The High Holy Days are approaching, and I'd like to make a heartfelt plea to everyone on this board.
What's that you say? Rosh Hashanah? No, no, no! That's not what I'm talking about! It is Premiere Week for your favorite network shows! Award-winning episodes of "Everybody Loves Raymond!" Conservative politics on "The West Wing!" Survivor goes pantsless! Rosh Hashanah, indeed!
But if you only watch one show this year, make it Smallville on the WB. Smallville is a retelling of the Superman myth, focusing on his high-school years (when he was friends with Lex Luthor). It isn't as sassy as Buffy, it is a pretty good show, with lots of good weekly stand-alone episodes and a large over-arching season long plot arc. Last season's cliffhanger left a lot of threads dangling, so I'm guessing season premiere is probably a little dense for first-timers, but give it a chance (especially if you are a Neilson family)! You need something, now that Buffy is gone!
| Superman |
I'm curious: do "Nielson families" still exist? If so, has anybody Ishish ever met one? Been one? Or are they sworn to secrecy--I would think a lot of lobbying/marketing would be directed at them if not.
Comment #1 :: link :: September 23, 2003 09:00 AMOne of my best friends was a Nielson family. He was not required to keep it secret in any way. He also showed two major personality flaws:
1. He refused to allow me to submit a list of programs that he should leave his television on for, even if he didn't like them himself; and
2. He voluntarily gave up the Neilson box to become a TiVo subscriber, surrendering power for . . . well . . . TiVo.
We don't speak any more.
We were a Nielsen family way, way back around the late '70s, when you had to write everything down. We were probably ideal Â- heavy TV watchers back then (well, my folks still are; I'm more of an "appointment" TV-watcher now). I think my folks tried to play up the PBS stuff they were watching, but basically they were pretty honest about it. My poor Mom: she probably didn't want anybody knowing how many daytime soaps she watched.
Comment #3 :: link :: September 23, 2003 09:00 AMFrancine and Lynda were a Nielsen products family for a while. Meant they had to scan in everything they bought, which, IIRC, was a right pain in the tuchis.
Comment #4 :: link :: September 23, 2003 09:00 AMAt 166, they wanted us to be Nielsen "family" (I guess the TV ratings people have a broader definition of family than, say, Rick Santorum), but at the time we were all working for a TV channel. However, recently, we were recently stalked and harrassed until we agreed to participate in whatever the radio version of the Nielsons is (it might be the Nielsons). We listened to a lot of WNYC and WBAI that week (plus some big band stations), then filled out a print form, and mailed them in. They gave us each a dollar. Woo-hoo!
Comment #5 :: link :: September 24, 2003 09:00 AMDebbie and I watched the first ep of "Jake 2.0", which we instantly decided was a Smallville clone -- slightly geeky guy with powers he doesn't understand, a girl he pines for but can't tell his secret, another who's after him... Plus the same production values.
We didn't stick around for 2.1.
