Why Canadian TV Guide Really Sucks Bad
- From: "Ppffhhtt" <Ppffhhtt@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
- Date: 24 Dec 2005 10:31:24 -0800
Got the latest bad joke issue of a TV Guide that Maureen Goldman here
complained about earlier this week. Granted, it's only a special issue
covering a two-week period that they seem to be testing out as a
possible future format change, but it's stupid! It has absolutely
nothing to do with TV or TV listings in any way that's relevant to a
power viewer, or even a laidback occasional one.
Let's break it down by pages, alright?
1 - Contents - Okay, no problem there
2 - Editor's Letter - Fine
3 - Ad - Sure, why not
4-9 - Tuned In - Now we're running into problems. Every piece of item
says absolutely nothing about what I'm supposed to be getting out of
TV. We learn the combined age of the Rolling Stones - 245. Yeah, so?
We learn Tom Green is promoting his rap album. Yeah, so? We learn the
total running time of music created by The Beatles - 10 hours 28
minutes. Yeah, so? We learn which small towns Canadian actors
appearing on U.S. TV shows came from, and what those towns are noted
for. Eh? We see two misplaced items for new shows Book of Daniel and
Four Kings. Aren't they supposed to be featured in some winter preview
issue, and why only those two? And the idiocy goes on.
10 - P.O.V. - The resident critic talks about the only show worth
watching, Lost. He keeps spinning the same propoganda about how
intriguing the show is, and it seems like this has been going on every
third issue in the magazine. Get over it already, it's nothing but a
lame Gilligan''s Island without the badly needed laughs.
11 - The Critics - A dialogue rant between two critics over the pros
and cons of the CSI shows. Now this would've been interesting had they
actually had real critics debating this in the dialogue format for two
or three pages. But what we have is barely half-a-page worth of two
nobodies bantering in the fluffiest of terms, i.e Greg: "Good Lord - I
think I'd watch that." Steph: "Heh - me too." Dumbed down to the
extreme or what?
12-17 - Style - Now we come to the really good part of the magazine. I
never understood what fashion had anything to do with watching TV.
Still, we're blessed with six wasted pages of it.
18-20 - Food - Again, what does food have to do with watching TV?
Sure, I'm going to go through the trouble of cooking up a spaghetti
alla carbonara just before I sit down to watch Las Vegas. I'm more
likely to order a pizza are munch on a bag of chips.
21 - Homes - And again we're treated to subject matter that's totally
irrelevant to TV, being what several nobody actors do for the holidays
in their homes. They don't want to know what I do, who cares what they
do?
22-24 - DVD - This could be a more informative section if it relied on
the new TV-related releases of the week. Instead, with the exception
of Gunsmoke, it's all about movies.
25 - Ad
26-27 - Tech - The latest gadgets for home entertainment. I can live
with that.
28 - Hall of Fame - A useless entry on how terrific Oprah Winfrey is.
29 - Ad
30-31 - Feature on Michelle Rodrigues (again with the Lost). Now this
is really sad. Whereas in the past a profile of an actor would run 2-4
pages, this one barely has a one-third page write-up, with the the top
two-thirds of it devoted to the heading 'Lost Girl' and the second page
to a full-page photo of her. Waste of space or what?
32-33 - A two-page photo spread of the flatulent-filled Corner Gas
sitcom set. My life is complete.
34-37 - Prison Break article. Finally, the first comparatively
substantial piece of the issue. Despite the four page count, the
article is only about two pages long since it's printed in only the
bottom half of each page with the top half devoted to pictures.
38 - Behind the Scenes - 11 little lines on Ty Pennington on a
full-page photo of him. I learned nothing of any value in those 11
little lines.
39 - Ad
40-44 - TV Guide Exclusive: Christmas on Wisteria Lane. Cast members
are asked how they're spending Christmas. Nobody asks me, I don't want
to know how they're doing it either. Five wasted pages.
45-46 - Feature on Dr. Who. It's not a lengthy piece, but it's worthy
of inclusion since there is a new guy on the show as Dr. Who.
47-49 - Feature of Trailer Park Boys. One of the three pages is a
full-page photo. Do I have to see those three ugly mugs as a full-page
photo?
50-51 - Something to Talk About - A spread on what's going on with the
various talk shows. Gossipy in snippet format.
52-54 - Feature on a TV-movie, Human Trafficking, starring Mila
Sorvino. As usual, one of the three pages is devoted to a full-page
photo, but at least it's Mila and not Trailer Park Boys.
55 - Ad
56-57 - Test Your IQ Game. Yeah, okay, it's mindless fun, not like it
hasn't been done before in the Golden Age of TV.
58 - Ask Brian. Trivia questions answered.
59 - Ad
Finally, the Listings!
60-123 - But hey! What's this? Where are all the shows? Where are
all the channels? Where's daytime, late night? How come there's only
about 10 shows listed per column? How come the columns are lined up in
genres? Is this a new revisionist kind of grid format? I don't
understand. And the colors ... all those colors, like a rainbow. But
how come I can't make any comparisons as to what else is on at the same
time on other channels? How come I'm supposed to use my brain to
interpret and follow this scattered approach? How come most of the
programs listed, and it looks like 95% of them, describe shows that no
one watches on channels that no one gets? But the colors ... all those
colors... What universe was this magazine printed in? I'm ... lost.
124-125 - Crossword - It's been around for ages and it's fun.
126-127 - Astrology - Another example of something with no relation to
TV in a magazine that's supposed to be about TV.
128 - Up Next. A full-page promo write-up for a new limited-run comedy
series, Getting Along Famously.
Well, that turned out to be a gruelling experience. Obviously, what we
have here is a failure to communicate - the failure of a magazine to be
a magazine truly about TV. If it's not going to be a meaningful
publication in the sense of whatever features or articles it prints,
then it should at least be a meaningful one when it comes to listings.
Of course, the problem with listings now is that there are too many
channels out there to list, but I think nobody would complain if only
the main channels were fully listed, being all the analogue ones and
whatever cable channels that are included in your area on the basic
service, or to simplify it, just the Top 50 viewed channels or so.
Who needs the listings for The Sewing Network on channel 479 when only
18 people watch it?
Personally, I gave up on TV Guide ages ago. I even became disenchanted
with it when it became a Canadian edition in 1977. The listings
weren't the problem then, but gradually the articles and features
became fewer and blander - thank you very much Canadian content
regulations - until they all practically disappeared in favour of
vacant fluff. I held on till the listings themselves began to suffer a
few years back. The fact that TV Guide in Canada keeps going through
all these format changes - about 10 in the last 2 or 3 years, is it? -
only goes to show that the people running the magazine haven't got a
clue as to what makes for a good and viable TV Guide. They have no
vision for the magazine, otherwise why all the changes? The magazine
can still succeed but it needs to get its backbone back, which is the
listings, and do it in a way that makes sense. There's no way it can
try to print out all the listings for every channel out there, so it
needs to stick to a number to keep itself sane, and something like a
Top 50 channel list is what it should aim for and not exceed itself
beyond that. Then it needs to make the magazine really worth buying by
printing features and articles not found anywhere else. All they're
printing now is just dime-a-dozen material and the worst kind of it,
too.
The verdict on this special issue: It's nothing more than a high school
production or a lazy publisher's version of what TV Guide should look
like.
And that's why Canadian TV Guide Really Sucks Bad. I hear the U.S. one
now is not that much better either.
.
- Follow-Ups:
- Re: Why Canadian TV Guide Really Sucks Bad
- From: Steven L.
- Re: Why Canadian TV Guide Really Sucks Bad
- Prev by Date: Re: Desperate Housewives Holiday Show?
- Next by Date: New TV Guide SUCKS ROYAL
- Previous by thread: House Munchausen Question
- Next by thread: Re: Why Canadian TV Guide Really Sucks Bad
- Index(es):
Relevant Pages
|
