Amy's Robot

Let's take a second to

Let's take a second to talk about good TV vs. bad TV. We can even use last night's line-up as an object lesson.

Good TV is Queer Eye for the Straight Guy, which involves interesting people doing interesting things. It portrays people who are seemingly from different worlds (5 flaming gay guys and say, a Staten Island cop) play off their differences and help each other. It's fun to watch the tension between these worlds dissolve as they spend time together, feeding off each other's energies and desires. The situations are engaging, the show's style is vivid, and it's instructive as well as entertaining. It realizes that it's not enough to take people from different worlds and put them in a room together. To make good TV, you need characters with strong personalities who aren't afraid of the unpredictable and who can satirize cliches while simultaneously embodying them. Queer Eye works because it takes an unusual approach to a tension rarely explored in any depth, and lets its characters be true to themselves. Maybe Amy will recap last night's ep in more detail later. -adm

But of course! One thing that surprised me about QE is that even the blatant product-placement nature of the show didn't bother me at all. This is an issue that normally bugs me: sometimes watching Dawson's Creek felt like watching a televised version of Lucky magazine, but on QE even all the noted mentions of name brands and tours of spas and flashy showrooms of stylish Manhattan clothing and home furnishing stores still felt organically integrated into the show. I think this is because everybody benefits from this kind of product placement: the Straight Guy, the viewer (who gets to find out where to get that clingy raw silk sweater) and the companies themselves. Plus, the products are being used to better someone's life, and we get to see that sculpting lotion and that candle sconce making a difference. If the Fab 5 had been pointedly sucking down Nantucket Nectars while redesigning some shlub's lifestyle, that would have been another story. Good work, guys. -amy

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posted by adm at 3:27 AM | #