Why doesn't the scifi community worry about me?

[AuntKate]

Hooray! An honest account of the film industry is much appreciated. Clearly, these executives live on the simplest of levels--and on the most primitive of ethics. If we are writing for men, especially young men, we have to assume they are totally into sex, so all women have to be young, thin, beautiful, etc. Add some good f/x, and they will flock to the movie, series, books, etc.

What's happening is that their sexy, f/x-filled shows are falling flat. What everyone one wants, first and foremost, is a good story--whether the actors are male/female, young/old, etc. No wonder viewers have flocked to reality TV shows like Top Chef or The Next Food Network Star or American Idol. The story of the competition beats most plots written for the industry today IMHO.

 

[exodus]

I think we need a boarder view point here.
I think by only taking the view point of one blog about one show doen't take all of sci-fi into consideration.
Star Wars, nuBSG, LOST, Alien and several modern sci-fi shows & movies do keep their female demographic in mind.

After the openning line of "All men hate Voyager", should have made you dismiss this POV from the get go.

 

[exodus]

Hooray! An honest account of the film industry is much appreciated. Clearly, these executives live on the simplest of levels--and on the most primitive of ethics. If we are writing for men, especially young men, we have to assume they are totally into sex, so all women have to be young, thin, beautiful, etc. Add some good f/x, and they will flock to the movie, series, books, etc.

What's happening is that their sexy, f/x-filled shows are falling flat. What everyone one wants, first and foremost, is a good story--whether the actors are male/female, young/old, etc. No wonder viewers have flocked to reality TV shows like Top Chef or The Next Food Network Star or American Idol. The story of the competition beats most plots written for the industry today IMHO.

..but outside of sci-fi, they put Camron Manhiem & Sara Rue in programs and nobody talked about what good actresses they are, most of the publicity about them dealt with their weight. So IMO even when such things are geared toward a more mature audience, the talk still turns back to shallow issues. We even have a post on this site for hot actresses/actors. Not one of them is old and or heavy set, every last one of them is young, thin & barely dressed.. So the public is kinda telling the studios that they do wanna see young thin women.

American Idol, Top Chef and the like are still full of attractive people.
Fabio got voted "fan Favorite" because he was seen as sexy.
Padma Lashmi is the co-host.
Tom Coliccio is a sex symbol within the gay community and he's straight.
Paula Abdul is more known as a sexy symbol than a singer.
Guy Fieri winner of the first season of Food Network Star is now a sex symbol.
Doesn't anybody remember Simon implying to Frenchie during season 2 or 3 that while she's a great singer, she doesn't fit the title of American Idol due to her size? Even Jennifer Hudson is now doing weight loss commercials to fit in with the image of what the public finds sexy.

 

[AuntKate]

I realize that the demographics pulled in by a series drives the sale of advertising, but when will these "eegits" figure out that the best way to get and keep an audience and to get and keep advertising is to write solid entertaining stories?

 

[exodus]

I realize that the demographics pulled in by a series drives the sale of advertising, but when will these "eegits" figure out that the best way to get and keep an audience and to get and keep advertising is to write solid entertaining stories?

Entertainment is in the eye of the beholder as reality TV and stuff like "Jackass" is a testiment too.

However, it might start happening sooner than you think considering many places around the country are requiring you to have cable in order to veiw basic TV. Add to that the cable companies now demanding that basic TV pay them to keep their channels on the air, they're going to have to figure out some way to bring in that extra revenue. I'm guessing that would require more networks to do more quality TV to draw an audience and have more big named sponcers back their shows. Still it's not going to stop them from using the tried and true formula of sex appeal to also keep that audience.

....but we shall see.