Craig: Mclaren

Some questions about US Television? :)

Hello all,

I've been a big fan of US TV shows since i was a kid in the mid 80's. I'm currently loving the High standard of programming that has been exported to the UK, The Shield, 24,The Sopranos, CSI, Boomtown, The West Wing etc. However i have some questions that i'm hoping my American cousins can answer

1. Shorter program length? My Airwolf, Miami Vice and Kojak DVD's have an average episode length of 47 minutes. My CSI and 24 DVD's run an average 42 minutes?? In 20 years we've lost five minutes of programming for more bloody hot dog commercials?? Is this really necessary. I know how important advertising revenue is but it should never affect the quality of prime time shows. 47 minutes is a fine minimum I reckon

2. Title sequences and theme tunes.

CSI has a great song for its theme tune but the title sequence is shockingly short. Less than 30 seconds. It used to be a nice 60 seconds standard for all my fav shows. 24 is a great show but it lacks a killer theme tune. Though i can forgive it because it is trying to be different. The last great decade for original themes was the 90's. The X-Files , E.R, The Simpson's etc. Is this now a lost art? The 70's and 80's had lots of great theme tunes and title sequences, sometimes better than the actual shows! Is there a reason for this decline?

3. Swearing in prime time?

US shows have always been violent but will the censors ever allow the f word etc to be spoken by the likes of Jack Bauer?

Jason Seaver

1. You've got shows getting smaller audiences due to more programming/entertainment options and higher (more expensive) production values. The money to pay for that has to come from somewhere, and that's generally going to be more advertising.

2. A lot of US television execs look at theme songs as an opportunity for the audience to turn away. And, referring back to #1, if you've got to cut runtime to fit in more ads, I'd rather it came out of the theme song than the show itself.

It's not all bad; I for one like the Randy Newman song they've added to Monk, but it's got just as many detractors (of course, I really like Randy Newman). Firefly also had a nifty theme, and the Dragnet title sequence was very cool (but will probably be replaced this fall).

3. We have goofy standards. I'm not going to cry too much over not having characters dropping f-bombs with regularity - it's generally used as a filler word anyway.

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PS Nystrom

2. You want a great, modern theme song and opening sequence? I recommend Six Feet Under .

Pieter

Michael Reuben

Now that "bullshit" has made it into primetime (on NYPD Blue), I'm sure the rest won't be far behind.

M.

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John_Berger

This is yet another one of those government short-sighted situations backed up by a bunch of jerks called a U.S. Court.

The FCC (Federal Communications Commission) has declared that they have final say over any broadcast that would go over the airwaves unscrambled because those signals can be picked up by anyone just for owning a TV and an aerial. I am pretty sure that this stupidity is backed up by a court ruling. The five major networks (ABC, CBS, NBC, Fox, and PBS) have affiliate stations in just about every corner of the U.S., and they all transmit their signal over the airwaves as well since not everyone has or can utilize cable or satellite. Hence, the Morality Police ... er ... the FCC has deemed that swearing or nudity is pretty much forbidden unless there are very specific disclaimers before and during any show that is broadcast openly over the air.

Shows like The Sopranos, however, are not created or shown by the big five. In this case, The Sopranos is shown on Home Box Office (HBO) which goes exclusively over cable or satellite; therefore, the person needs to purchase specific equipment and pay additional monies to gain access to these non-aerial TV stations. In short, if you're paying for it, then you are assumed to know what you're getting into. So the FCC still regulates these companies, but they have little or no say over what gets broadcast on them. Violence, swearing, nudity, sex, whatever ... the FCC doesn't touch them on "closed" TV stations.

Obviously, these cable/satellite channels still try to behave themselves during the daytime for market purposes (kids might be home sick or something like that), but it's not unusual to have something like Beverly Hills Cop on at 10 AM (and we all know how many time Eddie Murphy says "f**k" in that movie) because the signals are not open to everyone without the use of special devices or descramblers that the person must pay for. So the FCC has just about no control over content on these channels.

There are even some very hard-core porn channels that show such movies 24 hours a day. They're cable or satellite, so the FCC can't touch them.

I'm just glad that we don't have to pay a yearly tax ... er ... fee just for the privilege of owning the damned set like our cousins across the pond do.

Malcolm R

MarkHastings

Considering the way many stations use the actual SHOW to put up their banner ads I wonder how long it will be before commercials start running through the entire episode (i.e. like in a picture-in-picture window)

Bryan Tuck

Well, I wouldn't exactly call it killer, but it does kind of have a theme. Actually, it's more of an extended motif, but it gets the job done. It runs over the end credits and is worked into the scores of most episodes.

But you do have a point; there are some shows that I think could do with a bit more creative music. Glad to hear you're enjoying so many of our shows. I'm a fan of quite a few UK shows myself.

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Andrew Grall

Speaking of the censorship of the f* word...

I noticed on last nights broadcast of Jerry Maguire, they removed the whole scene between the little kid and Jerry where Jerry says,

"The f* zoo is closed."

and the little kid responds with "You said F*.", and after an awkward silence says "Don't worry, I won't tell."

Sucked to have that omitted for such a silly reason...