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On the Yoofication of television
Jan. 6th, 2009 03:06 pmWhen I was little "yoof" tv was the television directed at 18-24 year olds, totally incomprehensible to anyone outside of that age group, in order to attract that age group. Now, while the topic I'm going to talk about isn't directly that, I think it's related. Because, the "yoof" tv today is not directed at them, it's directed at 16-20 year olds, and as I'm only 24 I refuse to be too old for Saturday night television.
I haven't watched Merlin, so the comments I am about to make are not a diss to it, it's merely being used as an example of the phenomenon.
So TV wanted to do an Arthurian legend show, but wanted to concentrate on Merlin, figuring, quite sensibly, that he's a far more interesting character. They want to concentrate on his youth, again, while I have no fondness of 'growing pains' fiction, I can see why other people might. But you wanted the traditional Arthurian trappings, so knights and so on and so forth. Therefore they warp and spindle mythology to their needs when they really don't need to. Any one of the 500 million mythological Merlin growing up tales contains plenty of intrigue and rumour, and while they may lack sword fighting, you can right that in easily enough.
Or, and this would be how I'd do it, I'd have Arthur growing up and a mysterious boy who appears and gets left in his general vicinity by Merlin who goes off on one of his jaunts that he's quite famous for. Boy can be brought up by Gaius still, there'd have to be some changes to Uther's story re: magic, or maybe there's a crackdown after Merlin leaves because he's run out on Pendragon, again, or whatever. Mysterious boy gets exactly the same story as Merlin has now, complete with a name like Myrddin or Emrys or Ambrosius so that the twist is obvious and hidden. Because Merlin, grown up, can time travel or something similar, in some of the myths, so they can have their obscure urge for having no active characters over the age of 30 and they don't have to break the myths I enjoy.
Some time ago, Opera (I think) posted a thing on how parents or pseudo-parents in wrestling fan-fic seem to have no function other than to be sexless and not partake in the plot. There job is to act as Greek chorus and nanny for the lead characters who have all the fun, they have no motivation of their own, etc. And we're heading towards that in modern tv, and well it annoys me. When Donna Noble at 35-ish gets called old, we have a problem, probably with society as a whole. But then I start ranting and raving so I shall stop.
In no way brought on by the 11th Doctor being only 2 years older than I am, and my general viewpoint that younger actors don't have the range of older actors. That, my friends, is a rant for another day, which will feature Michael Caine as the example. There's also a secondary rant related to Merlin about the removal of any sex from stories that is not mainstream heterosexual sex, but that's also a rant for another day, which also drags in my review of the American Italian Job.
I haven't watched Merlin, so the comments I am about to make are not a diss to it, it's merely being used as an example of the phenomenon.
So TV wanted to do an Arthurian legend show, but wanted to concentrate on Merlin, figuring, quite sensibly, that he's a far more interesting character. They want to concentrate on his youth, again, while I have no fondness of 'growing pains' fiction, I can see why other people might. But you wanted the traditional Arthurian trappings, so knights and so on and so forth. Therefore they warp and spindle mythology to their needs when they really don't need to. Any one of the 500 million mythological Merlin growing up tales contains plenty of intrigue and rumour, and while they may lack sword fighting, you can right that in easily enough.
Or, and this would be how I'd do it, I'd have Arthur growing up and a mysterious boy who appears and gets left in his general vicinity by Merlin who goes off on one of his jaunts that he's quite famous for. Boy can be brought up by Gaius still, there'd have to be some changes to Uther's story re: magic, or maybe there's a crackdown after Merlin leaves because he's run out on Pendragon, again, or whatever. Mysterious boy gets exactly the same story as Merlin has now, complete with a name like Myrddin or Emrys or Ambrosius so that the twist is obvious and hidden. Because Merlin, grown up, can time travel or something similar, in some of the myths, so they can have their obscure urge for having no active characters over the age of 30 and they don't have to break the myths I enjoy.
Some time ago, Opera (I think) posted a thing on how parents or pseudo-parents in wrestling fan-fic seem to have no function other than to be sexless and not partake in the plot. There job is to act as Greek chorus and nanny for the lead characters who have all the fun, they have no motivation of their own, etc. And we're heading towards that in modern tv, and well it annoys me. When Donna Noble at 35-ish gets called old, we have a problem, probably with society as a whole. But then I start ranting and raving so I shall stop.
In no way brought on by the 11th Doctor being only 2 years older than I am, and my general viewpoint that younger actors don't have the range of older actors. That, my friends, is a rant for another day, which will feature Michael Caine as the example. There's also a secondary rant related to Merlin about the removal of any sex from stories that is not mainstream heterosexual sex, but that's also a rant for another day, which also drags in my review of the American Italian Job.
