What was on TV? Sat, Nov 20, 2004

Usher and Destiny's Child were tearing up the charts. Tucker Carlson had a show on PBS. National Treasure was the #1 movie in America. Let's see what was on TV.

Earlier: Category 6: Day of Destruction

Recorded, originally aired Nov. 14 & 17, 2004 on CBS

Watching disaster movies (or, in this case, disaster November sweeps miniseries events) is so weird now. This movie shows us a worst-case scenario in which natural disasters pile up on top of each other, it’s always blazing hot, our infrastructure can’t handle it, and people don’t seem to care. But that’s our reality! This is where the refusal to stop climate change has brought us!

This is a really, really stupid piece of television. There’s an Enron-ish power company causing all the problems, and everything is solved when one guy stops sleeping with his ambitious co-worker and goes back to his wife. It’s set in Chicago, but there are two Black characters, both of whom barely have names. Randy Quaid plays a storm chaser who’s apparently made of teflon. Brian Denehy is the head of some made-up weather agency and he has all these ridiculous theories. Dianne Wiest is the heroic secretary of energy. There is a plot involving teenagers that’s so stupid I could barely watch. Anyone whose name you don’t recognize has a Canadian accent.

But there are moments of surreal power, moments that feel like prophecies. The crusading reporter (Nancy McKeon from The Facts of Life) laments that she’s covering a story about people bathing in an unsanitary fountain to beat the heat and not the crumbling infrastructure that’s causing these problems. Her editor frankly discusses the economic realities he uses to justify that decision. Brian Dennehy says “I don’t know if it’s global warming, but our climate is changing and we need to do something about it” (that’s more than we got from this Summer’s Twister!). Dianne Wiest laments that it took such a disaster to wake people up.

It’s easy to dismiss this miniseries. But it was popular. Over 12 million people watched part one, and over 10 million people cared enough to watch part two a few nights later. Those ratings helped CBS win November sweeps. There was even a sequel: Category 7: The End of the World. It’s just depressing. There were genuine warnings in this bad and stupid thing. People watched, and nothing changed. And now our popular media is even less willing to discuss the realities of climate change, even as it tears our world and our lives apart.

11:30 Saturday Night Live! on NBC

Host Luke Wilson and musical guest U2

This episode was a real journey! I went from feeling from anger and despair to absolute joy, I really did it all.

The episode opens with a catchy song that I thought I recognized. "Money, money, money, money," where have I heard that? We segway into the sketch and I realize with dawning horror that this is an Apprentice parody set in the White House, as George W. Bush decides whether to fire Colin Powell, Donald Rumsfeld, or Condoleeza Rice after the election. Watching it made me feel ill. Some people think this is how the government should be run! They told us as much at the ballot box. I would say that this was how the government was run for four years and how it will be run once again very soon. Except I think the reality is probably way uglier than what you see in this sketch. I watched this while brushing my teeth right before bed. Big mistake. Huge.

I don't even hate the sketch! It's one of the better political sketches of the season so far. It captures the silly infighting and petty disputes that characterized this administration. What does make me angry is that SNL doesn't appear to have changed its approach to political satire, even though American politics has certainly changed in the past 20 years. Change the names and you might see this exact sketch on SNL in a month or two.

So that cast a shadow over the episode, which is a shame since this episode had some good sketches. There was the hilarious "woomba" commercial and another sketch I liked in which Seth Meyers and host Luke Wilson play dueling "cool teachers."

But this episode is remembered for the musical guest U2 and for good reason. They don't get off to a good start, performing "Vertigo," which just reminds me of the iPod ads featuring that song, which reminds me of how that collaboration ended with U2 forcing their latest album upon Apple users across the globe.

Their second performance is the kind of stuff that made them legends though, long and glorious. But the closing moments of the episode are what takes it over the top. We start with the standard goodbye with the cast and host, and then U2 goes into an encore. Bono heads out into the audience, a woman in the front row hugs him, rapturous. He approaches the SNL cast. He hugs Amy, she's crying, Maya and Rachel are jumping up and down in glee and then Maya is crying too. He goes back and says that this is Saturday Night Live, and lets the "Live" echo and echo (Live...live...live). It's a dig at Ashlee Simpson but it's also not. Ashlee Simpson and U2 both proved the unique power of live television on this season of SNL. But U2 also proved the power of live performance. The night ends, they sing through the credits, and as they cut to black, they promise yet one more song, only for the people there in person.

It's a perfect TV moment and also a true tribute to the power of live performance. I finished it and I wanted to go to a concert, or a theater show, anything where I could sit with strangers and expect the unexpected. There's no replacement for that.

Tivo Status

The three-hour Masterpiece Theater miniseries The Lost Prince, one Frontline episode, and The Office Christmas Special from across the pond (I’ll watch that one closer to the holidays after I’ve rewatched the series), and one episode of Peep Show. 6.5 hours, with 21.5 hours of space left.