Sat 26 Mar 2011
A TV Review by Michael Shonk: MANNIX “The Cost of a Vacation.”
Posted by Steve under Reviews , TV mysteries[37] Comments
“The Cost of a Vacation.” An episode of Mannix CBS-TV; Season 1, Episode 6 (27 October 1967). Created: Richard Levinson and William Link. Developed: Bruce Geller. Written: Chester Krumholz. Directed: John Meredyth Lucas. Cast: Joe Mannix: Mike Conners, Lew Wickersham: Joseph Campanella. Guest Cast: Joyce: Marlyn Mason, Ramon: Donnelly Rhodes, Leonard: Henry Beckman
“The Cost of a Vacation” was an entertaining episode despite the flawed premise of the first season of Mannix. The original idea behind the series was to have hardboiled PI Joe Mannix work for a modern computerized investigation agency named Intertect.
In this episode, Joe had to ask his boss’s permission to help an ex-girlfriend. Would any hardboiled PI ask permission for anything? It weakened the lone hero PI character, and for little reason, as boss Lew Wickersham gives in quickly. You are left wondering why someone like Joe Mannix would work for Intertect.
In “The Cost of a Vacation”, Mannix’s ex-girlfriend of the week, Joyce Loman asks Joe to find the man she fell for during a vacation romance. Long thought gone, she had spotted him on the street and gave chase. The beautiful but not too bright model failed to realize he was trying to get away from her.
The script is fast paced with few scenes without a twist or two. The episode overflows with classic elements from hardboiled mysteries. The lying client. Mystery man. His deadly reason to remain hidden from Joyce. A dead man in a dark alley that leads Mannix to an office where he gets knocked out from behind.
But not before finding a clue. Joe’s legman, the computer, discovers the meaning of the clue as Joe works “the streets.” Joe and disbelieving Joyce are shot at by a killer.
Later, the killer’s reason for missing them leads to a harrowing scene worthy of the darkest noir. Dark city streets. Camera angles, cuts and movement used to increase the tension of the final chase. What more could a hardboiled PI fan want?
Mike Conners was the main strength of the series. He portrayed tough guy Joe Mannix straight, as an old fashioned hero, without a hint of the modern day PI’s cynicism or sarcasm. The rest of the cast performed well, but you had to feel sorry for the talented Joe Campanella reduced to little more than telling Mannix, “No. I really mean no. Oh, go ahead, Joe.”
“The Cost of a Vacation” is an episode any TV mystery fan will enjoy, even those of us who never liked Mannix. You might even find yourself humming Lalo Schifrin’s theme music for days later.
SOURCE: The source DVD I used is listed at online at the usual outlets with the title Best of TV Detectives: 150 Episodes.
March 26th, 2011 at 12:51 am
At least the first four seasons are also available in boxed sets online, of which I’ve purchased the first one. I’ve yet to watch any of them, however.
There’s probably no one who prefers the first season over the remaining seven, but viewers must have seen something they liked in Michael Connors for the show to have stayed on so long.
Eight years in all, and yet I watched the program only hit and miss over all that time. We didn’t know we had it as good as we did, to have so many good cop and PI shows on every week.
We were spoiled.
Speaking for myself, of course!
March 26th, 2011 at 1:37 am
There is one person who preferred the first season — me. I liked the man vs machine aspect and the one guy against the system — though they never really did much with it. Certainly liked it better than the tedious repetion of the later seasons where they did the same handful of stories over and over and over without even pretending to vary them.
You’d think after the twentieth time in one season that someone tried to run Joe off that same damn mountain road he would have taken a different route — called a cab — something. He must have had at least one client who lived somewhere you could get to without getting on that stupid scenic route. Hell, I would have been satisfied if in just one episode he put the top up on his convertibile. Contrary to the Chamber of Commerce it does rain in LA.
Still I watched faithfully because every once in a while they would do something non generic — like the episodes with Victor Jory as his Armenian dad.
I don’t think I saw any of the last two seasons, still Connors was the thing that held the show together, and the main reason to watch. However tiresome the plots might have gotten his Joe Mannix was a real creation, and unlike a lot of spoiled and egocentric stars he knew which side his bread was buttered on.
Gail Fisher was largely wasted, though important in her own way just for being there. I think in eight seasons they did one episode revolving around her, but then Uhura didn’t get a lot of action of STAR TREK either.
And I know of at least two other guys who prefer the first season. We are a small but voluable minority.
March 26th, 2011 at 11:24 am
I’m open-minded about many things, and old TV shows I’ve not seen in over 30 years is one of them. I’ve not watched MANNIX since it was on the air “live.” That first season might be a lot better than I remember it, or maybe I was looking for something else at the time. I also think that one of the reasons why I was so hit or miss with the rest of the run is exactly what, David, you point out. It was awfully predictable in many ways. There was a stretch of time in which you could count on Mannix being conked on the head, show after show, like clockwork. Maybe the series outgrew that — I don’t remember — but maybe not? Or maybe I’m remembering that incorrectly too!
March 26th, 2011 at 7:41 am
Actually, I preferred the idea of the first season rather than the same old PI premise that followed. But watching this episode I saw why the first season was such a failure with the viewers. Private eyes work alone. Spade, Marlowe, Archer all worked alone.
March 26th, 2011 at 12:10 pm
Steve –
Considering this episode has him conked on the head, no, you are remembering it right.
There is a second episode on this collection, “Nothing Ever Works Twice”, that was awful.
March 26th, 2011 at 6:45 pm
Conked on the head, nearly run off the road in Topanga Canyon, solves the case in a flurry of activity in the last ten minutes before the end — every episode of MANNIX I ever saw.
March 27th, 2011 at 12:33 pm
David, if possible you should check this episode out. It is far from perfect but it is not the same old MANNIX episode. No almost run off the road. There is more than one mystery. Who is the man? Why is he there? How did he get there? Who is he after? With each solution, there is a new question.
As all TV mysteries, the suspense builds until the final fifteen minutes of the show. And yes, they chase the bad guy (on foot) in a cliche but nicely shot scene.
There are plot holes like why Mannix keeps his gun in his car and not always on him. The mysteries are not very challenging. You will groan at the shootout scene, but the payoff to the scene will not disappoint.
I was surprised enough by my reaction to the episode that aired in 1967 to wonder what others non-MANNIX fans and even MANNIX fans think.
March 28th, 2011 at 3:56 am
Michael
I may have this one on one of those 50 for next to nothing DVD’s they carry at Wal-Mart and the Dollar Store — I’ll check.
By all means all MANNIX episodes weren’t bad, and even in later seasons they once in a while stretched a little. I recall a fairly good one of Joe penned down out in the desert and the one shot they gave Gail Fisher at a bigger part, and as I mentioned before the eps with Victor Jory as Joe’s Armenian farmer father.
And once in a while they were worth watching just for the guest star. In all honesty in the later seasons I was in college and grad school or I might have watched more often — and then too, it came on Saturday night …
The Topanga Canyon thing was just a pet peeve of mine — like Barnaby Jones and the inevitable staircase (half the series suspense was whether Buddy Ebsen was going to reach the suspects apartment before he died of old age), and Rockford and the endless car chase (at least they used different locations — oh, look out, he’s going to hit a fruit cart! Oh, no, a construction zone — and there’s a pile of dirt and a trench — golly, what could happen?). At least with Cannon there was some suspense as to whether William Conrad was going to be able to squeeze out from behind the steering wheel and draw his gun before the bad guy mowed him down or got away when the chase ended.
Come to think of it, how many times was James West trapped in a pit of some sort and had to take some improvised explosive Artemis Gordon cooked up, put it under a bucket, and launch himself upward to escape. They made some sturdy buckets in those days — not one of them ever just blew apart or collapsed when he stood on it.
It was a bit like that same hill Roy, Gene, and every hero in every Republic western always caught up with the villain on just before they leaped off their horse, and the two of them rolled down to the bottom kicking and punching — or that same cliff every cowboy eventually rode off of into the lake.
And why did every monster, alien, and caveman live in Bronson Canyon? Rent control caves? And what was it about the Observatory that attracted every monster, crook, and juvenile delinquent within one hundred miles of Hollywood — even the last CHARLIE’S ANGEL movie had a big scene there?
For that matter if you can find anything in West Texas that looks vaguely like that canyon in Utah where all the movies are shot…
Just being picky, I don’t really let this stuff bother me, unless the episode or movie in question is so bad my mind strays.
I even have favorite moments, like in FORT WORTH where newsman Randolph Scott mounts his horse and announces he is going to Big Spring and will be back the next day.
That’s one hell of a horse. Big Spring is 350 miles from Fort Worth — uphill.
Oh, re why Mannix leaves his gun in the car sometimes (other than the handy dandy plot device), that one may have been a touch of realism creeping in even if they didn’t explain it. The rules of when and where and how a private investigator can carry a concealed weapon vary from state to state and from agency to agency, and sometimes from county to county. In some places you have to be sworn in as a deputy to legally carry one.
If you ever wondered why the hero always sweats so much when the cops threaten to pull his pi ‘ticket’ it’s because in order to open an agency you have to put up a bond varying from $50,000 to $150,000 depending on the state.
And private eyes do not have attorney client priviledge — unless they are working for a lawyer — which is why Sam Spade calls his lawyer to set that up in THE MALTESE FALCON. Otherwise they can go to jail for witholding evidence.
As to why Mannix would work for an agency, there’s that bond, and also most states require you have three years as a policeman, an agency employee, or some other similar experience before you can even be bonded and get your pi ticket (Marlowe for instance was an investigator for the D.A.’s office and Archer a military policeman, Spade, like Hammett, an ex agency man).
Then too, the agency pays a monthly salary — with no overhead our of your pocket. The classic private eye may be a loner in fiction, but in the real world he has to pay the rent on the desk where he keeps his whiskey.
Unlike the movies, a cheap office, a cheaper desk, an even cheaper secretary, a file cabinet, a gun, and a bottle of Old Grandad are not enough to get started.
March 28th, 2011 at 10:10 am
David, great and funny reply.
This episode has Mannix’s old war buddy asking him why he was working for an agency. Mannix shrugged and didn’t answer. I got the impression Mannix had been a PI on his own before.
Since Mannix is an old soldier (think Rick in “Casablanca”) taking orders should not be a problem. Except he rarely took orders. His Boss kept him for the old cliche, ‘he is the best agent I have’. But Mannix had little respect for the computer and the people he worked with. He respected Lew as a friend but not enough to take his orders.
That was the problem with the first season, the conflict did not really exist. Mannix was always right and he did whatever he wanted. The agency was never allowed to play a strong role. The writers were always on the side of the PI hero and never showed the modern agency in a positive light. The question became why is Joe letting Intertect get in his way. In 1967 the audience was not ready to accept the computer over the old fashioned hero. Later SEARCH was able to use the independent PIs with a computer because they had a human character speaking for the computer.
As for repetition, think of it as drama’s version of comedy’s running joke.
I understand Rockford’s weekly car chase better after seeing PIONEERS OF TELEVISION. James Garner loves to drive and do car stunts. So the writers added a car chase each week to keep their star happy.
March 28th, 2011 at 1:53 pm
Michael
They seemed to add Stuart Margolin’s Angel a lot to keep Garner happy too — I kept hoping they would do a ‘very special episode’ and Angel would die of some rare unknown disease that didn’t have a telethon and no one really had (angelitis), or that Rocky or Isaac Hayes would get tired of him and put him out of my misery.
Frankly I wish they had worried more about keeping me happy.
If I wanted to see Garner go in circles I’d have watched GRAND PRIX.
You’d have thought just once he would have had a flat tire, or busted transmission, or dead battery … if I drove the way he did my car wouldn’t have lasted three months.
I agree about the failure to use the agency thing in regard to MANNIX first season, but at least the conflict was suggested. Frankly from the suite he operated out of in the rest of the show Joe either had a rich uncle or one of his clients was either a Hollywood mogul of a mob chief, because you don’t get those kind of offices in LA solving murders — especially when you don’t do divorce work. Joe had buried some bodies for someone.
Yes, I know, I know, it’s just a show … understand I didn’t really want realism, but when I’m bored my mind wanders. It wandered a lot watching MANNIX week to week.
MANNIX had a good deal of potential that it never really tapped into. Everyone seemed happy to be in a more or less generic PI series and maybe once in a while stretch a little. The funny thing was that the plots weren’t as good (for the most part) as really light fluff like 77 SUNSET STRIP and HAWAIIAN EYE.
At least in the first season there was some innovation in the plots.
And here is one you don’t often hear from us old timers — most of the police action series today — for all their flaws — are better written, produced, and far cleverer than most of what we were watching then.
I grew up in the so called Golden Age of television (and with the medium, we got our first set in 1951) — there was always a lot of tripe, but also some good shows, and at least the cliche’s were borrowed from B movies and serials and even the pulps and radio (Robert Leslie Bellem was writing for THE LONE RANGER, SUPERMAN, and DEATH VALLEY DAYS).
About 1965 something started to happen, and there was a definte downturn. I tend to blame the fact that writers and producers were begining to come in to television who hadn’t come out of the movies, theater, radio, and print — writers and producers were coming in who mostly knew television so they called on television for inspiration, and as a result it started to feed on itself.
Oh, there were brilliant shows done, but by and large the medium was becoming more and more incestuous. From about 1968 on television became worse and worse — at first because it didn’t know what to do with the social change in the country, and then because it tried to be hip when at best it was a year behind any trend before a show could get on the air.
Sturgeon’s law applies to most things, but in television’s case it was more like 98% was crap too often. The 2% included some wonderful shows, but they were surrounded by a sea of mediocrity — when it rose to the level of mediocrity.
In the 1990’s something did finally change. People came into television again from the movies, from comic books, from other media, and audiences reacted when they began to see something different. The shows got better. Sometimes much better.
For all its flaws television is probably as good right now as it has ever been in my lifetime. I’ll go farther, it is far better than it was for most of my adult years. Even some of the series I don’t watch, and may make fun of once in a while, tend to be better acted, produced, and written than the average series was then.
There once was a golden age, and I think there is one now, but from 1970 to about 1990 was a long slog, with only a few high spots to really brighten the trip. For every ALL IN THE FAMILY or MARY TYLER MOORE there were ten LOVE BOATS or SHE’S THE SHERRIF, for every HILL STREET BLUES there were an endless run of KNIGHTRIDERS. For every WISEGUY there were ten other Cannell series that were stamped with a cookie cutter.
Fairly or unfairly MANNIX is one of those series that always reminds me of the long slog through two decades of pretty bad television. If VCR’s and cable hadn’t come along in the seventies and with them movie channels and things like A&E I might well have stopped watching entirely.
And keep in mind, I never said there were not individual good series, or highlights — but when people tell me they are nostalgic for the shows of their youth, and it turns out to be T.J. HOOKER, I just sort of sigh. By that standard even MANNIX was high art.
March 28th, 2011 at 10:01 pm
I don’t believe in Golden eras. What is one person’s Golden era is another person’s boring. I see THE ROCKFORD FILES much like you see Ellery Queen’s mystery novels, both changed their world at the time and should not be judged without being placed in that context. In the distant future, LAW & ORDER and CSI will be judged the same.
The percentage of good vs bad remains much the same over time, only the numbers of programs has risen. From Wikipedia:
1960s: 687 American TV series
1970s: 762
1980s: 967
1990s: 1482
2000s: 2623
2010s: 736
From 1990 through today there were over twice as many TV series as between 1960 through 1989. Twice as many good series, twice as many bad.
Why does the top rated cable network, USA have TV series that belong to the NBC 1970s and 1980s schedule? And TNT has the CBS 70s and 80s style shows?
Can you think of any TV mystery writer today of equal to Richard Levinson and William Link? The closest I got was Graham Yost.
Has there been a better lawyer show than CBS’ original PERRY MASON? A better cozy than MURDER SHE WROTE?
RICHARD DIAMOND, PETER GUNN, I SPY, MISSION IMPOSSIBLE, POLICE STORY, HILL STREET BLUES, HARRY O, KOJAK, REMINGTON STEELE, EQUALIZER, PHILIP MARLOWE, HOMICIDE, THE MIDDLEMAN, SHERLOCK, RUBICON, JUSTIFIED, etc.; great TV mysteries come in all forms and all decades. (I snuck a couple in there you can argue with. But it is my list, I add with a grin.)
And MANNIX fans will remind you that the series won the Edgar for best episode in TV mystery for 1972.
As for nostalgia, each of us remember our youth while we were forming our judgment of good and bad. I fondly remember MAN FROM UNCLE and DARK SHADOWS. But then I forgive others for their childhood favorites, it bugs me more to learn how terrible their taste in TV is as adults.
March 28th, 2011 at 10:49 pm
Michael
I did say there were highlights in each period. Certainly COLUMBO was one, I’d probably pick BANACEK as one, and short lived experiments like CITY OF ANGELS.
And MAN FROM UNCLE falls well within the good period.
But no one is arguing that there weren’t good series, what I am arguing is that there are more good series now — even taking in to account there are more choices — than any period since the acknowledged Golden Age — at least acknowledged by the majority of critics.
No one is arguing everything on television was magic — even as a kid I knew ROCKY JONES was childish. But most pioneering periods are golden ages in one way or another simply because almost everything is new, experimental, untested, and not tainted with familiarity.
They call it the golden age of comic books too, but there was a high percentage of drek along with the enduring work. That will always be true of mass entertainment. When you have to feed the beast that is the public it isn’t all going to be filet mignon.
Incidentally I agree ROCKFORD was a high point. It was not a favorite of mine for a lot of reasons, but largely because I held it to a higher standard because it had the potential to be so good, and so often was lazy and self indulgent instead. At its worst I was happy to spend an hour with James Garner — even if I had to endure Angel.
And yes, I can objectively say that if my nostalgia is NAKED CITY, PETER GUNN, or PERRY MASON and their’s is T. J. HOOKER and THE DUKES OF HAZARD mine is objectively and demonstatably better.
I have fond memories of FURY and SKY KING too, and never missed ROY ROGERS or the RANGE RIDER, but I wouldn’t argue those were exactly the finest moment of television.
I can remember — just barely — when there were only two networks and some nights the only thing on was wrestling.
The idea that somehow time passing makes things equal is one of those politically correct ideas that try to equate Andy Warhol’s paintings of soup cans with the Mona Lisa.
Judgments can and must be made. There is no art without judgment. All things are not equal even within the same media. If they were Justin Bieber would be Elvis or the Beatles — he’s not, he’s Bobby Sherman. He might yet become something more, but he has yet to.
There is a reason we remember Hammett and Chandler for their art but Carroll John Daly only for his historical import.
And again I never said there weren’t great individual series in and out of the genre. There were some noble experiments that failed like MADIGAN, BANYON, CITY OF ANGELS, THE OUTSIDER. There were outstanding series that did make it,like HARRY O, and even those that made it for a little while like TENSPEED AND BROWNSHOE.
And even today they can make the same old mistakes. It wasn’t that long ago they tried to bring back KNIGHTRIDER.
But I do think you can objectively say that television is better today than in the seventies or eighties. Some individual series then were better certainly, but on a day in day out, night after night basis, even if you limit yourself to the three basic networks the shows tend to be better written, acted, and produced (and I don’t mean CGI) than the majority of series from those periods.
And you have to be able to make these judgments, because without making judgments about the best and the worst there is no best to set the standard. There is certainly room for disagreement, but for it to have any reason behind it at all it calls for standards that are generally agreed on.
I for one liked GILIGAN’S ISLAND, but save for tongue in cheek argument I would not argue it was a highpoint of anything save maybe Tina Louise’s career — even Bob Denver was much funnier as Maynard G. Krebs on DOBIE GILLIS.
March 29th, 2011 at 12:15 am
While the outside may look prettier, the inside is stagnant. The production side has advanced in movies too, but I don’t consider today’s movies better than the past.
This month I have enjoyed three series, JUSTIFIED, ARCHER, and FRINGE. Everything else bores me. I have seen all the twists. I spot the set up and know what will happening and when it will happen. Characters rarely have any more or less depth than before. And in TV, characters are everything. Premise gets the viewer in the door, but it is the characters that keep the viewers coming back. Be it another CSI or LAW & ORDER, originality remains too rare and when it arrives it is gone too soon.
As a former professional critic, I see no Golden age of TV. In my reviews here I have picked a TV series from every decade since the 1950s except for the 1970s. It was not on purpose. I find each decade has its own wonders and disasters, none better or worse than another.
Things must be judged by the viewer not by the critic. The critic is a guide, someone to lead people to what the critic believes is good work and save people from what the critic believes is bad. There is no single truth, only the individual’s perspective.
David, I hope you are enjoying these little chats we are having as much as I. This comment thread would be near empty without it.
So it is your turn again. This time name some examples from post-1990 TV proving that era is better. I have run out of examples claiming all is equal.
March 29th, 2011 at 4:17 am
I’ve worked as a film and movie critic, but never television. It’s strictly amateur when it comes to the tube.
But I disagree strongly that the critic is just a guide. True the ultimate decision is made by viewers, but the critic has a responsibility to speak his opinions. Then the viewer can agree or not. I grew up reading critics like Judith Crist and Bosley Crowther, James Agee and Konrad Lorenz, Graham Greene and Cleveland Amory — I didn’t always agree with them, but I knew what they thought, and knowing what they thought I could better make judgments for myself. When it came to criticism I’m not sure any of them even knew what the word subjective meant.
There is a reason they are called critics and not judges — they are not expected to leave their opinions in their chambers and turn a blind eye to everything but the appeal of the show to viewers.
So we may have a basic disagreement about the role of the critic. I can tell you from personal experience that not even historians are as subjective as you suggest. For that matter, while science may claim it I’ve never known one that actually was that subjective. That’s okay though. I’m enjoying these discussions too, even if we do end up talking to ourselves.
My one disagreement with you on today’s shows has to do with characters, because I would argue that many of them are much more character driven than before. Certainly the plots aren’t much — if any — better when it is the least likely suspect every week, or the first guy they casually interview and dismiss every week — well, anyone watching them for the mystery must never have read one.
But then I have been surprised by ‘who done it’ on a television show very few times. At best you sometimes enjoy a bit of cleverness in how they choose to work out the familiar business, but I’ve long suspected they don’t want to fool us — they want us to feel as smart as the detective in question and superior to everyone else.
They aren’t playing the same game we know from books. They don’t want to fool us — they want to engage us. Ideally we should figure out who done it a few beats ahead of the detective, and then hang around to see if we are right.
Then too, let’s be honest. Some viewers are fooled every week when it turns out to be the least likely suspect, just like some of them never caught on the biggest name guest star was always guilty.
And I’ll be honest here, with no claim to superiority whatsoever I don’t think I’ve been fooled more than a handful of times by television mystery since I was ten and figured out storytelling logic — at least not by series mysteries.
Now COLUMBO was very cleverly done since it was a ‘how is he going to catch him’, but if we are going to be fair not a single murderer he ever caught would have been convicted when their lawyer finished with the Lieutenant on the stand. At least Philo Vance convinced his killers to commit suicide when he couldn’t nail them in court. COLUMBO was a great show and Falk and most of his guest star opponents great at it, but most fair play mysteries do at least bother to pretend that the evidence the detective produces would stand up in court. Lt. Columbo seems to have attended the Mark Furhman school of detection.
But then, as a friend retired from the LA police once quipped: “He is an LA cop you know.”
So the mysteries today aren’t really any worse than most we got back then. No better, but no worse. The best series are always about style over substance even when they pretend to be about substance. It’s really hard to do substance on a weekly basis.
But these series are character driven in a way that those earlier series were not for the most part. N.C.I.S. is wholly character driven, and most epsiodes require us to be much more familiar with the lives and basic human behavior of the team of detectives than we ever were of Mannix, or Quincy, or Jessica Fletcher, or even most of the characters on HILL STREET BLUES.
The same was true even for MONK, where plots often tended to arise out of the characters rather than merely happen to them. They may not have been deeply drawn, but they were certainly deeper than all but a few of the better earlier series in that way. Even CSI in its various incarnations is as much about the week to week drama of the people as about the plot.
You mentioned an example. Go back to BUFFY THE VAMPIRE SLAYER, which beneath all the slaying and supernatural nonsense was one of the canniest looks at the problems of late adolescence, the conflicts of growing up, the politics of school life, and negociating it all without losing your way ever done on television. Without the depth brought to the characters the television series would have been as shallow and pointless as the movie that spawned it. Instead it managed to substitute vampires for acne, werewolves for problem students, witches for cliques, demon’s for faculty, and the mouth of Hell for our mixed feelings about home town and dear old alma mater.
By comparision, much as I liked it, KOLCHAK was about Darren McGavin snapping pictures of monsters that never came out clear enought to print. His biggest problem as a character was keeping track of his straw hat and not being fired by Simon Oakland every week.
I’m no LAW AND ORDER fan, largely because I think it glamorizes prosecutorial abuse and allows its fictional cops to run roughshod over the law and individual rights, but at least SVU is strongly character driven. I don’t even watch regularly and I know many of the personal demons driving the main characters, and in virtually every episode those demons drive at least their behavior which in turn drives the plot.
Since they are never going to do actual mysteries anyone older than twelve can’t solve before the half hour break they at least try to make us care for the characters in most of today’s shows.
True we aren’t talking Tolstoy or Marcel Proust, mostly we are talking a bit better than soap opera, but within that these shows are character driven, and unlike most past series plot derives from character.
Take a gimmick show like CASTLE. The premice is ridiculous, and the mysteries, while fun, are patently transparent, but the appeal of the series is not just the will they or won’t they sexual byplay between the leads, but their relationships with others — notably his mother and daughter and her past, and their own personal demons. By going far beyond the will they or won’t they kiss set up they have defused that particular problem. Unlike MOONLIGHTING where the minute David and Maddie kissed there was no reason to keep watching, CASTLE suggests that mere physical cohabitation is not going to solve all the problems these two have.
And while they don’t come up with the greatest mysteries at least they — and some of the others — come up with some clever set ups in regard to how the corpse becomes a corpse and sometimes where it happens. That part of the Golden Age tradition is at least still active. If you can’t do clever, grotesque is sometimes an acceptable substitute.
Also, there used to be two types of mystery/crime drama on television. The first one was the standard that virtually all programs follow today. It followed the protagonist or his team as they investigated a crime, interviewed the suspects, and solved the crime. PETER GUNN, MANNIX, QUINCY, ROCKFORD FILES … they all followed this formula.
There was however a second formula that is virtually unused today, which was quite common then. In that formula the protagonist appeared at the start and at the end and somewhat through the heart of the series, but the main drama was conveyed through the guest stars and their unfolding stories. Because of that they sometimes could do more complex crime stories.
Series that sometimes (or always) used this format included THE FUGITIVE, THE FBI, CANNON, THE DETECTIVES, CHECKMATE, CAIN’S HUNDRED, THE UNTOUCHABLES, and NAKED CITY to name a few. It was actually the original idea behind THE MAN FROM UNCLE before David McCallum’s popularity meant that the series ended up mostly about he and Robert Vaughn.
Because the format allowed more room for the writers and there were characters involved who could die, change, and didn’t have to end the episode exactly as they started it these series often worked like a good anthology series with a depth the other format didn’t always allow for.
But by the mid seventies that format was pretty much a thing of the past.
I would never argue there weren’t good mystery series in every decade. You have named some of the best. But even if you adust for the sheer number of shows today I would argue that general quality in regard to storytelling is higher. Even shoot ’em ups like NCIS LOS ANGELES are strongly character driven compared to similar programs from an earlier era. Too often what passed for character in the past was grizzled old timer, hot shot new kid, steady reliable good old boy, and handsome tough brilliant leader.
I can’t think if anything today that is that simplistic when it comes to character. Plot driven books can be fun, but the best books, films, and televison are virtually always character driven. If you don’t believe me try watching some of the Tara King episodes of THE AVENGERS or MAVERICK when they replaced Garner with Robert Colbert as the new Brett in the exact same plots.
Virtually all the series today understand that viewers invest in character far more deeply than plot.
March 29th, 2011 at 11:03 am
Nice. I agree about character. I disagree the characters of this era are deeper or better than the past.
I wrote a hundred page writer’s guide for REMINGTON STEELE that focused on an episode guide and the characters. This was a series that focused on the characters and their past.
I have never seen a CASTLE that does anything I have not seen done before and better.
People watch TV to escape. How often have you heard, “I worked hard all day and I just want to come home, turn on TV and not think”? TV is what the viewers wanted then and now.
We agree that most fiction today is character driven. I prefer today’s mystery novels over your Golden Age mysteries because today’s books are about characters and their stories rather than a game I don’t want to play.
TV has always been about character. The fun of COLUMBO was not the mystery but watching the characters. On Steve’s email is a review I have done on DECOY, a 1957 female DRAGNET. There is one episode where the main character is in very little and instead the criminals are the focus. Worst episode of the series. It proved the series was not about the stories but Casey Jones. Like Joe Friday, little of Casey’s past was mentioned, but it was still her character that got us to watch every week.
Do you really think in twenty years anyone will even remember Mark Harmon’s character’s name as we do Joe Friday or even Mannix?
I watched CSI for William Petersen as Gil Grissom, we left the show together. So there are great characters on TV today, but there has always been great characters on TV.
As for BUFFY, remember it was on the WB network. Which is one of my points. TV is taking more creative chances because there are more than three networks. Compare the three networks today to twenty years ago and you will find little different beyond less censorship. And for every BUFFY, how many horrible series on WB did we suffer through?
I am not saying TV is worse than the past. I am saying, minus the natural learning process and technology advances, TV today is not that much better.
March 29th, 2011 at 12:37 pm
Ah there we agree. Not that much better.
Certainly not as good as it could be — probably should be.
You bring up REMINGTON STEELE, which I loved, but much as I liked it the characters on that show were all surface, there was little or no real depth. Once the central conflict between Steele and Laura was addressed and some of the mystery solved there was no place left to go and it floundered about for the last season or so trying to find a story line for the new character dynamic.
I don’t mean to suggest CASTLE is fresh or innovative, but I do think the greater depth the characters are given allows them broader activity within the parameters of the setup. You have a sense of who they are if you watch regularly in a way that you never were allowed or expected to know Steele of Laura. You couldn’t know Steele, because once you knew he would always do the right thing and could be trusted the whole basis of the series was gone. It was character driven, but it is very hard to maintain a character whose chief trait is you can’t really know him.
Mark Harmon’s Gibbs has as good a shot as any recent characteer of being remembered, but of course won’t be Joe Friday. The difference is that DRAGNET became a cultural event and Webb an icon. That’s true of Columbo too (I loved Columbo, I was only pointing out that much as I loved it, good as Levinson and Link were, it still was on the far side of actual mystery puzzles) — it was a character driven series for all the clever plots, and even though we knew little of Columbo’s private life we could infer a good deal from his actons. The plot always derived from his reaction and his behavior in relation to the suspect.
Yes, BUFFY was on the WB, and they did a lot of schlock — as television always does. Keep in mind though that I remember when ABC was Fox and the WB. The new kid trying to establish a face and style. Broadcast television is pretty much broadcast television in my view in that sense.
I still think in general quality is higher today than for much of the seventies and eighties. There were some individual series that were better then — timeless classics, but then too there was an awful lot of DUKES OF HAZARD, BJ AND THE BEAR, T. J. HOOKER, CHARLIE’S ANGELS, RIPTIDE, AIRHAWK, HARDCASTLE AND MCCORMACK, THE SNOOP SISTERS, FATHER DOWLING, JAKE AND THE FATMAN, KNIGHTRIDER, SIX MILLION DOLLAR MAN, THE BIONIC WOMAN, MANIMAL, MATLOCK, and other drivel that were at best cookie cutter drama that had nothing but perhaps a charismatic star going for them. I don’t think most of them would go past half a season today — there is too much competition, and there are too many better choices. To some extent when a series does make it today it has to be a little better or it won’t catch fire quickly enough to survive.
And let me be clear, by character driven I don’t mean a Joe Friday. Certainly DRAGNET was a remarkable hit and at least the first series a classic, but Friday was a symbol and not a character — an archtype. The show was not character driven because the plot was extraneous to Friday’s character. If you can create a character that becomes an icon like Friday you don’t need to or really want to delve into his personal life. He is symbolic. MANNIX wasn’t character driven either for the most part, though the first season was set up to be, because most of the time you could have substituted any generic eye for him and had the same result — though without Connors charisma in the role.
MAGNUM and ROCKFORD though were character driven because the plots as often as not arose from the nature and behavior of the two protagonists, and to change them would have significantly have changed the story. Even when you don’t like them most of today’s shows make an effort to present characters who drive the show from week to week instead of characters who simply react to the weeks storyline. But I will grant because of that they are less likely to create the archtypes and symbolic characers that can sometimes carry drama to another level.
DECOY, as you mention couldn’t help but be character driven simply because it was about an undercover cop, but still few episodes derived from her character just as few TIGHTROPE’s derived from Mike Connors. Such characters — and Joe Friday — are not characters but catalysts. They are sort of human deus ex machina, forcing a climax by their mere appearance.
When I say character driven I don’t mean the plot or crime directly links to the protagonists — mostly it doesn’t — but that how the protagonist views the crime, how they behave, how they interact with the suspects, each other, and regulars is what you watch for and not the plot. I watch NCIS for Harmon and his team, I watch THE MENTALIST for Simon Baker and his, I watch CASTLE for Nathan Fillon and his — I watch them for the character interaction as you watched CSI for Grissom. I never watched DRAGNET to interact with Joe Friday because Joe Friday was a symbol and never really a character. The few times they tried to portray him as a character he came off as rather pathetic frankly. Webb’s gift was to make Friday a sort of template for the ideal police detective — but you never felt he existed off the screen or that there was a man behind Badge 714.
I just think in general there is a level achieved today that is higher than that of earlier programing. That said, there may be less outstanding innovation, fewer programs that feel really innovative and new simply because in the old days along with a sort of genial incompetence there was always room for a flash of genius. I’m not sure todays television is as inviting to genius or as forgiving of mindless esapism. Audiences today would laugh the A-TEAM off the air if it tried to pass off those tired plots and silly characters. Television is a little better because there are more choices and there is more discrimination among viewers. I may not always agree with their choices, but by and large, at least in terms of drama and sit coms, they are generally much less tolerant of mere competence.
And yes, some of those past series I mention have done well in reruns and appealing to nostalgia. Mom may not have been Julia Child, but sometimes nothing will do but her macaroni and cheese out of the box. But some of the hit series today are doing quite well in reruns while still on the air, which suggests they may have reached that iconic level without us quite realising it.
March 29th, 2011 at 3:13 pm
A good example of what I’m talking about is in medical drama. Look back at series like MEDICAL CENTER, TRAPPER JOHN, DR. KILDARE, and BEN CASEY, and compare them to ER, CHICAGO HOPE, or GRAY’s ANATOMY even. They don’t stand up very well.
There were some good experiments — Richard Boone in MEDIC or Patrick McGoohan’s RAFFERTY, but they were too challenging for the viewers then, whereas HOUSE has been a huge hit. MARCUS WELBY may have been well loved, but in dramatic terms it can’t compare with modern equivalents.
Yet there were series then too that I don’t think have been equalled — and may never be. The original DICK VAN DYKE SHOW, MY WORLD AND WELCOME TO IT, HE AND SHE, the Jim Hutton ELLERY QUEEN,CAROL BURNETT, THE AVENGERS, BARNEY MILLER, EAST SIDE WEST SIDE, SLATTERY’S PEOPLE — even the slick NAME OF THE GAME adapted Thomas Wolfe and original work by Philip Wylie.
But for every one of those there is the faux hip forced street toughness of a BARETTA, the somewhat geriatric thrills of SWITCH, the incredibly shallow HART TO HART, or the sonambulistic O’HARA TREASURY AGENT.
I suppose it comes down to I’m not sure today’s best is as good as the best was then but the average programs are better and the really bad ones tend not to last as long. Despite reality television, which is a separate category, the general IQ of most drama and comedy is considerably higher.
Of course that’s excluding JOEY, but then JOEY would have been gone after two episodes if it hadn’t been a last ditch effort to hold onto the FRIENDS franchise. Whatever else, that doesn’t change. The networks would rather beat a dead horse than invest in a new one.
March 29th, 2011 at 6:11 pm
I feel like I am approaching the level of the network and their horse.
You made some good points but you are totally and completely wrong about the depth of characters on REMINGTON STEELE. As I said I wrote a hundred page guide exploring those characters, their backgrounds and motivations, a guide used by the writers and producers. A woman used the character of Laura Holt as the subject for her university thesis.
Neither of us are right or wrong since its all just opinions. I don’t think the post-90s are bad, just not better. I don’t think either of us changed the other’s view, which is good. It is more fun to find someone to challenge my point of view than talk to the mirror.
March 29th, 2011 at 10:40 pm
Michael
I agree, and I don’t doubt that you found more in the STEELE characters than I did, but I don’t think the series was driven by more than the fairly surface idea of the two characters attraction and conflict for most casual viewers.
Obviously you invested more in the series and characters than I did — but I suspect more than most viewers did too. But just giving a character a hisory and using it is not character driven plot.
A good example of what I have been talking about was NCIS tonight. The episode was obstensibly about an investigation into two murders that were tied to a whistleblowing book about a secret military terrorist sting that went wrong; but, it was revealed largely through the characters reactions to events in their lives.
Gibbs ex was remarrying and had invited him to the wedding — complicated by the fact that his best friend and rival in the FBI was also an ex of the same woman. McGee was forced to deal with his mixed feelings about his experience as a writer because they had to deal with a publisher. DiNozo, having an affair with another agent was obsessed with secrets … In each case their personal lives helped to lead to the solution (the usual least likely suspect inteviewed before the first break after the intro).
It’s not merely that the characters have a history, or even that some of the plots arise from that history, but that their personal experience directly impacts each and every investigation to the extent that a casual viewer likely would miss many of the more subtle aspects.
I never thought REMINGTON STEELE was shallow — in fact I was a huge fan of the series and both Brosnan and Zimbalist. But while the certainly did episodes that drew on the characters backgrounds and history the average episode really only called on the surface story — the mystery man who isn’t what he pretends to be, the brilliant woman reluctantly forced to hide that behind his charima in order to succeed. That is plot driven not character driven. Their unique talents led to the solution, but not their unique personalities (in most episodes — that said, some of the plots were cleverer than most series attempt).
Let me give you an example of a character driven book. Nothing that happens in THE MALTESE FALCON, other than the hunt for the black bird and perhaps Archer’s murder, would happen if the detective was anyone other than Sam Spade. Everyone in the book reacts to and because of the unique nature of his personality. Without Sam Spade the book would only be a fairly melodramatic tale of intrigue.
But in THE ROMAN HAT MYSTERY, while Ellery Queen is given a personality it doesn not impact the plot — though it does impact the solution. Everything that happens in the novel save the solution to the mystery whould happen whether Ellery Queen was the detective or Philo Vance or someone else. Yet all of Rex Stout’s Nero Wolfe novels are character driven because the force of Wolfe and Archie’s personality drive the direction the plot takes (later Ellery Queen’s are character driven to a much greater extent).
Virtually all series today are character driven. They didn’t use to be. In dramatic terms that is an improvement, though like anything else it can be used as a crutch.
March 30th, 2011 at 2:17 am
Sorry for all the typos — winter has briefly returned here and arthritis is playing hell with my dominant typing hand.
March 30th, 2011 at 10:42 pm
MANNIX certainly inspired quite the sweeping discussion here…and yet Bob and Ray’s BLIMMIX didn’t quite come up (the villain would refute Blimmix’s weekly argument as to why he shouldn’t be beaten up yet again)…nor the catchy theme song, which sticks with me.
I have been a professional television journalist and reviewer as well, and by me US tv has never been better than it was ca. 1999-2001 (including not a few crime dramas), though there have been bright spots throughout the history, and interesting trends, as I suspect we all can agree.
March 31st, 2011 at 3:19 am
Todd
Bob and Ray did have a way of reducing any thing to its simplist and funniest possible form. I’d forgotten about BLIMMIX, which was painfully dead on.
Don’t disagree about 1999-2001 though I was talking broader eras and general overall quality. Frankly as far as cop series go I’m not sure anyone has ever really done better than the best of NAKED CITY, just as I don’t think most legal series will ever approach PERRY MASON for entertainment week end week out or PETER GUNN for style and that undefinable thing called cool. HAVE GUN WILL TRAVEL remains the single most adult western series while I don’t think anyone ever did one more entertaining than MAVERICK or the short lived THE WESTERNER.
But I do think, all factors taken into consideration, today in general — in the over all sense — that episode to episode, series to series, the overall quality is better than in the past. There may be fewer classics on right now — but there is little out there that approaches some of the long running mindless dreck that once dominated the screen in the seventies and eighties. Over all the writing, acting, and skill is much higher — though certainly some of the old pros and great character actors are missing.
Admittedly they still write to the lowest common denominator and most of them couldn’t plot a mystery if they channeled Agatha Christie, but at least some effort is made to deepen and broaden the characters and to have the story come out of the character’s nature rather than have them as nothing but the Road Runner and Wily E. Coyote.
I don’t think movies are better — though they may be better than the over all period of the seventies. But I do think television is. In fact most of the long running junk series of the past (and I grant many of them are well loved as nostalgia)would not make it past a single half season today.
Simply because they have to compete with more kinds of media and more venues of entertainment I don’t think the networks feel like they can get away with mindless drivel like the A-Team, The Dukes of Hazard, B J and the Bear, T J Hooker, or some of the other low points of network television from the seventies and eighties.
I’m not sure they always reach the high points of some of the best either, but as far as drama and comedy go, while there are many (in fact most) that I don’t watch, there is nothing on right now that I would leave a room to avoid or feel tortured if forced to endure — not even on the CW and Fox (with one exception, the painfully unfunny BOB’S BURGERS).
There are still nights I don’t watch much other than the evening news — I’m no fan of reality television and never was — and if I wanted to see amateurs sing or dance I’d go to a kareoke bar — but even series I never watch like VAMPIRE DIARIES or FRINGE aren’t unwatchable. In the past there might be whole seasons I only followed one or two series — and that was before VCRs and endless cable programming gave you other choices.
March 31st, 2011 at 12:52 pm
Hi, Todd, nice to have someone join us. I agree about MANNIX’s theme (I mentioned it at the end of the review). Even David will admit this is not the Golden era of TV theme songs.
Every era needs to be judged within context of its time. Compare JUSTIFIED to ROCKFORD FILES. (side note: James Garner has announced he is “writing” his autobiography called, as of now, THE GARNER FILES). Both are great TV detective series. ROCKFORD FILES featured stand alone stories from the POV of one character. Garner was in virtually every scene. This meant his happiness was vital to keep the show alive, thus car chase a week. JUSTIFIED is based on a season long arc with stand alones mixed in. Its main character is Raylan Givens (Timothy Olyphant). But much of the series deals with other supporting characters in the cast.
The production reason for going from one star to a group is to avoid the problems of a Peter Falk (try shooting around a demanding star who is in every scene).
The arc story has always existed (soap operas for example), but a change in the audience’s taste have made them increasingly popular.
As NBC is learning ROCKFORD FILES was magic because of its star, the writing, the time it was in, and the audiences’ tastes at the time.
Time changes everything. David thinks the post-1990 is best, Todd likes the 1999-2001, and I find flaws and virtues in every decade. Since we are talking POV here, we all are right.
But from my POV, strip the new cameras, HD, 3-D, advances in special effects, and all the other surface stuff, it remains the same stories. I try to get through a NCIS or CSI or CHUCK and I am bored. I have seen it before. I can predict the next twist and even the act and time it will occur. TV used to surprise and excite me. It still can, but most of the crap just makes me wonder why I am wasting my time with television.
March 31st, 2011 at 4:21 pm
After the information on MANNIX on PIONEERS OF TELEVISION I added the first season to my Netflix queue. I had completely forgotten the first season was different from the rest, but am enjoying what I have seen so far. Some of the reason is sheer nostalgia — we frequently watched MANNIX when I was growing up. When I told my brother I was watching old MANNIX episodes he reminded me that Dad hated watching when the chase started. Yet, Dad was a regular viewer in spite of the chase.
March 31st, 2011 at 6:08 pm
Randy, your Dad didn’t have much choice at that time, did he? One of the reasons so many people remember old TV like MANNIX is we had little else to watch.
We lived in an era when a 25 share of the audience could get you cancelled. Today, they throw a party at a 8 share.
Which premise worked best for you, modern agency or on his own?
March 31st, 2011 at 6:40 pm
Michael
I think post 1990 is superior over all, but hardly the best. I just think general quality is higher and certainly higher than the 1970 to 1990 period.
I appreciate that they knew they had a good thing in Garner and ROCKFORD and catered to him to keep him happy (not too happy, he had to sue the studio in a landmark case to get the money he felt was coming to him), but I just think his self indulgence hurt the show. It may not have hurt it in the ratings, but it did hurt in over all quality. Even then they had an awfully high hit ratio compared to misses. I’d watch Garner in almost anything, and have, but I found ROCKFORD awfully self indulgent in far too many episodes. The best episodes are still outstanding, but there were too many below average episodes where everyone seemed to be on cruise control.
I understand why they did it, but I have to say where I differ with you is that I don’t care about their problems and or needs and wants. They are in the business of entertaining me, not themselves. Their excuses mean little to me. Perhaps if someone dies unexpectedly or walks off I might give them more leeway, but it isn’t my job to understand them — it’s their’s to entertain me.
But you have to wonder what idiot thought they could recreate the magic without Garner. The innovative thing about ROCKFORD was Garner, not the stories, even the good ones.
Again, I don’t think the stories are all that better either, but I do think that the presentation of the story and the way they are telling it is an improvement in many ways. In some cases it isn’t even that. In some cases they just take a completely differnt turn. The characters of the original HAWAII 5O were icons, but they weren’t presented much as humans with actual lives. The current series isn’t as good as the original, but it doesn’t try to copy it, instead it fills in history and story for the characters. It reinvents the idea rather than try to copy it. It’s a clever move, because I don’t think viewers would watch the series today as it was done then, even though I think the original was better (though my favorite description of it was DICK TRACY GETS WET).
But which programs surprised you in the past? Storywise I can’t think of many that qualify there. Maybe a few sitcoms that went somewhere new, but most of the drama of the 70’s and 80’s was pretty average. There were shows like WISEGUY of course, but they were few and far between. HILL STREET BLUES was really good for about half a season doing the best swipe of 87th Precinct ever done, but soon became silly and while I liked ST. ELSEWHERE, it was all over the place.
Sometimes the old stories were done well, but not consistently, and there are always examples that don’t fit the bill.
And I have to confess, starting about 1968 television and the movies took on a tacky look that I still don’t like. Much of it was technical based on cameras and film, but it still annoyed me. Almost everything looked exactly alike, shot exactly alike, with exactly he same sets, actors, and exactly the same story.
You could spot a Quinn Martin, Cannell, Spelling, or Larson production with less than a minute of footage generally.
But I’m only arguing a general improvement in overall quality — a bit better acting, a bit more attention to how the same old story is told. I’m not suggesting they are being particularly inventive plot wise, but as I said earlier, with only a handful of exceptions I haven’t been surprised by the plot or story on episodic television since I was ten and the logic of storytelling structure dawned on me.
And again, I really don’t think they want to surprise anyone. Most shows don’t want to be as challenging as LOST or as confusing as X FILES. Most of them want to reach a sort of medium level of general competence and entertainment, and it that I think more of today’s series are succesful than in the 70’s and 80’s. MIKE AND MOLLY may not be much, but it blows away BRIGIT LOVES BERNIE.
And contrary to what many people think so called Golden Ages are not just about the best material, but the level of the material in the middle and how much really belong at the bottom. I think there is an awful lot of material today at the high end of the middle level.
March 31st, 2011 at 8:17 pm
Still do not believe there is such a thing as a Golden age, just eras that appeal to different people.
I do not think any era is better or worse than any other era. But TV used to be new and fresh. After fifty years of watching TV, it has become predictable to me. Much of the problem is most TV drama is based on the twist. How many times do I have to watch a character get killed but no body is found to know the character is not dead? I keep waiting for Kate of WHITE COLLAR to show up.
After watching the TV detectives of the 50s and 60s, THE ROCKFORD FILES was a surprise and different.
NICHOLS killing off the lead character was a surprise. Even when BABYLON 5 did it in 1994 it shocked people. Today, killing off regulars have grown so common it is boring.
Jay Tarses gave the world a new form of sitcom when in the late 1980s, THE DAYS AND NIGHTS OF MOLLY DODD added the horrible term but nice genre “dramedy” to TV.
I’d try to remember more, but I don’t want to get distracted and miss FX’s ARCHER. Though Hanna and Barbera did it better (a joke).
April 1st, 2011 at 4:07 am
I’ll grant NICHOLS ending was a surprise, but I think I meant more in term of plots over all and not one time stunts, but I’ll grant I didn’ say that — obviosly some series did new things — but they still do. Love it or hate it, LOST was not the same old television.
ROCKFORD was charming, but not a surprize. MAVERICK PI with a bit of his MARLOWE thrown in. Yes, shows like MOLLY DODD were different, but again in terms of story week to week they didn’t often go far beyond the original innovation. NICHOLS came back as his twin and promptly began to tank in the ratings. Today and then follow up is not one of the mediums strengths.
It was a surprize when JR was shot, but otherwise really only a soap opera staple carried over to night time. That they managed to keep it boiling for three months when it was obvious only one major character could be spared from the series was a bigger surprise than any innovation. I had a friend in Ireland call long distance to see if I knew anything to help him hedge the money he had running on it.
But to give a good example of what I think is the strength of some of the series on now, THE MENTALIST did an extremely well done episode tonight. The central mystery was only okay — as most are and always were — but the back story involvng Jane’s relationship with a character who had previsously been an antagonistic one was very well handled. The way that was played out, and the really nicely handled ending, took what would have been a typicaly gimmicky and not too surprzing mystery and made it secondary to showing a more likable side to the protagonist — without getting sticky or overly sentimental with it — and providing a thoughtful look at one man dealing with death and the prospect of prolonged illness.
Again, nothing innovative, but well done, and without the cloying sentiment and melodrama earlier series would have insisted on injecting — ‘a very special episode’ as they used to say whenever a comedy decided not to be funny.
Dramedy wasn’t really new save in the term. Some sitcoms had always done serious episodes, just not on a weekly basis.
And I’ll grant golden ages are difficult to define so I have no problem with your not believing in them. But I will hold with my own personal view, that despite some individual brilliant programs the rough perio from 1970 to 1990 was not one of the mediums shining hours. The individual highs may have been higher than they are today, but the lows were some of the lowest in the mediums history — and many of them long running hits on the major networks.
I haven’t seen JUSTIFIED or ARCHER, but look forward to both on DVD, everything I’ve heard echoes your words.
Still as yet another forensic series debuts this week (BODY OF PROOF) I’m thinking of doing a new series called OKLAHOMA MEO (Medical Examiner’s Office). One character is a CSI who has doctored evidence on over forty cases (and counting) that have been thrown out of court and the convicted men released; the Medical Examiner is under investigation for charges of sexually harassing female and male employees; and my heroine is a full blood Cherokee former televsion anchor woman who changed careers because she saw herself as getting too old for the tube after a battle with cancer; meanwhile the facilities are dated and falling apart; the morale is in the tank; and they are completely overwhelmed by the simplist of cases and faced with one after another invesitgation by locals and Feds not to mention the press … Then do a follow up, OKLAHOMA CBI where the state investigative agency is similarly hexed and have a backlogue of unsolved cases going back almost a decade.
Trouble is that isn’t drama — that’s the local news.
But you have to admit that would be innovation.
July 21st, 2011 at 7:16 pm
Mannix and The Rockford Files are the two best private eye series, ever. I have every season of Rockford and all five seasons of Mannix that have been released. Any time that you compress a season of shows into a few days of viewing, you will notice a lot of duplication/rehashing of material that you wouldn’t notice if you spaced out your viewing. I feel that both shows were very inventive in their storytelling. This is especially noticeable when you compare them to the dreck that has come along since they went off the air.
P.S. Don’t write off Barnaby Jones as a bad show. His stories were well-told and a lot of the cliches of the genre had to be tossed due to Buddy Ebsen’s age. I wish they’d release season two on DVD.
February 24th, 2013 at 10:54 pm
Afraid I couldn’t disagree more with David’s contention that “Plot driven books can be fun, but the best books, films, and televison are virtually always character driven.”
David’s wrong, but he’s not alone. Despite Aristotle’s insistence that plot trumps character, at a certain point in the last 50 years plot became the red-headed stepchild among storytellers and their critics, and I am goddamned if I understand why. It’s baffling to me because a cunning and beautifully constructed plot is a thing of beauty and a joy forever and often the most important ingredient in the success of a film, book or TV show.
Here are just a few examples, among hundreds:
While THE STING has fantastic actors and wonderful, Damon Runyon-esque characterizations it is the extraordinary precision of its plotting that keeps us returning to it time and again.
Likewise BODY HEAT, THE SIXTH SENSE, DOUBLE INDEMNITY, BACK TO THE FUTURE, ROSEMARY’S BABY and WITNESS FOR THE PROSECUTION all owe their success at least as much to the ingenuity of their stories as to the depth and richness of their characterizations.
On the small screen, the audience for MISSION IMPOSSIBLE tuned in faithfully for seven years not to learn more about the paper-thin characters but for the missions those characters pulled off each week.
THE TWILIGHT ZONE, THE OUTER LIMITS, ALFRED HITCHCOCK PRESENTS, THRILLER, et al. were all telling PLOT driven stories, not character driven ones.
“Ah,” you might say. “But that was the 1960s. The taste of the audience has changed since then.”
Has it though? Nobody’s going to tell me the original LAW & ORDER remained on the air for 20 FRIGGIN’ YEARS because of our investment in the main characters (most of which kept being replaced like spark plugs, anyway), it was because of the STORIES, people.
And the next time you’re gushing to a friend about, say, a long-forgotten Brando flick you caught on TCM the night before, the question they will invariably ask you isn’t “Who’s it about?”
The question you’ll always get from them (naturally) is, “WHAT’S it about?”
Because people want to know the story. People ALWAYS want to know the story. And of course, to be made to wonder, What’s going to happen next?
That never changes, and hasn’t changed since… well, since Aristotle.
February 25th, 2013 at 4:27 pm
30. filmklassik, it is generally accepted in series TV, characters are more important than plot. The reason is a TV series can range from six to thirty nine (the old days) stories a year. It is impossible to come up with that many fresh and interesting plots a season. There will be weeks where the story stinks.
So what makes the viewer watch every week, even after a few plot failures? The characters. It is the character you find interesting, a character you want to spend time with every week. What made Perry Mason different than any other lawyer show?
The character and actor who plays it become a part our family, invited into our homes every week.
When it comes to TV series the premise and how the story is told is more important than the plot. The arc shows such as FRINGE and LOST was more about the long term story of the characters and universe than that week’s plot.
Plot plays an important role in standalone stories, but in a movie such as THE STING it wasn’t the plot that sold tickets it was Redford and Newman and their characters.
Your example of LAW AND ORDER is flawed. The plots are the weakest part of any of the LAW AND ORDER series. The shows remain popular because they are comfort food. The stories never take risk or have original plots. Remember what happened to LAW AND ORDER CRIMINAL INTENT without Vincent D’Onofrino? All the plots in the world meant less to the viewers than watching D’Onofrino’s Detective Goren.
March 4th, 2013 at 4:01 am
“So what makes the viewer watch every week, even after a few plot failures? The characters. It is the character you find interesting, a character you want to spend time with every week.”
Wait a minute. Do you really believe that this maxim applies to MISSION IMPOSSIBLE?
Nonsense. Agree to disagree.
“Your example of LAW AND ORDER is flawed. The plots are the weakest part of any of the LAW AND ORDER series.”
What, in your opinion, was the original LAW & ORDER’S strengths if not its rigidly structured plotting? Your reply to my post begins with the following assertion: “It is generally accepted in series TV, characters are more important than plot” but are you honestly insisting that this applies to the original L&O?
Once again, agree to disagree.
“Plot plays an important role in standalone stories, but in a movie such as THE STING it wasn’t the plot that sold tickets it was Redford and Newman and their characters.”
I can get behind the idea that Newman and Redford are two of the greatest movie stars of all time but do you really believe THE STING would have made 1/2 as much money as it did if its story was no better than, say, THE MACKINTOSH MAN? Or WUSA? Or LITTLE FAUSS AND BIG HALSY?
Once again, and once and for all, agree to disagree (strongly).
March 4th, 2013 at 3:24 pm
#32. Cool. This is not my site but as you might notice we like discussions (as long as we are respectful to the other, and you have played nice.).
You think people watched MISSION IMPOSSIBLE because of the cliche and unbelievable plots? It was a caper plot. Caper plots are fun because of the twists. You know at one point the caper will go wrong. With MI we were invested in the characters enough to care about them when things went wrong.
I believe the average viewer will remember the music bit, Jerry Orbach’s character, Sam Waterston’s character and others before they would remember one plot of LAW AND ORDER that wasn’t a cheap rip-off of the news.
I had a similar discussion over if the actor is the only reason for TV series success in a HARRY O review.
https://mysteryfile.com/blog/?p=20086
There I said and still agree that TV series is a success for a variety of factors. STAR TREK plots could have been adapted for WAGON TRAIN (Roddenberry pitched the series to the network as WAGON TRAIN to the stars). It was Kirk, Spock and the crew that would eventually lead to its success.
Timing is also an important part of a shows success. MI failed in its TV remake in the 80’s.
But we both can be right in our own ways. As my studies in film has taught me, there is no truth just perspective.
March 4th, 2013 at 8:30 pm
“You think people watched MISSION IMPOSSIBLE because of the cliche and unbelievable plots?”
Are you kidding me? That, my friend, is the ONLY reason anyone was watching. But don’t take my word for it: The cast, the crew, the writers, the directors, creator Bruce Geller (RIP) have all made a point (sometimes laughingly) of admitting that the characterizations on MISSION IMPOSSIBLE were paper-thin to non-existent (which is why Leonard Nimoy left after only two seasons) and that its primary appeal lay in the suspense and ingenuity on display in the weekly missions.
“It was a caper plot. Caper plots are fun because of the twists.”
Thank you! My point exactly!
“You know at one point the caper will go wrong. With MI we were invested in the characters enough to care about them when things went wrong.”
So you think it was Peter Graves’ rich, Chekhovian character of Jim Phelps (getting to know Phelps was like peeling away the layers of an onion!)… and the witty, anything-for-a-laugh Barney Collier… and the multifaceted personae of Rollin Hand, Willy Armitage and Cinnamon Carter that kept us coming back each week? To ask that question is to answer it.
But asking it does raise another interesting question, Mike: What do you think of Bruce Geller’s consternation over the fact that so few writers could master MISSION’s intricate style of plotting?
It seems not enough writers knew how to script the show… knew how to construct those byzantine, Chinese box-like capers MISSION became known for… and it was driving Geller crazy. But in light of your theory (“It is generally accepted in series TV, characters are more important than plot”), if the viewers were, in fact, tuning in for the characters and not the plot, wasn’t he getting himself worked up over nothing? The capers, after all, were secondary.
So what do you think? Did Geller have his knickers in a twist over nothing?
Or isn’t it more likely that some shows (maybe not most, but SOME) are much more dependent on the ingenuity of their scripting than others? (I’d say the same thing applies to movies, too, but that’s for another post).
March 4th, 2013 at 10:34 pm
My point is there are a variety of factors that make any TV series or movie successful. When it comes to weekly TV series it can survive weeks of bad plots if the viewer cares about the characters. If they don’t care about the characters you can’t survive a couple of bad plots. And yes, you do not need deep characters for people to grow attached to them.
I remember my days trying to break in as a writer for Remington Steele. Michael Gleason might complain in public about how hard it was to find writers who could write a good TV mystery, but in my story meeting with Elliot Lewis he told me my problem was I hadn’t gotten the voice of the characters right.
I could have the world’s greatest plot and mystery and it would mean little unless the characters fit.
We watch TV for different reasons. Many seek mindless entertainment while others seek programs that educate and enlighten. I certainly do not want to say the plot means nothing, nor that one thing means more than another with every TV series ever made, but what I have found the average viewer remembers most about any TV series is the characters and who played them.
March 4th, 2013 at 11:05 pm
“…but what I have found the average viewer remembers most about any TV series is the characters and who played them.”
Yeah, I would agree with that. A notable exception, of course, are those now-unfashionable anthology shows such as TWILIGHT ZONE, OUTER LIMITS, THRILLER, NIGHT GALLERY, etc. where plot pretty much trumped everything.
Whenever people talk about them it is always in terms of story. “Remember the one,” they’ll say, “where the old lady is swatting at the tiny invaders who turn out to be astronauts from Earth?!” or “What about the one where the pilot from WWII ends up in the present day?”
Etc.
March 5th, 2013 at 11:15 am
#36, filmklassik, I do hope you join the conversation here more, especially the new posts where more people will notice.
Isn’t it interesting that the most remembered and arguably successful anthology shows had a host? Would TWILIGHT ZONE been as popular without Rod Serling or ALFRED HITCHCOCK without whats his name? The host is what made the show more than just random stories.
My favorite episode of TWILIGHT ZONE was “Time Enough At Last.” You know the one with the timid book reader who survives the WWIII and sits down to enjoy a lifetime of reading without interruptions and breaks his glasses. It starred Burgess Meredith. The story has huge problems if you think about it, but the O. Henry twist at the end was so emotionally powerful you ignore such things as if paper books survived I am sure there is an eyeglasses shop with product left.