Tuesday, July 27, 2010

History Channel's "Mega Disasters"

Dear History Channel's "Mega Disasters" TV Show,

I've noticed your show is about the future, specifically, what could happen during a natural disaster in the future.

I also couldn't help but notice you, a show about the future -- or in other words fiction, is airing on the History channel.

The History channel is the only channel exclusively dedicated to things that have already happened. You are a show exclusively dedicated to things that have not happened and may never happen. Let me reiterate that. History channel = history. "Mega Disasters" = not history.

You blatantly contradict the channel that produces you. This would be akin to ESPN going out of its way to air a non-sport, like the Spelling Bee, or Music TV, MTV, going out of its way to promote anything but music, and we know these things would never happen.

Stay in your lane, History Channel.

Sincerely,

I-don't-have-a-Neilsen-box-but-my-opinion-should-still-count Television Watcher

Wednesday, July 21, 2010

Elementary School Valentine's Day

Dear Elementary School Valentine's Day,

I heart you.

You bring Superman and Batman to us on small cards, wishing us a kick-butt February 14. You bring us those tums-like chalk hearts with the all-caps phrases: B MINE, ONLY YOU, and GO GIRL. You bring pre-pubescent love to the forefront of public education.

Most importantly, you waste a day of school.

Thank you.


U R A 10,

The Childrens

Wednesday, July 7, 2010

Due Process and the Board Game Clue

Dear Concept of Due Process as Presented in the Board Game 'Clue',

You disregard our usual presumptions about crime and criminal investigation. Is this good? Maybe. But maybe not.

If I know Mrs. White killed somebody in the library, why does it matter whether or not I know it was with a lead pipe or a candlestick. Someone has been bludgeoned either way and you are worried about minutiae. Please, let's bring some common sense back to fictional murder investigation. Rope, revolver, or wrench -- they're dead and nothing will bring them back. Plus, the victim's head is now misshapen and we can't have an open casket... the whole thing makes me sick.

And why do we even care what room it was in? From now on, let's assume it was done in the room WHERE THE BODY WAS FOUND. If Peacock or the Colonel moved the body, we'll give credit where it is due -- they fooled us. But they didn't fool us on who did the dirty deed, and that's what counts.

And yet the purists will defend you, due process in the game 'Clue.' In a court of law, they'd say, you'd surely need a weapon and scene to pinpoint a killer. Well, if we are to be purists, we must do so in every sense of the investigation. Yet, in the very rooms of your mansions, in lieu of true investigation that turns to interrogation -- it is instead interrogation that pretends to be investigation. Citizens boldly accuse each other, without justified suspicion. It was Professor Plum! The scalawag did it in the lounge, I say! No, it was the billiard room! The billiard room! The knave used a knife! It could cut through a shoe -- I saw it on TV!

Due process in the game 'Clue' -- you have twisted an ugly distortion into our lives with your lies. The Parker Brothers did it, in the Family Room, with Dumb Rules as its weapon.

Sincerely,

Justice and Freedom... with a side of Freedom Fries and Just Ice