Pensamientos Acerca de Televisión
One Day at a Time: “The Politics Episode”
Every time I'm ready to give up on this series, it surprises me. But not always in a good way.
For example, the most recent episode was the first effort by a major TV series to find a way around the rules of social distancing by using animation to alleviate the need for having cast members stand so close to each other. And while the animation was nothing to make a fuss about, it worked well enough that I looked forward to seeing future episodes filmed in a similar fashion.
Unfortunately, the script was another matter. Granted, one could expect only so much from a thirty-minute sitcom episode but I still found it hard to put up with the constant parade of political cheap shots masquerading as jokes.
Yes, I get it. Nowadays is a very frustrating time to be a liberal. On the other hand, it is also frustrating to be a conservative -- especially one who does not automatically agree with the current occupant of the Oval Office. Moreover, there used to be a time when Norman Lear shows found time to focus on nuances that most sitcoms avoided. However, if the current version of One Day at a Time is any indication, those days are long gone.
Anyway, I could have lived with a sitcom whose political beliefs were different from mine if the jokes were actually funny. But like the conservative show Last Man Standing, the writers often assumed that their political humor was a lot more clever than it actually was.
It was not until toward the end of the show when the show showed a hypothetical dialogue between lead character Penelope and her conservative cousin Estrellita that the show showed any sign of genuine wit. Ironically, the one thing that won me over was the way the show managed to evoke the specter of Fidel Castro in order to explain the political viewpoints of Estrellita and Penelope without turning it into a cliché. A lesser show would have either ignored Castro or else exploited him for a number of political cheap shots. But the show managed to find a way around all that that evoked genuine sympathy from me for both Penelope and her cousin -- and for that, I am grateful.
One Day at a Time: “The Politics Episode”
Every time I'm ready to give up on this series, it surprises me. But not always in a good way.
For example, the most recent episode was the first effort by a major TV series to find a way around the rules of social distancing by using animation to alleviate the need for having cast members stand so close to each other. And while the animation was nothing to make a fuss about, it worked well enough that I looked forward to seeing future episodes filmed in a similar fashion.
Unfortunately, the script was another matter. Granted, one could expect only so much from a thirty-minute sitcom episode but I still found it hard to put up with the constant parade of political cheap shots masquerading as jokes.
Yes, I get it. Nowadays is a very frustrating time to be a liberal. On the other hand, it is also frustrating to be a conservative -- especially one who does not automatically agree with the current occupant of the Oval Office. Moreover, there used to be a time when Norman Lear shows found time to focus on nuances that most sitcoms avoided. However, if the current version of One Day at a Time is any indication, those days are long gone.
Anyway, I could have lived with a sitcom whose political beliefs were different from mine if the jokes were actually funny. But like the conservative show Last Man Standing, the writers often assumed that their political humor was a lot more clever than it actually was.
It was not until toward the end of the show when the show showed a hypothetical dialogue between lead character Penelope and her conservative cousin Estrellita that the show showed any sign of genuine wit. Ironically, the one thing that won me over was the way the show managed to evoke the specter of Fidel Castro in order to explain the political viewpoints of Estrellita and Penelope without turning it into a cliché. A lesser show would have either ignored Castro or else exploited him for a number of political cheap shots. But the show managed to find a way around all that that evoked genuine sympathy from me for both Penelope and her cousin -- and for that, I am grateful.
Labels: Conservadoras y Conservadores, Cubano-Estadounidenses, Fidel Castro, Justina Machado, Liberales, Pensamientos Acerca de Televisión XIX, Rita Moreno, Series de Televisión Latinas V, Un Día a la Vez
posted by Tonio Kruger at 7:58 PM
0 Comments:
Post a Comment
<< Home