Entertainment For Lively Minds
X Factor back? Oh dear - what cack!
Posted by Richard Raftery on 24 August 2009 - 6:39pm.
Let's face it, the X factor was never much cop. However, after delving briefly into Saturday's show it seemed to have sunk to a new low. The introduction of a happy-clappy audience; over-emphasis on the 'freaks' (some of whom were being recycled from previous years for hilarious comic effect); and the predictable face-pulling of the judges all seemed to be very contrived and even dated.
It almost made me long for the sincerity of Hughie Green. (I said almost!)
I realize it is only light entertainment and not to be taken at all seriously but surely there must be more to Saturday evening telly than this load of tripe!
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Jumping the Shark?
i get the feeling that this kind of format has reached that saturation point. Surely, the only way is down. Certainly, Big Brother is on the way out and I wouldn't be surprised if interest in The XF is only sustained at the last few years' extraordinary levels by the injection of a few gimmicks. Did I read somewhere that Kate Moss is going to make an appearance?
Serious comment
At what point does the emphasis on 'freaks' stop being "entertainment" (and I use the word loosely) and become abuse? I think a very thin line is being trodden here and the show is not necessarily erring on the side of caution.
At least the age qualification criteria for this show, unlike Britain's Got Talent, avoid the clear (to me, anyway) abuse that really young children are forced to suffer at the hands of the show's producers and, sadly, their own parents.
I'm not sure this is 'light' entertainment at all - I think there is a danger of real damage being caused to vulnerable individuals here.
The audition process.......
.....was the only part of the series worth showing. But having a live audience now makes that part tiresome as well.
I notice the universal criticism for the change in the press. Nothing Cowell can do for this year tho, its all been recorded.
One to avoid methinks.
A bloody big belly laugh for me
Lots of WTF moments - not just the crap acts, for which there needs to be a Royal Society to protect them from being foolish, but some genuinely good singers.
I would rather have this guy over Leona Burke and Alexandra Lewis anyday...
Teens eh! Too many Red Bulls I suspect
I long for the days of the Melody Maker Rock/Folk Contest. Perhaps The Word could revive this for "our kinda music" with a judging panel of Hepworth, Ellen, Mossman & Baker. Televised on Dave probably.
Embedding disabled by request
Seems the taste police are on the case
Didn't he used to be the
Didn't he used to be the front man for Living Colour?
Very good point from a
Very good point from a review of the first show by Helen Rumbelow of The Times
snip
"When some 17-year-old twins came on stage actually showing some teenage swagger, they were slapped down as “incredibly annoying” by Cowell. For the model X Factor kid is also the exact opposite of the rebel that usually becomes an icon of youth culture. The ability to belt out a cover of a Mariah Carey ballad according to the specifications of a 49-year-old hit-factory tycoon is not how musical legends are born, and is why most past winners have lacked industry staying power."
I think it's brilliant TV
Irrespective of the talents or otherwise of the contestants, it's beautifully choreographed programming. The best moments - like Danyl Johnson's performance on Saturday, and like Susan Boyle's debut and Shaheen Jafargholi's re-start on Britain's Got Talent - are fantastically well orchestrated. They're edited so they appear to come out of nowhere and against all expectations. Yes, it's low-brow, yes, it's ridden with schmaltz, yes, it has very little to do with "music" in the way that most of us prefer to think of it, and yes, none of it is actually spontaneous. But it's still great TV.
Fraser
isn't this a high falutin way of saying you like it and just an elaborate justifcation. Liking a show because of it's editing is very curious.
A side note this is one downside to twitter on saturday it was full of people discussing every bl**din' second of x-factor. Strange considering some the people who doing and the fact that BBC4 were actually showing some good films at decent time for change.
Oh and Richard we've found something to agree on! My main problem with whole thing is that X-factor,the dancing and skating shows will just drag on from now until christmas, piss on the Xmas singles and just be in your face even if like me you choose not to watch.
Curious?
The editing is everything, just like with most pre-recorded TV. It's how the drama is created. Without the cutaways to the stuff that's not happening onstage, without the context being made clear, without the music that's added to ramp up the drama, the show would be nothing. And yes, that's why I like it. Apologies if this seems high falutin'.
fair enough
but you must also like the emotinal reactions this editing engenders in you ? But is this enough to sustain 12 (?) weeks of tv? Anyway I'll bow out now you can't complain about how x factor takes over everything then gab on about all night. Have fun. See you all in the new year.
Closer
to 18 weeks I think.
Leonard Cohen
I'm broadly in agreement with Fraser. Clearly X Factor is edited and produced to tug at our emotions. So what? Most things are.
I am also disinclined to view Cowell as the Anti-Christ, He seems to speak eminent good sense in an amusingly cutting way. He also seems genuinely to want to give a chance to the disadvantaged and, by all accounts, is personally generous.
Some of the artists that have emerged from these shows are clearly very talented. Leona Lewis, Will Young, Alexandra Burke.
Finally, getting Leonard Cohen to Christmas No 1 - surely is an achievement that most Word readers would applaud.
Fraser
I agree with the cuteness of the cutting. My argument is that it has passed the point of being a cliche. Even my kids (8 and 10) have realised that if the contestant gets a back story slot, they are going to be very bad or good. I think the artifice was very cleverly done to begin with , but now it is so telegraphed the audience may be beginning to see it, despite Mr Cowell's crying Pay no attention to the man behind the curtain
I'm sure you're right
I'm very much aware that I'm being manipulated when I watch. I should also probably mention that I don't actually watch the show on TV - like many people, I expect, my experience of the show comes mainly from watching highlights on YouTube as they cross my radar.
Just what I was going to say
But put far more eloquently.
EDIT - Meant to write this in response to Fraser's remarks above.
Watch one of the other numerous channels
I'm always a bit baffled when people complain about the quality of Saturday night television. A quick look at the schedules shows that there was actually quite a variety to chose from on terrestrial television while the X Factor was on including Dramas, Film, documentaries, sport another game show and a few sit-coms. If none of them suit then there can't be that many people these days that can't just shove in a DVD and if you have a computer there's a pretty big choice on 4OD and the iPlayer. I've seen some of X Factor in the past and I found it painful so I don't watch, lots of people do though and if that pays some of the bills to give more choice the rest of the time then that's fine with me.
But we all have the right to criticize!
I don't buy or read any of the redtops but that doesn't stop me being aware of the dumbed-down drivel ('Jordan in crisis', 'Kerry Katona in meltdown' etc) which they serve up as news on a daily basis. Or should we all just accept it as being the way it is and therefore inevitable? It just seems a bit passive. 'For crap to triumph all it takes is for intelligent people to do nothing' as someone might have said if anyone was prepared to listen.
Of course we have the right to criticise
And I cherish it, Richard.
But JohnW's right. The answer to the question regarding Saturday night televisual options ("surely there must be more") is self evidently this: plenty. Yet here we are, talking about The X Factor because - as is your absolute right - you've opened a thread on it.
Beyond simply not watching, what should "intelligent people" do about a programme that's clocking up the kind of ratings for which, these days, network executives would kill their first-born?
But there's a choice
My comments really concerned the statement that there must be more to Saturday night television than that and pointing out that there is. The time to worry is if it seemed that the choice was disappearing. Your newspaper analogy is a good one. I'm aware of the redtops as well but they have their place, serve a purpose and as long as there's an alternative I think they should be allowed to carry on and serve their market (I wonder if The Times could exist as it does without the News Of The World and The Sun alongside it). If we had only a few newpapers or only a few television channels then there may be an argument but as we have quite a few of each, complaining about a paper or programme that is clearly very popular seems a little unnecessary. Do we really want to go back to the "golden" days when every Saturday night programme tried to cater for the whole family? If we did then I'm sure we wouldn't have the same Film4 stuff that was on opposite X Factor or a one of James May's programmes (albeit a repeat)? I think on Saturday, across the 15 or so terrestrial channels there was a choice that suited most intelligence levels and moods. The thing is, there is a choice, and for whatever reason, a lot of people have chosen the "dumbed down" approach. Surely by the same token it's only fair to make the programmes made for the "more intelligent" more accessible to everyone as well. Look what happened to 6Music when they decided that they wanted to alter their demographic. The existing listeners complained. I say, why produce something to please everyone when you don't need to.
Like most things in the howling sh*tstorm of the
modern media world I just pretend it isn't happening...
What isn't happening?
.
If you made up the phrase 'howling shitstorm'...
then I am seriously impressed. Fine work.
PS: Can I borrow it?
You can borrow it Patrick
Just so long as you promise to look after it...
Apparently, there are 10 million people
in the UK who have nothing better to do on a Saturday night than watch this shite! Jesus H Christ, the BNP are more than welcome to this particular island!
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/entertainment/8216669.stm
conversely
this means 50 million people didn't.
This gives me cause for hope. They ere either watching something better or, you know, actually doing something. Which is nice.
'BNP's Got Talent'...
heading to a TV screen sometime soon.
Springtime for Griffin / in Bethnal Green...
I'd pay to watch that...
Tomoooorrroowww belongs / tomooooorrrooww belongs...
Think your Saturday night is bad?
Try watching TV in Canada. We emigrated here a few weeks ago and still can't believe the appalling state of TV here. We were never big TV fans, but it might be nice to have the option of watching something good.
Take last Saturday (although most Saturday schedules are pretty much the same): what's on the 40-plus channels we can access? Around 20 (yes, 20, count 'em) news programmes, the weather channels (one English, one French), a handful of sitcoms, one TV movie and repeats of the week's daytime shows. And that's it. No big film, no variety, no drama, no easy-watching showbizzy/quizzy/Ant'n'Deccy-type thing. Zilch. Zip.
Admittedly, we haven't yet subscribed to paid-for cable or satellite, so we're only watching free-to-air channels. But the range, or lack of it, of shows for the fiscally challenged unable to access HBO and similar channels beggars belief. Absolutely nobody is so interested in the news that they need a Saturday night dominated by programmes about it.
Anybody who says US TV is great as it gves us The Sopranos, 24, Mad Men, etc, has clearly never spent as long as we have switching channels trying to find something, ANYTHING, bearable.
The X Factor? I might hate it and everything it has done to what's left of the music industry, but at least you can watch it without wanting to put pins in your eyes.
I emigrated to the States last year...
...and it's even worse - we had cable but couldn't find anything to sustain any interest, or even face browsing the 600+ channels. Even reliable programs on the "Sharks and Nazis" channels (History, Discovery, etc) were scarred by advert breaks every 5 minutes.
Realising that this was costing $80/month, I ditched the cable box, and we haven't looked back. Now it's DVD boxsets, and downloads.
I know the BBC is knocked mercilessly, but you wouldn't half miss it, I know I do.
Controversial?
I quite liked Ben Mills, I thought there was something behind the X-Factor schmaltz that I hoped would come out after that series ended. Unfortunately a look at his Myspace shows him playing local weddings in Kent and getting involved in a Rod Stewart tribute thing. Oh well shows what I know, this was good though and I hate Queen as a rule!
Utter utter crap.
I find it difficult to express the depth of my contempt.
The artists "discovered" would have risen to the top notwithstanding. I will leave it to Charlie Brooker to dig up invective sufficiently excoriating.
I'm listening to some Lewis Taylor at the moment. What would Danniii Fucking No Hits Botox Brow Last Throw Of The Dice Bloody Hell I Seem To Have Lucked Out Here Oh Shit There's That Cow From Girls Aloud She's Prettier Than Me AND Younger And Has More Hits Why Am I Here? Minogue and the rest have made of him?
I could get very angry here.
Wow
I'm just glad you're not my dentist.
arsed?
no
not interstesd
i love charlie brooker
but his cultural references leave me with a clueless expression
If you want to lose the will to live
watch this ....
It's Bros!
There's nowt new in pop music. Auditions have always taken place in theatre so why not in music. Now we know there is a process where the researchers filter out the bad stuff before it gets to appearing before the judges, how come they let through the really tuneless wonders. That must be the entertainment equivalent of throwing the Christians to the lions. I must stop laughing at them and pity then instead. No chance.
Do You Remember?
the first series of Harry Enfield's Television Show?
And the Double-Take Brothers?
Looks just like them...
I love it
If you hate it, tune out. I'm not mad on the new format, but I'm not giving up on it now. It's great fun. See it for what it is. It's not a serious music show or psychological experiment, just pure light entertainment.
Once upon a time
a visit to Bedlam to laugh at the insane was regarded as a good day out.
And let's be honest
some of those people who are held up for ridicule seem to be inadequate at the very least. They are brought on purely for public ridicule. I am well aware of the 'switch off/over if you don't like it' argument (God knows it gets recycled often enough!) but there are a disturbing number of this type of programme on various channels. David Mitchell's parody sketch 'The Boy With An Arse For A Face' said it all really.
But no one's holding a gun at their heads
They don't have to be on TV. If they're that desperate, let them get on with it. They soon see it's not all it's cracked up to be.
I'm sick of this 'they've got mental health issues' bullshit. Of course they have. No sane person enters a talent show like this or gets themselves filmed for a documentary.
On that basis perhaps we could commission a documentary
which takes us inside an asylum to observe the inmates. Oh what laughs!
Oh yes, what enormous fun that would be
Because a lunatic asylum is JUST like a reality TV show, isn't it.
Well let's see...
*lots of gurgling noises
*mad staring expressions
*shouting and gibbering
*people singing the same song over and over again
*strong men needed to guide people round the building
*tantrums and throwing things
*people suffering from psychotic delusions
So much for the X factor. I haven't actually ever been in an asylum so if anyone out there....
Many of the 'freaks' / rubbish acts...
...know exactly what they are doing. It's a just a craic for most of them, an opportunity to get on TV. No problem that we laugh at them, that's what they want.
From my p o v, X Factor is good family entertainment, the Generation Game of now. And like that show it will get steadily worse, that's normal.
sorry had to pop back just got
this via twitter. mad me smile
http://www.theonion.com/content/news/study_watching_fewer_than_four?utm_...