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© 2008 Page iler Lid and Associates www. pagefilier com

LETTITOR

 

 

I’m crushing your head, I’m crushing your head!

 

ity the sad state of Canadian

television. Aside from our country’s

unbeatable hockey coverage and
pleasantly moderate news reporting, there’s
not much to cheer about on Canada’s
airwaves. Our most-watched non-sports
programs are almost all products of the
American networks, and with pitiful
funding from the private and public sector,
the financial support is lower than the
dismally low public support we give home-
grown fictional programming.

To be frank, I don’t think this level of
viewer apathy is unjustified. It seems like
the only Canadian shows that we Canadians
are watching are all part of the Brent Butt
empire; Corner Gas, Dan for Mayor and
Hiccups are the most successful Canadian
programs in recent memory, and again,
being frank, these shows are pretty rotten.
At least I think so. Sorry, I know so. So
there.

But over the last few weeks something
changed on the lovely glowing rectangle
we call television. Our beloved Kids in the
Hall— Bruce McCulloch, Scott Thompson,
Dave Foley, Mark McKinney and Kevin
McDonald— made their triumphant return
to television with an eight-part miniseries,
Death Comes to Town on CBC.

If you’ ve missed the Kids’ brilliant
sketch comedy half as much as I have,
you won’t be disappointed with their latest
offering. The characters and situations are
completely new but the attitude is all the
same.

Death Comes to Town is about a
murder in a small northern Ontario town
called Shuckton, and follows a collection of
bizarre-as-hell characters as the murder and
its motives are explored and investigated.
But that’s not important. The important

thing is that gutsiness, risk-taking and a
twisted sense of creativity have returned

to the airwaves, if only for eight 30 minute
sessions.

If you ask me, this is what Canadian
television has been missing—a willingness
to take risks. Shows like Corner Gas are

a dime a dozen, particularly in North
America. Do our airwaves really need
another overly broad situation comedy with
forgettable archetypal characters and rely on
“insult comedy” to get most of their laughs
(but not too insulting “insult comedy;”

this is Canada, after all)? There have been
hundreds of shows like this produced in
North America over the past decades and
adding one more doesn’t really broaden
our cultural horizons or our notions of what
television can be.

Canadian art has been internationally
regarded and celebrated as something a
little outside the mainstream. So why are
we so mainstream and mediocre these days?
Maybe it’s a lack of advertising and private
sector revenue or maybe it’s government
interference with our public arts funding
agencies. I don’t know, to be honest, but
I do know that unless our television, like
any other art form, is distinctive, it doesn’t
justify its own existence.

So three cheers for the Kids in the
Hall! Three cheers for their creativity!
Three cheers for sketches about buying
pot from Satan, necrophilia and comical
abortions. They may cause you to feel
shock, they may make you feel offended,
but at the very least, they’Il make you feel
something.

Your friend in high fidelity,
Liam Britten
Editor in chief

The Other Press

 

WRITE FOR US!