Monsters of Television

“I keep letting myself fall into bad patterns.”

So I’ve fallen way behind on watching Dallas. A lot of this was due to just feeling tired on Wednesdays for some reason, and a little bit of it was just forgetting that the show was on Wednesdays in the first place. But I’m all caught up and ready to go.

Except that I’m kind of yawning a bit. The structural issue with Dallas was laid out in the premiere when it established pretty much everything it was going to do, all the schemes that were in play. The rest of the reason was always going to be how it all unraveled, and there’s something a bit dull about watching plans collapse as opposed to watching plans come into fruition. Read more »

“Don’t believe me, do you?”
“Excuse me, brother, but no, I don’t.”

I’ve never seen a single episode of the original Dallas. I was only six years old when it ended it’s 14 season run in 1991 (plus various TV movies and reunion specials), and the series was never really on my syndication radar (I don’t think I’ve ever seen it in syndication, though it has been syndicated in limited capacities). I’m familiar with it, then, only in reading TV histories, clips of the series in “TV’s best [whatever]…”, and pop culture parody and homage.

Which doesn’t exactly make me the best person to talk about the show since TNT’s Dallas is more of a continuation than a reimagining or reboot of the original series. But that doesn’t mean I don’t recognize its influences. Dallas popularized the use of the season-ending cliffhanger after the “Who shot J.R.?” season finale, and as we’re all aware now, the cliffhanger is pretty much way to end lots of shows, even sitcoms sometimes, these days (his likely explains, by the way, the show’s lack of syndicated presence following its conclusion).

As a result, I’m more likely to discuss ways in which this new Dallas feels a lot like other shows that are, in turn, likely indebted to the original Dallas. If anything, this version of Dallas perhaps represents the final segment of a snake eating itself. Read more »