I don’t know if you can tell from reading my blog, but I like watching television and movies. A lot. I know, shocking. Pick your chin up off the floor. But there are things that I see a lot of in my viewing experience that thoroughly bug the heck out of me.
1. When people dressed up as creatures wear gloves that make their fingers longer than they really are. They always make the fingers longer, but there’s no way to change the way in which they bend so the first two knuckles are the same, and then the tip is twice as long as it should be. The creatures will undoubtedly wriggle their fingers menacingly (as if wriggling fingers is all that menacing to begin with) and it just looks ridiculous because the knuckle length proportions are totally out of whack. And don’t even get me started if they need to grab or hold onto something. Just plain ridiculous.
2. Empty to-go coffee cups. You’re not fooling anyone! We can tell they’re empty! These people are practically juggling three cups without any threat of scalding and yet I can hardly hold onto one for longer than 10 seconds at a time.
3. Where have New Years Eve television episodes gone? And no, the lame three holidays in one episode of Grey’s Anatomy doesn’t count. Since TV execs feel the need to take a winter break and we no longer get very many new episodes of our favorite shows in December and January, the New Years Eve episode has gone extinct. The holiday used to lend itself to such interesting drama (resolutions! who to kiss!) but I can’t remember the last time I’ve seen one since Monica and Chandler had to figure out a way to kiss so no one would know they were dating. Could you even imagine the awesomeness of a Gossip Girl New Year’s Eve episode? I want New Years Eve episodes back!
4. When people get hung up on with their cell phones and there’s a dial tone. Cell phones don’t have dial tones jackass! And while we’re talking about cell phones, I don’t think I’ve ever seen a text message on a television show that has looked remotely close to text messages I’ve seen in real life.
5. Previews on my DVDs. I can understand previews on rentals, and maybe even the cheaper single disc editions of movies, but if I’m dropping money on the super duper two disc deluxe special edition or a season of television, there better not be a damn preview or even worse an anti-piracy advertisement on there! Hello! I bought the DVD! I’m not a pirate.
6. And this one comes courtesy of Mom. She says it drives her nuts when people on television and movies get parking spots right in front of the buildings they need to get into. I haven’t really noticed it before, but now I’m sure it’ll drive me crazy now.
What are some of your pet peeves in television and movies?
LOL. Of course all the study finds is that all men HAVE LOOKED AT porn at some point. It doesn’t show that all men WATCH porn. We’ll just have to ask Josherz whether the study’s findings are accurate
Oh Michelle — I LOVE cheap jump scares in horror movies! That’s what it’s all about
Justin…noooooooooooo… I want a bona fide scare – twin girls, spinning heads, chest bursters… not a kitten knocking over a lamp. The ice maker in When a Stranger Calls (the original) was good, though.
And I thought the hokey pokey was what it’s all about.
But Michelle you can have both! The original Alien had both chest-bursters AND kittens. The kitten scare was as integral a part of the full experience as anything else.
Now I’m trying to remember what cartoon it was that DID have the sepulchral joke “What if the hokey pokey IS what it’s all about?” …. hmmmph
I am impressed at how observant you are. I think I have been conditioned to ignore many of the minor implausibilities in TV and movies because there are so many.
What grates on me is when BASIC technology is misrepresented in really stupid ways. I have seen screen shots of computer programs that have unnecessarily elaborate colorful and artsy animated user interfaces rather than a normal Windows, Mac, or Linux GUI. Please! Almost every TV viewer under the age of 75 knows what a computer UI looks like. It isn’t that hard to get right.
Another annoyance of mine is silly infinite image zooming. Digital images have a finite resolution. Yes, you can interpolate and sharpen them, but there are limits to what algorithmic enhancement can do. Don’t show me patently fake digital image manipulation and expect me not to cringe!
I am also annoyed when writers pull plot twists out of their ass, especially when they could have easily setup for those twists! I don’t mind plot depth, or creativity, but you can’t just ignore setups and make things happen to advance the plot in implausible ways!
Wow… I did not know how angry I was at the entertainment industry.
Thanks for giving me an opportunity to vent. 
If you’re going to complain about zooming (which I highly approve of), don’t forget the trope that everybody in movie and tv land has zoom-lenses built into their eyes. Highly useful!
There’s no dial tone when someone hangs up on you on a landline either. It’s a click, silence for a while, and then the “off the hook” sound.
I hate that 99% of the time when people are on the phone in TV/movies they don’t say “goodbye” or “talk to you later” or give any indication that the conversation is over, they just hang up. That’s just rude.
I’m with Polt on the countdowns. It drives me crazy when it takes 20 real-world minutes for 2 movie minutes to pass.
Also, Chuck Bass’s squinting. And the fact that Dan for some reason forgot that Chuck tried to rape his sister in the first episode.
The way that England, or indeed anywhere more than 12 miles off the cost of America is depicted in tv shows. And the awful accents you insist we have. Not everyone is posh (yes, I know I am, but I’m special like that).
Also, the way people can fly around the world in impossible times and no one seems to get jetlag. If I did LA to Hong Kong in 14 hours I’d probably touch down in the middle of the night looking like shit after my nerves were shot to hell on the white-knuckle ride of a super-supersonic flight. I wouldn’t just get off the plane at 8am on a Monday morning ready for a full day’s work. And I certainly wouldn’t be flying with my gun. Yeah, I’m looking at you, FlashForward.
One final thing: soft focus. Softening the edges of your cast will not soften the edges of your dreadful, dreadful script. Write better, you mook.
Fear not my wonderful dancing monkeys! I’ve been enjoying your comments all day. Sorry I haven’t been able to comment till now, but I love all the ones you’ve listed. Hate squished credits, crazy shaky cameras, magical date arrangements, and abrupt goodbyes on the phone.
Oh, Sven, how spoiled you are if you think TODAY’s depiction of British accents is bad. Did you never see Mary Poppins while growing up? Dick Van Dyke’s “cockney” accent is designed to make any Englishman’s ears bleed.
Boy are you right about the jet-lag though. Ugh.
And thank YOU, Craig for providing us dancing monkeys with such a great topic. Boy, we all do hate entertainment!!
Oh, and decongestion time is the best time.
Ryan: For the “decongestant” study, it should be noted that the study took place in Montreal, porn capital of Canada. I’m sure they’d be hard pressed to find 20 guys who haven’t been in on-line porn or at least watched it being produced let alone just looked at it.
I hate when shows feature too many deaths (devaluing life is not cool) and when they have prominent product placement (often phones). Ugh.
And I hate when movies are not Precious.
…or “Drag Me To Hell” or “Dreamgirls.”
Justin: Porn? I don’t even know what a p33n lookz like. I’m virginal and innocent.
Enrico: I hate it when they introduce a character in an episode only to kill him or her off to add a sense of danger. Unless they do a really, really good job at developing the character, I won’t care, and the scene will feel cheap.
I think Battlestar Galactica did a good job at avoiding this. They killed a lot of minor characters over the years, but the characters usually were present or took part in many scenes over the course of the seasons by the time they died. Each character who died was an actual loss for the show.
Ryan — I totally agree. (Even though I ended up going from being a BSG fanatic to being totally pissed as fuck at them by the end of the series. The original miniseries still stands for me as the finest scifi ever done, excluding the 1950s The Day the Earth Stood Still, though.)
Josh — I suppose it was too much to hope that you would actually answer the question seriously, but your p33n-free persona is still adorable.
Justin: The ending did majorly suck.
My roommate recently started watching my copies of BSG and was very disappointed to learn that I only had the first two seasons. He even joined Netflix in order to watch the remaining seasons.
What is with the BSG finale hate? I liked it!
“I don’t even know what a p33n lookz like”
Look down, Josh.
Craiggerz: Sorry…I only look up towards mah (lite)bright future!! So, don’t you bring me down today!
Josh: P33n?? They’re called “thingiez” and they are beautiful!!!!
Dammit, now he has me doing it!
Thingiez? Mine’s called Mr. Happy.
The plot that scores of sitcoms have used over the years: Someone wants to sell the family house and when prospective buyers come over and talk about how they are going to re-construct the inside, the members of the family selling suddenly reminisce about what the house means and then decide not to sell.
My aunt designed & landscaped her house for over 30 years and she told me she didn’t care what the new owners would do, it wouldnt alter her memories and they have a right to do what they want with it once they own it.
#4 bugs me too, but after pondering it a bit I think there’s a reason for it: if they just make up some stupid little graphic, the story advances and everyone’s happy. But if they use an actual phone, then they’re advertising for the phone manufacturer and/or carrier. Ya think? Or no?
So actually about BSG it wasn’t JUST the finale — though that pissed me off (yeah, I *really* believe 30-odd-thousand people will all just meekly agree to give up technology) — but most of the 3rd and 4th seasons. It just became increasingly clear that they DIDN’T have this all planned out, that they WERE just making it up as they went along, and what’s worse, that they had very little respect for their characters or their integrity or consistency and could just make them do anything without regard to what actually made sense based on their previous history. It seemed arrogant to me.
There were still sublime moments in the last 2 seasons. Really impressive acting. There were even some phenomenal moments in the finale (basically *everything* involving Laura Roslin was always phenomenal). The “revelation” episode with Ellen Tigh and the Brother Cavill conversation where everything was revealed was an episode I really enjoyed, though then I felt they ruined it by wasting another episode on Ellen and Saul and #6 having their hissy fit, as if Ellen would still be the same person after regaining all her memories from “Earth”. So, all in all, a very mixed bag.
I’m still going to watch Caprica though. And The Plan.
Don’t hate me, but I always get that parking spot. I can’t explain it really. There I am, whipping through the parking lot, my cinnamon dolce latte secure in the extra long fingers of my perfectly manicured right hand, and voila! there it is.
Oh well. Que sera, sera, right?
SK
Justin: There is a reason I only own the first two seasons. I pretty much agree with your assessment. I still enjoyed the show, but it just wasn’t as good.
Thanks
Exactly. I would probably even watch the show again on DVD despite my misgivings.
BTW: Does Ryan only have cupcake or does Ryan also have twitter feed?
But season three is worth it for the New Caprica episodes alone!
Oh, and SK? I’m not sure I can promise to do as you ask
(j/k)
& Craig I’m sorry to disagree but *I* thought that whole storyline was just a cheap, shallow, facile “oo aren’t we deep” faux-analogue of suicide bombers in occupied Iraq (Simpsons did it better in one of their Treehouse of Horror episodes) without actually taking ANY STAND — in their usual chickenshit way, like they didn’t take a stand on rape, murdering civilians who don’t agree to be impressed into the army, or faking an election. And don’t get me started on the totally-out-of-character Anders moment “You know what you have to do [i.e. cold-bloodedly murder your own wife]“. Bah! I say. Just … BAH!
Justin: I do have a Twitter feed.
I protected my Twitter feed when I realized that Google had it near the top of the results when people searched for my name. I wanted to be able to talk about Puntabulous decongesting without worrying about professional type people reading it.
I am late getting here, and read through all the comments first thinking someone would surely mention my biggest TV pet peeve EVER, but nobody did! I HATE when someone knocks on a front door then they only give the person inside like 2 or 3 seconds to get to the door. If they don’t come, they say “Well, he must not be home” or “let’s go around back”. Hello????? Maybe they weren’t standing in the front hall just waiting for someone to knock on the door. Maybe they’re in the den reading. Maybe they’re on the toilet. Maybe they’re having some “alone time”. Give it a minute!
I know I am late writing this but this is the first time that I ever checked out your blog. I know there are laws about this but I think it is crazy when they show a newborn and it is very clearly a 5 month old baby. Newborns are so small that it is ridiculous to believe a baby that big is a new born.
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