Best Fictional Series on TV

Well, there's nothing for it then. You and I are through. Please come pick up your cheesy records. Oh, and tell your mother that I said her feet stink.

Well, you can have the year's supply of Cheeze Whiz and the store bought pretzels! I guess I'm an HBO/Showtime junky (it helps not having to plow through all the commercials to really get connected to a dramatic or comedy show). Everytime I see "staff of writers" on a show, I can only think of, "a horse is a camel designed my a committe" In that way, I'm an Ayn Rand objectivist in that I believe that the only great things in this world are creations of individuals. Collectivism is one of the aspects of the liberal philosophy that is anethema but the Jefferson's liberalism has been just as warped by modern politicians as Monroe's conservatism.

LW

I understand your objection to team artistic endeavors, but I'd argue you are being too absolute (and the film medium is a perfect example). Even more to the point, the Simpsons, though written by a team, I think has produced some of the most engaging satire in American letters in half a century.

Only a few films have rose to be considered great movies with multiple writers on the script -- most studio staff writers in the Golden Age of Hollywood were editors, not script writers. Multiple writers has torpoed more projects than I could put in a large book. But they were unable to utilize any important writers like F. Scott Fitzgerald or Gore Vidal as they should and the films are not memorable, although "The Best Man" is also an exceptional film with an incredible script following the play almost to the letter.
"Casablanca" was being written in conferances as it was being filmed and that is one big exception to the rule. "Gone With the Wind" still suffers for me from glaring script problems that are mostly made fun of in lampoons. Stanley Kubrick was the director and writer on most of his films and even if he had a script like the one turned in by Nabokov for "Lolita," he felt is was not cinematic and rewrote the entire script with a more black comedy viewpoint. Nabakov, of course, was miffed but I think Kubrick was right -- look at the remake as it's almost inert. I've had this debate recently on Abuzz about how strong the director should have control over the final product. If you look at the list of ten top films on Sight and Sound's last survey of directors and critics, they are all director's films with strong scripts written by one writer. There's always going to be editing as the script is performed for the cameras because it may not be that the written word in a novel doesn't come across on the screen as written. I just believe "The West Wing" would be far more effective with one really brilliant screenwriter. The controversy that is injected into the series is tepid at best. If they really were exposing politics for what it was, the show would look more like "The Sopranos!."
Incidentally, Alan Ball ("American Beauty,") who is behind "Six Feet Under" wrote the first script and provides outlines for each subsequent writer -- that does seem to work as you're never conscious of it. I realize those who don't get HBO or Showtime are at a disadvantage here because they have nothing to compare shows like "CSI" and "The West Wing."

LW

By alluding to film as an example of team artistic endeavours, I was thinking of the whole process, but your point about authorship of screenplays is well taken.

I don't get HBO or Showtime, so haven't seen 6 feet under, and am waiting for the CBC to pick it up (hoping). They have carried Sopranos, and I'm a fan, but I'm personally much more impressed with the writing for West Wing. I guess we have to make room for subjective taste here. It would be unseemly of me to just flat out insist that you are terribly terribly wrong.

The HBO series are available to buy or rent on DVD/VHS. Alan Ball is just one of the few geniuses writing for the media and is the guiding production force behind "Six Feet Under." I just find "The West Wing" has become too prosaic for my taste but as Oscar Wilde said, "One man's meat is another man's poison." Well, I don't exactly believe TWW is poison and I can sit through one of the new episodes -- it's just because I come out unsatisfied. Politics is much more conniving and repelling then they come close to suggesting. Of course, if they really told the story of what goes on behind closed doors, we'd be disgusted and they'd likely get driven off the air, a la "The Smothers Brothers." Actually, the comedy shows like Jon Stewart's "The Daily Show" often turn over the slimy underbelly of politics and that's because they can make it palatable with humor.

btw, I did like the first two seasons of "The West Wing" and thought the writing was high level for TV.

Wow. I hardly know any of these shows... except Friends which I watch with my teenage kids, when they're home.

Uhm, nobody watches BBC America? I adored and watched every episode two or three times of Ballykissangel. It's not showing now, I don't know why. I have watched about three episodes of Monarch of the Glen, they actually have new episodes as of this season. I'd seen all the other twice when they came out a couple of years ago.

BBC has a great programming thing where they'll play all the episodes of one of their series over a weekend... It'll be an AbFab weekend, or a Monarch of the Glen weekend. That's how I found BallyK -- a weekend when I was ill and sitting on the couch.

As for these American shows... hmmm. We're even getting HBO free for the next 20 months. I just can't get interested.

I think that The Sopranos is the best tv drama I've ever seen. The characters are complex, the writing is gritty, and the plots are filled with portent.

As for the major networks, I enjoy CSI, but I don't think it's the best ever. I'm thinking maybe Hill Street Blues or St. Elsewhere. And I may have to throw in Law and Order. It's the energizer bunny of tv. It just keeps going and going.

Roberta? Is that you??? Hiya! Hiya! How ya doin'?

Doyou like any of BBC shows? The Brits seem to enjoy crime drama too, the best of theirs is, I think, Inspector Morse.

I used to watch a show about a police precinct in NYC... can't think of the name, it was about 15 years ago. Most of their audience moved to Hill Street Blues and one of the coolest characters now sells (sob) furniture.

Morse was good stuff but I`m more of a Columbo fan.
"Excuse me Sir,just one more thing..."
Saw a brilliant episode just last night:"Etude in Black" with John Casavettes who was probably in the show to earn enough $$$ to complete one of his films starring Peter Falk.

Oh yeah, Columbo was good. Is that still going or are you watching re-runs?

I just saw Peter Falk in a good movie... hmmm, can't recall -- nothing to do with Columbo or war. Ahh, I checked his filmography... Lake Boat. I liked it. Slow, too slow. But I still really liked it.

OK... here's a new twist.....

South Park

My daughter got me started on this show, and I think it's really funny!!

Hi Piff,

Oui, c'est moi. I don't get BBC programs, so I can't say whether I like them or not. The only ones I see are on PBS. Masterpiece Theatre. Some I like; some I don't.

R

Re-runs Piffka.

Hiya Roberta - mon ami!

No BBC? sigh, it is my weakness. That and SkySports.

Luckily I can iron clothes and watch TV at the same time when I feel the need to rationalize or be productive.

It is Sunday. A big night for TV!

Hebba? 'Merican Re-runs in Copenhagen? Really! Do you get to see the BBC?

I grew up with BBC Piffka and you won´t believe how much American dross is re-run over here.There´s actually a couple of channels that ONLY show American re-runs.Terrible stuff too.I wouldn´t mind if it was "Starsky & Hutch" or "Kojak" but it´s "Walker:Texas Ranger" or the likes.Another reason why I hardly EVER watch the box.
BBC can be seen if one has cable or satellite which of course I do not.

Yeah, what's that all about?? Maybe they're cheap to broadcast??

No wonder everybody hates us... they see the very worst.

Yes, it is cheap broadcasting, precisely. Which also explains the horrid movies we see again and again here in Canada.

I would have to say the Xfiles.

Only because I felt I simultaneously created it. Once upon a time in Toronto back in 1983 I was asked by happening television producing friend to submit a TV proposal. I called it " Aaron Quest PHOTOGRAPHER " I fashioned the lead character after myself a freelance photographer who uses a pendulum to solve mysteries and help people. The Photogragher also gravitated towards the mystical, and through his freelance assignments and job for a weekly magazine photographing celebrities, he would find way into mystical adventures.

I gave him a red haired assistant, who was his studio manager and assistant. I got this charecter from having just read about the red haired Vampire in an Anne Rice Novel.

Well, we had the meeting, I was deamed too excitable and my idea was declaired truely Corny . That was the last time that friend and I ever talked about collaborative process's or anything else really.

A few years later after hearing about the Xfiles show, I saw one and said Ohmygod ! This guy has about the same kind of adventures I had.

You see in my proposal I had to give 12 sample show themes. Now these weren't exactly the same or was this show like mine, but after travelling the world twice and hanging out with the Holy people and mysticals I learned alot about Sprits and Legends.

Plus the only show I ever liked as a kid was Johnny Quest or Rod Sterlings Twilight zone and Night Gallery. Add Castanada's The Teachings of Don Juan and the role model of Gandaulf and you have me.

I had a wealth of possible ideas and adventures for my Aaron Quest from having travelled so much throughout the world.
Anyhow, I don't think my proposal had anything to do with that show. But at least I knew I had created it first.

Algis? Really? You interest me strangely!