About 1923: Another Year-Show
Post 1747:
In the year 1923, they say things were roaring. This is what we were taught in school. Maybe they roared and maybe they didn’t. I’m willing to say things were relatively good. In between World Wars. Anytime you’re not in a World War, that’s not so bad. Roaring, some would say.
In the show 1923, things are terrible. Things are terrible because the characters are stupid when they’re not cartoonishly cruel, mean, or violent. Things don’t make sense and the drama is embarrassingly contrived.
The main narrative of the season is the arduous Odyssean journey that the main dude and the English lady have to make to get to Montana after their heartbreaking separation. I can’t remember why they’re separated, but no doubt it was something stupid and avoidable.
These two knuckleheads somehow get across the entire continent by being the dumbest humans to ever live. The show tries to paint them as star-crossed or ill-fated I suppose, but this is an insult to those terms and to stars and to fate. Fate has nothing to do with idiocy of this sort.
She is pretty, though. And he’s handsome. Too bad we don’t get to see them tackle life’s challenges. Nah. Instead, we get to see them stumble through every ridiculous situation imaginable. If there are three seconds of time to reflect, we are smacked with another contrived disaster to make us feel horrible and therefore stop thinking.
This is effective stuff. Tons of viewers. It’s also degrading to the people of that time period. In order to facilitate the myriad horrors that befall our characters, everyone from that era must be a psycho, villain, or crook. If not one of those, they’re most likely full of hate and bigotry and greed and corrupt of soul and spirit.
Around 2003, they made some good shows. Objectively better stuff. Some trash, but there was certainly an observable competitive culture to make quality stuff. Now I’m observing a race to dump forgettable sludge onto the public. I guess we should’ve been more grateful during the days of The Wire and The Sopranos and about 50 other things people thought about before pumping out.
I know the people making this material are talented. But something’s off. If they keep up like this, there’s going to be a crash. I hope they make a show called 1929. I doubt it’ll be as depressing as this though. They’ve set a low bar. Or high bar. You get my meaning. Happy 2025. Cheers and see you after.
