I don’t watch a lot of Canadian television shows. For the most part they’re pretty bad.
Don’t get me wrong: I’m really proud of the arts in Canada. There are some very good programs in place to see that people have the wherewithal to produce art in our country.
But Canadian-produced television — as a general rule — is really substandard when compared with British and American television. I won’t name names here because that’s fairly rude. Cold Squad, you know who you are.
(Okay. Maybe I lied just a little there.)
There are exceptions. Da Vinci’s Inquest is quite brilliant, and, in my opinion, better than every other crime drama on television. Made in Canada was brilliant, though sometimes quite painful to watch.
For this reason I was a little slow getting around to trying Corner Gas. I like sitcoms. I like the stand-up comedian star, Brent Butt. And the commercials for the show made it look kind of cute.
But I don’t want to be forced to like a Canadian show simply because it’s a Canadian show.
All that has changed. For the past several weeks Sarah and I have been watching it whenever we get a chance, having each seen one episode and mentioned that the other might like it. We’ve grown quite fond of the situations and of the people that live through them. It’s quite a cute little program. We’re even considering investing in the DVD collection of the first season.
So I would like to take this opportunity to thank my mother and sister for doing everything short of insisting that I watch this program to get me to watch this program. This time, you guys were right.
Though we’ll still have to agree to disagree about The Red Green Show. Darn, I’ve done it again.
Permalink | 1 Comment
So, the biggest problem with spending Christmas in the prairies: getting up one Monday morning to find this outside the window:
Image removed during 2007 redesign
My opinion seems to be the minority, though. Everyone else in the house is really pretty happy about the sudden prospect of a white Christmas.
I’m trying to teach Rowan that what’s happening out there is that the world needs a little Selsan Blue.
Permalink | 1 Comment
Here in Swift Current (where we’re staying for the holidays), Sarah’s parents have a digital TV service through their telephone/internet service provider, SaskTel. That’s right: TV over their ADSL line. Very cool.
In much the same way as our digital cable at home, and things like satellite services, they have an onscreen guide. When you pull up the blurb for a program it includes a genre or two. Letterman is ‘talk comedy’, the Late Late Show is ‘talk variety’. Pokemon is ‘kids animated’.
Star Trek is ‘variety’.
I haven’t yet actually found a ’science fiction’ show on this guide. Star Trek: The Next Generation is also ‘variety,’ while Star Trek: Voyager is ‘action/adventure.’
Hey! I wonder if they get the Variety Network?
Permalink | 5 Comments
