2007-03-14

Top Five Dumbed Down Docutainment Shows

Personally, I'm a fan of no-frills advertising but it don't half lead to some vulgar brand names, like If You Think This Is Butter I'll Smash Your Fucking Head In (or whatever that margarine is called).

In broadcasting, the theory is seemingly that your ch-average viewer, if he/she can actually read a newspaper, won't, so you'd better give your show the most descriptive title possible if you want to grab his/her attention before something shiny distracts him/her.

5. Who Do You Think You Are?
4. I'm A Celebrity, Get Me Out Of Here!
3. Honey, We're Killing The Kids
2. Help! My Dog's As Fat As Me
1. £50 Says You'll Watch This

It's idiotic lowest-common-denominator stuff and it's everywhere.

7 Comments:

Blogger Basquiat Scrawls said...

Are they actually real? What the hell is no 2 about? Do they put the dog and owner on the same diet? Wierd!

23:45  
Blogger thisismarcus said...

They're real, alright.

Dunno about #2 but #1 is about a guy with a gambling problem and on #3 they use computer imaging to show what your kids will look like in 40 years if you feed them crap. #5 is actually quite a good show about ancestry on the History channel.

12:24  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

I have to admit I like Honey, We're Killing the Kids. Do they have a British version they show there? If television programs are going to make money, I'd at least prefer them to do something productive like make fat people not so fat. Also, they tend to make bratty kids not so bratty, which is another public service.

22:54  
Blogger thisismarcus said...

Your point has merit but I still hate those programmes. More than the shows themselves I hate the way any pretense at artistry goes out of the window and they aggressively try to hook you into watching with the names.

20:17  
Blogger Trundling Grunt said...

I'm still waiting for them to make "Eat Bugs For Money" - that's a show I'd watch.

00:38  
Blogger The Paranoid Mod said...

Charlie Brooker invented a tv show called "Wanking for Coins" on his TVGoHome site years ago, and we're almost there...

22:18  
Blogger Trundling Grunt said...

only for coins? Man they're cheap. But I'll bet they still have to turn away people at the door.

00:50  

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