5 ms·

Because TV is absolute trash. low quality, full of filler, 25% commercials (!!)[0]. [0]https://www.marketplace.org/2018/04/30/television-too-many-commercials/

Because TV is absolute trash. low quality, full of filler, 25% commercials (!!)[0]. [0]https://www.marketplace.org/2018/04/30/television-too-many-commercials/ https://www.marketplace.org/2018/04/30/television-too-many-c...

samstave 7y ago
Exactly. Take late night talk show hosts' shows for example. Ill watch the monologue of the shows and thats it. Most times - I will just watch the clip on youtube. I dont give a shit about which actor is promoting their crap, or what musician is going to perform a song. I get the same jokes told in a slightly different angle from Colbert, Kimmel, Meyers, Noah, etc... and I get all their propaganda angles from both sides in short order. Whats worse is that people like Bill Meyer are so freaking smug about their "unique" perspective.... Its all garbage. The news is even worse than the "comedy" -- reality is a freaking joke.
- moduspol 7y ago
  I assume you're meaning Bill "Maher," right? And I'm sure you're probably aware of it, but you're not getting "both sides" from the hosts you've listed.
  - samstave 7y ago
    I am aware... and Yes I forgot how to spell his name. Just that the late night shows dont usually have a bunch of pro-trump comedy... Regardless, its all garbage.
    - dajohnson89 7y ago
      throw into the mix fallon and oliver
      - crooked-v 7y ago
        Jimmy Fallon is usually really annoying to me. It's something about the constant laughing and him being pretty bad at 'getting it' when it comes to the flow with guests, even though on a shallow level he's quite likeable. The weird part is that when he gets into bantering with the other cast members (miming stuff at the desk, exchanging dumb jokes, etc), he's really, really entertaining to me in a way that the rest of the show doesn't manage at all, and yet he barely does it.
  - pacomerh 7y ago
    I'm curious, and its a serious question. How do you get both sides of the story?
    - aaron695 7y ago
      Watch news not entertainment. If you can't see the bias in The Daily Show etc, Bill Maher might be a good stepping stone.
- Shorel 7y ago
  We need Craig Ferguson back.
- hgoel 7y ago
  Add in how their humor generally doesn't amount to much more than bad faith descriptions of real world issues, senseless comparisons accompanied with a bad Photoshop and it's no wonder people use a second screen at the same time! John Oliver especially ran this sort of thing into the ground.
ljm 7y ago
US TV is so disappointing when you expect an hour long episode but, because of the ads, it's only 42-43 minutes long. A mid-way intermission would be fine, but instead you get shallow plots driven by the need to shove in ads every 12 minutes. And all the procedurals are built around that, like the lives of those characters in that universe pause so some shitty marketing material can play. Of course, they're also 24 episodes long so they run for most of a year, and 90% of the show is the baddie of the week. The 10% of actual substance is distributed in 3-4 episodes throughout so you have to deal with all of it to get the real plot. I've been watching the last season of Mr Robot on Amazon (and my god is it a cracker). As soon as I went to reddit to check out the fanbase reaction, so many of the posts were about how the vibe was ruined by ads appearing so often. But for me...it was a solid 50 minutes of TV, completely uninterrupted. I imagine those who enjoyed The Expanse on cable are now delighted about season 4 being a pure continuous stream on Amazon. I was. Of course, you still get the blatant product placement. Death Stranding is my recent fave example for that, where you get Monster energy cans rubbed in your face. Same as with the old Splinter Cell games you'd be climbing across a massive billboard advertising Axe body spray. I think the US has a serious problem with its special blend of capitalism, individualism, and consumerism. Everybody is out there to get something from you.
- reificator 7y ago
  > Of course, they're also 24 episodes long so they run for most of a year, This hasn't been true for shows I'm interested in for a long time, and to be honest I kind of miss it. Especially for shows that used to have longer runs but are now shorter, the pacing seems off. There used to be a season-wide arc alongside individual episodes that may or may not have anything to do with that arc in particular. You might say that episodes that don't tie into the season are filler, and I get where you're coming from. But in sci-fi specifically, I'm so sick of the trope of "there's a thing that threatens the very fabric of the universe", and literally everything the main characters do between learning about it and resolving it are related. I miss lower stakes episodes that balance out the larger stakes in the overall season. I'm thinking specifically of Doctor Who in that last paragraph. (which to be fair is not US TV, but I can name some US/Canadian shows that took a similar route) It used to be that the doctor could have a romp around a new planet or an interesting period in history, the doctor or his companions would learn something new, and then they'd move on. Those kinds of one-offs are what the show is built around IMO. But now with fewer episodes every season, the very fabric of the universe is always threatened, and every companion is the most important person ever born, and everything you see on screen reinforces those two ideas. They keep mentioning adventures off-screen, I think because the writers recognize that they're losing something by not having those unrelated adventures happen where the audience can see. (The latest season of Doctor Who is at least a step back from that, but it had plenty of its own problems, not least of which is a very crowded main cast that ended up underdeveloped as a result. The only character that I felt was interesting in the first episode didn't make it to the main crew, which is probably why they were developed so much better than the rest.)
criddell 7y ago
Does watching Netflix, HBO, or Hulu count as watching TV? That's how I usually watch television shows and none has commercials. If I watch broadcast TV it's through my DVR and I skip commercials. Pretty much the only live TV I watch is sports and there's a lot of advertising there. I'd argue that TV isn't trash though. There's an unbelievable amount of stuff being made and it isn't hard to find something great to watch. My to-watch list still has Sopranos, The Wire, Breaking Bad, Mr Robot, Westworld S2, Game of Thrones, and about 20 other series on it.
apatters 7y ago
There's certainly a lot of boring, formulaic content out there. I recently watched Easy Rider and season 4 of Rick and Morty and in both cases my phone was left on a shelf and forgotten for hours. Yesterday I tried to watch the first episode of Witcher and it just wasn't my thing, I was fiddling with my phone after 10 minutes. (YMMV obviously)

samstave 7y ago

Exactly. Take late night talk show hosts' shows for example. Ill watch the monologue of the shows and thats it. Most times - I will just watch the clip on youtube. I dont give a shit about which actor is promoting their crap, or what musician is going to perform a song. I get the same jokes told in a slightly different angle from Colbert, Kimmel, Meyers, Noah, etc... and I get all their propaganda angles from both sides in short order. Whats worse is that people like Bill Meyer are so freaking smug about their "unique" perspective.... Its all garbage. The news is even worse than the "comedy" -- reality is a freaking joke.

moduspol 7y ago
I assume you're meaning Bill "Maher," right? And I'm sure you're probably aware of it, but you're not getting "both sides" from the hosts you've listed.
- samstave 7y ago
  I am aware... and Yes I forgot how to spell his name. Just that the late night shows dont usually have a bunch of pro-trump comedy... Regardless, its all garbage.
  - dajohnson89 7y ago
    throw into the mix fallon and oliver
    - crooked-v 7y ago
      Jimmy Fallon is usually really annoying to me. It's something about the constant laughing and him being pretty bad at 'getting it' when it comes to the flow with guests, even though on a shallow level he's quite likeable. The weird part is that when he gets into bantering with the other cast members (miming stuff at the desk, exchanging dumb jokes, etc), he's really, really entertaining to me in a way that the rest of the show doesn't manage at all, and yet he barely does it.
- pacomerh 7y ago
  I'm curious, and its a serious question. How do you get both sides of the story?
  - aaron695 7y ago
    Watch news not entertainment. If you can't see the bias in The Daily Show etc, Bill Maher might be a good stepping stone.
Shorel 7y ago
We need Craig Ferguson back.
hgoel 7y ago
Add in how their humor generally doesn't amount to much more than bad faith descriptions of real world issues, senseless comparisons accompanied with a bad Photoshop and it's no wonder people use a second screen at the same time! John Oliver especially ran this sort of thing into the ground.

ljm 7y ago

US TV is so disappointing when you expect an hour long episode but, because of the ads, it's only 42-43 minutes long. A mid-way intermission would be fine, but instead you get shallow plots driven by the need to shove in ads every 12 minutes. And all the procedurals are built around that, like the lives of those characters in that universe pause so some shitty marketing material can play. Of course, they're also 24 episodes long so they run for most of a year, and 90% of the show is the baddie of the week. The 10% of actual substance is distributed in 3-4 episodes throughout so you have to deal with all of it to get the real plot. I've been watching the last season of Mr Robot on Amazon (and my god is it a cracker). As soon as I went to reddit to check out the fanbase reaction, so many of the posts were about how the vibe was ruined by ads appearing so often. But for me...it was a solid 50 minutes of TV, completely uninterrupted. I imagine those who enjoyed The Expanse on cable are now delighted about season 4 being a pure continuous stream on Amazon. I was. Of course, you still get the blatant product placement. Death Stranding is my recent fave example for that, where you get Monster energy cans rubbed in your face. Same as with the old Splinter Cell games you'd be climbing across a massive billboard advertising Axe body spray. I think the US has a serious problem with its special blend of capitalism, individualism, and consumerism. Everybody is out there to get something from you.

reificator 7y ago
> Of course, they're also 24 episodes long so they run for most of a year, This hasn't been true for shows I'm interested in for a long time, and to be honest I kind of miss it. Especially for shows that used to have longer runs but are now shorter, the pacing seems off. There used to be a season-wide arc alongside individual episodes that may or may not have anything to do with that arc in particular. You might say that episodes that don't tie into the season are filler, and I get where you're coming from. But in sci-fi specifically, I'm so sick of the trope of "there's a thing that threatens the very fabric of the universe", and literally everything the main characters do between learning about it and resolving it are related. I miss lower stakes episodes that balance out the larger stakes in the overall season. I'm thinking specifically of Doctor Who in that last paragraph. (which to be fair is not US TV, but I can name some US/Canadian shows that took a similar route) It used to be that the doctor could have a romp around a new planet or an interesting period in history, the doctor or his companions would learn something new, and then they'd move on. Those kinds of one-offs are what the show is built around IMO. But now with fewer episodes every season, the very fabric of the universe is always threatened, and every companion is the most important person ever born, and everything you see on screen reinforces those two ideas. They keep mentioning adventures off-screen, I think because the writers recognize that they're losing something by not having those unrelated adventures happen where the audience can see. (The latest season of Doctor Who is at least a step back from that, but it had plenty of its own problems, not least of which is a very crowded main cast that ended up underdeveloped as a result. The only character that I felt was interesting in the first episode didn't make it to the main crew, which is probably why they were developed so much better than the rest.)

criddell 7y ago

Does watching Netflix, HBO, or Hulu count as watching TV? That's how I usually watch television shows and none has commercials. If I watch broadcast TV it's through my DVR and I skip commercials. Pretty much the only live TV I watch is sports and there's a lot of advertising there. I'd argue that TV isn't trash though. There's an unbelievable amount of stuff being made and it isn't hard to find something great to watch. My to-watch list still has Sopranos, The Wire, Breaking Bad, Mr Robot, Westworld S2, Game of Thrones, and about 20 other series on it.

apatters 7y ago

There's certainly a lot of boring, formulaic content out there. I recently watched Easy Rider and season 4 of Rick and Morty and in both cases my phone was left on a shelf and forgotten for hours. Yesterday I tried to watch the first episode of Witcher and it just wasn't my thing, I was fiddling with my phone after 10 minutes. (YMMV obviously)