Monday, February 05, 2007

Music: Randy Newman - Short People
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Today I would like to talk about the television program "Monk."

There was an all day "for people who don't care about the Super Bowl" marathon on yesterday and it pointed out something that I've known in my heart for years...

Monk just isn't as good anymore. Old Monk was fantastic. Newer Monk is just...Well...let me explain.

The real turning point was when Bitty Schram left. It had started tapering off in quality before hand, but when they lost the character of Sharona...for me that was it.

What I liked about the show when it started was that, while the show was funny, there was also a sense of tragedy about the main characters. Monk was a fucking basketcase who could barely funtion in the everyday world...and that was a little sad. This is summed up for me by one episode where he's about to play clarinet with Willie Nelson...until someone else puts their lips on the mouthpiece. You could tell he was heartbroken. It made the character that much more real, and you felt for him. Sharona was another character like that. She was barely scraping by, had been a prostitute in a previous time in her life, but she could still function and be interesting and a good person.

When Monk had his little phobia-freakouts, they were organic and just rose from the situations that happened to be part of the case he was solving. It didn't feel like a setup. Now the show has become an obvious cash-in.

When they fired Bitty Schram (God only knows why), they simply replaced her with someone who was basically the exact same fucking character. Just blonder, less interesting, and with a daughter instead of a son. It's the same fucking character without any attempt to make her fit a different role. A cynical replacement. This new chic? Couldn't care less about her. Sharona was interesting on her own.

And the plots....my God I feel like on day they're just going to break down and have an episode called "Mr. Monk wears a silly hat." Instead of focusing on the plot and letting the character tics flow from there, they are coming up with plots specifically to hit a certain button in the character. Instead of feeling sad for a character with so much baggage...I cringe.

I can't watch Monk anymore. It's long since jumped the shark. Maybe I'll invest in some DVDs of the first couple of seasons. I just can't take it anymore.
This transmission logged byErisSaid on 10:40 AM

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