis with which there was little wrong to begin with). Every medical professional she consulted told her she ran the risk of fucking up her nose for good, but so convinced was she that this could finally turn her life around ahe determined to plow on regardless. The making of the show was the disbelief of the documentary maker. He echoed the feelings of the viewer perfectly, astounded at the completely deluded self image of the sufferers, but attempting sympathy while clearly resisting the urge to shake them very hard. I don't think I'd have been as restrained. The solution would clearly be to take them to any student club in the country and show hem what really ugly people look like. Still, I found myself fairly drawn into the featured individuals stories, and my usually unsympathetic air disolved in a sense of genuine tragedy at lives wasted for no good reason other than a lack of good available treatment for this bizarre condition.

Away from the UK medical documentary scene, the shining light of my last two weeks has been the continuing second season of Prison Break. The promise of the season premier has been spectacularly fulfilled, and episodes two and three have taken the series to previously uncharted heights. I mock myself now for complaining how the format would never work outside the walls of Fox River. In the outside world the writer's penchant for ludicrous contrivances and unbelieveable conincidence is allowed to develop unfettered. Any situation the characters find themselves in, the writers can simply reverse engineer a solution by inventing something Michael did before he got himself locked up. Being followed closely by the FBI? No problem. Just blow up your car with some raw animal meat in it to make it look like you're dead. Of course, the meat was stashed in the spare wheel compartment and the radio rigged as a timed explosive device at least six months ago. As predicted, Bellech is now out on his own, pissed up to fuck and hunting down the brothers on his own revenge mission. This is genius escapist television. It gets better every minute, and I never want it to stop.

3 Comments:

At 11:54 am, Anonymous Anonymous said...

still not got round to prison break, despite numerous sources telling me how good it is... but then i was pretty late on lost and ended up doing both series over the course of about 3 weeks... :|

 
At 2:29 pm, Blogger Moore said...

I did that with 24. I missed the end of season 1 when it was on the BBC, and just never got back into it until mid way through season 4. I then had a power weekend of watching what I'd missed. It's great sometimes just absorbing a whole series in one marathon session.

 
At 11:50 am, Anonymous Anonymous said...

yeah, you avoid the highly frustrating cliffhanger-ness of some episode endings too :)

 

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