GLEE!

On the surface level, Glee looks like it is a very diverse show that pushes typical boundaries and stereotypes. With such a diverse cast, this appears to be the truth, however, after watching the pilot, the show seems to revert to typical stereotypes that are often played out in television shows.

In his engaging article “Stage Left: Glee and the textual politics of difference,” Lucas Hilderbrand discusses the pilot episode of Glee. In the first episode, while all of the characters are given face time, the audience is given extensive background information about Rachel and Finn, the two white lead characters. All of the other characters, which include Artie, a paraplegic, Mercedes, an overweight black girl and Kurt, a homosexual white boy, receive very little attention. Hilderbrand goes so far as to say “The rest of the cast seemed like set dressing.”

I really think that Hilderbrand is on to something, however, when he says “I have no actual access to network scheming, but this seemed to reek of the logic that the show had to be palatable enough for mainstream ratings before the minorities would incrementally get their own numbers and subplots.” Lets face it, America is pretty critical and still by some terms very conservative. I’m sure network executives were fearful of producing a show that pushed the limits too much early on in a new series. They probably thought that they needed to maintain a steady, consistent viewership before delving into more controversial topics; after all, they are all about the ratings.

Hilderbrand argues that Glee, in its second season, is now starting to create actual storylines that are somewhat ground breaking for television in their controversiality. In its diversity, however surface level it may have initially been, Glee allowed itself the room to create such controversial storylines, and for that I commend it and hope that it continues to further develop characters other than the main white characters.

Lastly, as I side note I have to ask: did anyone else find it odd that Quinn, the cheerleader, was the head of the celibacy club when thinking back to The Secret Life of the American Teenager where Grace was also very religious and committed to abstinence? I, personally found it to be an odd coincidence and wonder what it suggests about millennial religiosity especially when (SPOILER ALERT) both girls end up ignoring their pledges.

Survivor

The show I ended up watching for the first time was just one that I stumbled upon on TV. Many years ago, when the first season came out I admittedly watched the show, but I have not seen it since and I have heard that there are many differences now compared to back then. Survivor is on its unprecedented 22nd season. Arguably, Survivor was the first reality TV game show to take off and has continued to succeed for the past 11 years.

The specific name of the show this year is Survivor: Redemption Island. Redemption Island is the twist of the season. When a member is voted out during tribal council, instead of immediately being sent home, they are sent to Redemption Island where they are secluded from everyone else. The next time someone is voted out they, too, go to Redemption Island and those two members compete in a duel. The winner gets to remain on the show at Redemption Island and the loser goes home. In the episode I watched, which was not the pilot or even the first episode of the 22^nd season, the duel taking place at Redemption Island was crucial. You see, every once in a while on the show, the winner of the battle at Redemption Island is allowed to leave Redemption Island and get back into the game: its their second life.

In this episode, Matt, who had won 5 consecutive battles at Redemption Island to remain in the game, faced Sarita. The challenge was one that tested physical and mental strength. They needed to “use [their] arms to brace [themselves] against two walls while [their] bare feet are perched on very narrow footholds. Every 15 minutes [they’d] move [their] feet to smaller footholds.” There were only three levels of footholds so when they got to the last row, there was no time limit. These footholds were about a half inch, quarter inch, and eighth of an inch thick.

Matt ended up winning the challenge and the two tribes were forced to merge into one tribe. Back at the camp, Matt was conflicted with whom to side with: his old tribe that voted him out, or the other tribe that was trying to persuade him to jump ship. He ended up staying with his old tribe and voting the way that they told him to. Unfortunately for him, he was “played” and instead of voting for Steve, they all voted for Matt, and he was once again sent back to Redemption Island. Matt seemed to be a threat to many people because he is such a competitor and I wouldn’t want to be the next one sent to Redemption Island to face him. Overall it was pretty intriguing and I can see how it has remained so successful. 

Gossip Girl

I’m an avid Gossip Girl watcher, but never, would I have characterized it as noir prior to this week. Admittedly, however, I can’t say that I have put too much time into thinking what the show could be marked as. I accepted it pretty much at face value, as a teen, girl soap opera/ drama that many girls (including myself) enjoyed.

After reading Stein’s article this week on Millennial Noir, I have reconsidered the genre of Gossip Girl. At first I was skeptical of how Gossip Girl could be characterized as noir. Stein’s article, in conjunction with the episode from the screening, however, were fairly convincing of the “noirness” of the show.

Certainly the type of noir that Stein is referring to is not the typical kind of noir that most people would think of; instead it is a reworking of traditional noir. Stein suggests that through a combination of millennial and noir aspects, this series (along with Veronica Mars and Supernatural) has reworked the idea of typical noir into a more millennial noir. Braithwaite even uses the term “double architecture” to describe the joining of teen and noir.

Gossip Girl serves as a good example of this double architecture and reworking of traditional noir into a sort of millennial noir. Rather than having a femme fatale, as is typically the case in traditional noir, Gossip girl reworks this idea of noir “inverting and exposing noir gender/ power expectations” by using home fatales (Stein 9). Along those gender power inversion lines, the female characters are the ones who have the power. And not just the female characters, Stein is careful to note that it is the teenage female characters that hold the power, exposing generational differences.

In this particular episode, Blair (most prominently) and Serena hold the power. They are the ones whose actions and evidence eventually led to firing of the new teacher. It is interesting to me the role that technology has taken in this show. While the female characters are the ones who hold the power in this show, it is the technology of cellphones and the Internet that allow this to be possible. Without Blair’s original post on Gossip Girl that circulated a rumor about inappropriate relations between Dan and the teacher, she would have been limited in her power. Without cellphone picture taking capabilities, Serena would have never been able to provide evidence for Blair’s claim. Thus, I think it is safe to say that in these reworkings of traditional noir films and television shows like Gossip Girl and Veronica Mars, females certainly have been given more power, but it is also imperative to note the presence and power of technology that gives them such power. 

Bethenny

This week I decided to watch Bethenny Ever After, which is a spin off of the Real Housewives of NYC, but much better. The Bravo! show follows the life of Bethenny Frankel (the creator of skinny girl margarita), her husband Jason Hoppy and their daughter Bryn.

Bethenny was always one of my favorite personalities on RHONYC so I was excited to hear that she got her own show. She is extremely witty and sarcastic and her commentary is always hilarious. Also, after watching one episode the viewer can tell that she definitely wears the pants in the relationship.

In this episode, Bethenny, Jason, Bryn and their dog, Cookie, take a trip to visit Jason’s parents in a small town in Pennsylvania. The trip to get there proves to be a nightmare and it takes them forever to just get out of the city. Once they finally arrive, it is clear how excited the grandparents are to see Bryn. They hint at wanting to see her more often. Jason loves his family dearly and would seemingly be happy to visit them every weekend, but Bethenny feels very differently. She expresses her strong feelings that they do not visit more than once a month. I couldn’t believe how open she was about this topic in front of Jason’s parents. To me, it seemed fairly rude and somewhat thoughtless (Plus the fact that I could never imagine being so blunt in front of my mother and father in law). Jason becomes visibly upset by Bethenny’s lack of regard for his parents feelings. Things end up getting settled but there certainly was some tension.

The episode also features Bethenny going out to get drinks with Jason’s friends from his past. She thinks that they’re a group of characters, but thinks they’re great, nonetheless. They are extremely welcoming with Bethenny and offer to include her in their “family.” Bethenny is touched by this outreach especially because of her own family life, or lack there of.

Overall, I enjoyed the show. Bethenny is hilarious and I’m happy that she was given her own spinoff. I think it could be interesting to see how this show does ratings wise compared to a Real Housewives series, specifically, RHONYC.

Twilight Moms

Cathy Leogrande’s article on mother daughter bonding proved to be the most interesting article for me this week. I like twilight, but by no means am I a die-hard fan. I usually associate teenage girls with this series. I envision girls screaming over Edward Cullen. Leogrande’s article made me question these stereotypes. Leogrande suggested that young teenagers weren’t the only ones who were enjoying the books and the movies. Mothers, she argues, are also active fans. She makes a convincing argument that mothers and daughters shared enjoyment of the twilight series allowed for them to engage in conversation that without such common ground, they likely would not have.

In her study of the connections made between mothers and daughters through the series, Leogrande spoke with numerous mothers and daughters. The interviewees seemed to mimic her belief that mothers and daughters forged closer bonds because of the series. One daughter reiterates Leogrande’s point of the great conversations sparked by Twilight saying, “Sometimes we’d talk for hours about all sorts of things, and I’d think, ‘How did we get to this from talking about Edward and Bella?’” I think that this quote highlights the relatability of the movie because it allows for mothers and daughters to relate events in the series to events in their lives and allows for an open dialogue between the two family members. At first glance, most people may think that they have little in common with a series that revolves around werewolves and vampires, but there are clearly a lot of ways for people to relate.

Thinking about this older generation appreciating the movies, I wanted to accept her suggestion of googiling twilight and finding twilight moms as a popular query. I came across a website entitled twilightmoms.com that had a discussion forum filled with various threads. Clearly, Leogrande was right, based on the sheer size of this website, there is definitely an interest in twilight that ranges beyond the millennial generation. Something that I found interesting was that on a thread called “How many times have you seen it & who you went with,” it appeared that many moms weren’t just going to see the movies with their daughters, they were going with other women their age from book clubs, husbands and even sons. While there was a presence of mothers going with daughters, I found it interesting to note how many mothers were even going without their daughters. 

If you look at the two texts (movie vs. book), I definitely think that there is a greater possibility for discussion after the book, but the movies nonetheless are interesting to compare to the movies. In my opinion, the writing is definitely better than the visual representation, but seeing how the writing was interpreted and presented was definitely interesting. This series is captivating for many people and its applicable and somewhat significant themes allow for mothers and daughters to discuss beyond just the text.

Lie To Me

I hope that everyone is enjoying the end of their spring breaks. I went to Punta Cana for 6 days with some of my friends and had a great time. Trying to avoid a lot of phone charges for using my phone in another country, I turned off my data package, which left me Internet and email free for the whole time. When we finally landed at Newark on a rainy Thursday afternoon, I turned my Internet back on and was hit with a flood of emails. One of them was an invite from Professor Jason Mittell to an advanced screening of an upcoming episode of The Chicago Code, which was produced by a Middlebury Alum. When I read the email, I saw that Shawn Ryan ’88 had also produced Lie To Me (among many other noteworthy shows). Lie to Me was a show that I have been meaning to watch for a while because of the high reviews my friends have given it. This email was just what I needed to spark my interest in the show.

The pilot opens with Dr. Cal Lightman questioning a supposed criminal. Cal questions the suspect, but instead of trying to solve the crime by listening to the suspect’s answers, he reads the suspects facial expressions and involuntary body language. You see, no words are necessary for Cal to solve the crime; he is a prominent deception expert that helps law enforcement solve crimes using this technique.

In the first minute, Cal drops a shocking statistic: an average person lies 3 times in every ten minutes. That boggled my mind. Being called a liar is probably one of the worst things I think someone could be called, but this statistic suggests that not only is everyone lying, they’re doing it a lot.

One of my favorite parts of the episode came when Cal seemed to be giving a lecture on reading body language and facial expressions to an auditorium full of people. He broke down the interview that the show opened up with and paused the interview at certain parts to show certain facial expressions and body movements that the suspect made and explained what each of them meant. Each reflected a different emotion that gave Cal information related to the crime. To the average eye, many people would not pick up on these, but in freeze frame, these emotions become clear. Cal then went on to show the audience pictures of many recognizable people from well-known public criminal cases. He placed images on the screen of some of these people making the same body movements or facial expressions that signify a certain emotion. For example, he put a picture of Hugh Grant, Marilyn Monroe, and Bill Clinton sided by side, showing them making the same facial expressions and hand gestures. Cal suggested that this particular look signifies shame. After going through a few examples like these, he says “Emotion looks the same whether you’re a suburban housewife or a suicide bomber. The truth is written on all of our faces.” This quote is backed up by the pictures he shows and really makes the viewer rethink how we question people to get to the truth.

Writing this blog post the day after I saw the episode, I can honestly say that I have found myself on numerous occasions thinking about my own facial expressions and what they suggest. Having Cals’s ability to read body language and facial expressions to get to the truth would certainly be cool, but I don’t know if I necessarily would want to be able to do this all the time—I think I might go crazy if people are actually telling lies 3 times every ten minutes on average.