Wednesday, August 09, 2006
TV quality
Is it just me getting old, or is TV getting increasingly banale?
I am of the generation that grew up with a choice of three channels, in black and white. We had BBC1, Yorkshire (now ITV) and BBC2, although BBC2 didn't really count as it had a test card on all morning and played "watch with Mother" from about 1.30 to 2.16 p.m. then high brow stuff nobody wanted to watch until 11p.m. when it closed for the night. Even the main channels closed before midnight, and they used to play the National Anthem and remind you to put out your milk bottles and lock all the doors. Yet still there was always something worth watching. With just three channels we were constantly fighting in out house because someone wanted to watch "the other side." What a strange yorkshire expression that was. Kets see what's on the other side. Well, so far as I could see the other side was a bakelite casing with a load of cooling slots in so that the valves didn't overheat.
Anyway, I digress. TV back then was a luxury I suppose, certainly on the council estate where I grew up. We were a large family, but must have been quite well off, my Dad always ran a car, whilst neighbours had motorbikes or cycled to work.We were by now means rich though. I can remember when the TV broke down we couldnt afford to get the "teleboff" to come and mend it. Instead my mum would bang all the valves with a screwdriver, which more often than not, and quite amazingly would do the trick. If that didn't work out would come Grandads box of old radio spares and valves would be replaced seemingly at random until the magic picture screen came to life again.
It was whilst I was still a child of about 8 when around 1976 we got our first colour TV. I can remember watching the TV coverage of the death of Elvis in colour, so it must have been before '77. That same year brought us Star Wars at the movies, and my richer cousins had the state of the art "tennis" game for their TV. Wow!
Times moved on and by '81 video had reached the masses. I won a bet with a mate who insisted a car in the original "Gone in 60 seconds" was a manual shift. Utilising his new video I was able to prove it was an Auto, and winmy £5 bet, although thinking about it he still owes me the cash.
Anyway I digress. The point of my rant was that in the days with just 2 1/2 channels we were constantly entertained, and could always find something worthwhile watching, and even out the video into use regularly to video the mysterious "other side" to watch later.
Now I have Freeview didgital TV. At last countI had 38 channels. Okay some of them are silly shopping channels which nobody watches, except perhaps people in old folks homes who dont know how to use the remote. And some are MTV type channels which play music all day except with pictures as well. Call me old fashioned but a TV that plays music all day is a radio. And some are news channels full of doom and gloom. That still leaves at least a dozen channels for general entertainment. So why can;t I find anything worth watching? It's all Celebrity Love Island/Big Brother/X Factor unreality TV Crap. Well I've got news for you Mr Program maker. I don't want reality. If I wanted reality I'd go outside, it's more real anyway. No I want entertainment. I want Monty Python, Rowan Atkinson, the A Team, Auf Weidersein Pet, yes even bloody Coronation Street if you must. But please give us something worth watching.
At the moment I'm looking fondly back on that Christmas probabkly 1979 or thereabouts, when all the engineers went on strike and we all had to read books or play scrabble and monopoly. If you don;t buck up, I'll probabkly get rid of the TV altogether!
I am of the generation that grew up with a choice of three channels, in black and white. We had BBC1, Yorkshire (now ITV) and BBC2, although BBC2 didn't really count as it had a test card on all morning and played "watch with Mother" from about 1.30 to 2.16 p.m. then high brow stuff nobody wanted to watch until 11p.m. when it closed for the night. Even the main channels closed before midnight, and they used to play the National Anthem and remind you to put out your milk bottles and lock all the doors. Yet still there was always something worth watching. With just three channels we were constantly fighting in out house because someone wanted to watch "the other side." What a strange yorkshire expression that was. Kets see what's on the other side. Well, so far as I could see the other side was a bakelite casing with a load of cooling slots in so that the valves didn't overheat.
Anyway, I digress. TV back then was a luxury I suppose, certainly on the council estate where I grew up. We were a large family, but must have been quite well off, my Dad always ran a car, whilst neighbours had motorbikes or cycled to work.We were by now means rich though. I can remember when the TV broke down we couldnt afford to get the "teleboff" to come and mend it. Instead my mum would bang all the valves with a screwdriver, which more often than not, and quite amazingly would do the trick. If that didn't work out would come Grandads box of old radio spares and valves would be replaced seemingly at random until the magic picture screen came to life again.
It was whilst I was still a child of about 8 when around 1976 we got our first colour TV. I can remember watching the TV coverage of the death of Elvis in colour, so it must have been before '77. That same year brought us Star Wars at the movies, and my richer cousins had the state of the art "tennis" game for their TV. Wow!
Times moved on and by '81 video had reached the masses. I won a bet with a mate who insisted a car in the original "Gone in 60 seconds" was a manual shift. Utilising his new video I was able to prove it was an Auto, and winmy £5 bet, although thinking about it he still owes me the cash.
Anyway I digress. The point of my rant was that in the days with just 2 1/2 channels we were constantly entertained, and could always find something worthwhile watching, and even out the video into use regularly to video the mysterious "other side" to watch later.
Now I have Freeview didgital TV. At last countI had 38 channels. Okay some of them are silly shopping channels which nobody watches, except perhaps people in old folks homes who dont know how to use the remote. And some are MTV type channels which play music all day except with pictures as well. Call me old fashioned but a TV that plays music all day is a radio. And some are news channels full of doom and gloom. That still leaves at least a dozen channels for general entertainment. So why can;t I find anything worth watching? It's all Celebrity Love Island/Big Brother/X Factor unreality TV Crap. Well I've got news for you Mr Program maker. I don't want reality. If I wanted reality I'd go outside, it's more real anyway. No I want entertainment. I want Monty Python, Rowan Atkinson, the A Team, Auf Weidersein Pet, yes even bloody Coronation Street if you must. But please give us something worth watching.
At the moment I'm looking fondly back on that Christmas probabkly 1979 or thereabouts, when all the engineers went on strike and we all had to read books or play scrabble and monopoly. If you don;t buck up, I'll probabkly get rid of the TV altogether!
# posted by Martin Thorp @ 2:46 PM 
