Bob Loblaw's law blog lobs law bomb

[sigma7]

And the blogspam continues: CNN on the "Arrested Development" meta-fest on Monday night.

With Fox's November announcement, "Arrested" has been rumored for a possible move to cable -- and even that development was satirized in an exchange between Jeffrey Tambor's George Bluth Sr. and Bateman's Michael.

"I don't think the Home Builders Organization is going to support us," George says.

"Yeah, the HBO is not going to want us," replies Michael. "What are we going to do?"

"I think it's show time," George then says.

Comments

[sigma7.livejournal.com]

Okay, fine, here goes.

I have to ask, then, since you brought it up: why do you not like the show? I wasn't looking for a debate of its merits, but hey, you brought it up.

Because while I'm well aware my appreciation for the show is not universal, even on my f-list, I appreciate it, enjoy it, and like sharing it with those who do.

Many people on my f-list have hobbies, interests, affectations which are outside my realm of interest. Some f them, quite far. Some of them are even worthy of my scorn, and many of them are beneath the threshold that I find acceptable for any intelligent human being of having. But hey, it makes them happy. So good for them.

The funny thing is, I don't feel the need to piss over people's "fandoms," telling them how stupid or lame their interests are, wishing them well over their lack of popularity and eventual extinction. I don't even need to restrain myself from doing so. Somehow I find it within myself to skip to something else. Maybe it's just because I have this mouse with a scroll wheel. It makes it pretty easy to just...scroll down to the next story without spurting bile into my friends' interests.

Would you like a mouse with a scroll wheel, Jim? I have another.

[jim-smith.livejournal.com]

I don't like the show because I'm just sick of people saying how orgasmically brilliant it is, and then either making vague, incomprehensible references to what was brilliant or perfectly clear references to something which is not so brilliant. It inspires in me the need to publically observe that the emperor has no clothes.

In this case, having the characters make sly references to the show's search for a new network is cute, but I fail to see why it's such a big deal, or why I've been hearing about it all week. I grant that if I was an AD fan I would find the gag funnier, as I find the Simpsons' jabs at Fox being a lowbrow network, but I still wouldn't see why CNN thinks it merits a whole article.

Like Firefly before it, if AD fans could just say "Hey, this week's episode was pretty good" once in a while instead of treating every single moment of the show as the most amazing thing in the history of television, non-fans (I'm not the only one) would not have the intense schadenfreude they have in seeing the show die.

I shouldn't really take it out on you, since it's rspwfaq's AD posts that make me want to throw up all over myself, not yours. But after a while I just can't take any more. Also, I sincerely don't understand why a show that's so famously cancelled never seems to actually end--usually when Fox lowers the boom on a low-rated show it's effective immediately.

[sigma7.livejournal.com]

Okay, y'see, that makes more sense.

Actually, the meta-parts were one of the least funny bits on the show -- I'm also finding the whole "Tobias = Gay" thing a little tiring; he was much more engaging as a failed/frustrated actor seeking kinship with Carl Weathers. And as an episode in and of itself, it was...okay, but not one of its shining moments. (Except for the bit where the narrator notes "We'll just tell you right now -- she's the one that dies.") And they just reran "Afternoon Delight," my favorite episode, so I can't tell you to stay tuned for it....

It's also interesting in that a great deal of its humor delves from continuity -- catchphrases, ironies, things that just don't make sense on casual viewing. It takes investment, and that kind of investment breeds fanaticism, which leads to the exact behavior you detest. Outsiders remain baffled, insiders tickled.

I like it, I like the chances it takes, I like that it's different from everything else that's on the tube right now (it's not "Standup Comic and Wife and Wacky Inlaws in Sitcom"), and just for that, I want it to survive. And yeah, I don't know how/why it's done so for this long. But I'm just happy that it has.

And forgive its fandom, it knows not what it does.