TV Chatter

 I noticed some hype coming up over the 'Friends - Reunion' TV show, and then some counter-hype (negative criticism).

The criticism?  Well...for the two-hour show, they intended to bring a number of big-name people on (Lady Ga-GA, Justine Bieber, Tom Selleck, etc)....which just happened to be all white.  From the list of around 30 guests....the only two non-whites were some South Korean boy-band, and Mindy Kaling (Sri Lankan).  

Lacking diversity?  That was the comment made.  

You can go back over fifty years of American TV, and shows rarely came in diverse cultural patterns (maybe All in the Family Counts, Chico and the Man, etc).  

If you attempted to bring back Bonanza today?  You'd likely have to offer two prominent black cowboy characters in order to sell the show.  Seinfeld?  He'd have to have either a black 'friend' or a Puerto Rican girlfriend.  Dallas?  You'd have to suggest that Jock Ewing had a black girlfriend in the 1950s, and has a black son hidden in the oil business.  Remaking Scooby Doo?  Someone in the group would have to be a minority character....probably from Atlanta.  

All of this leading to lesser quality TV scripts?  I would suggest for the past for the past two years....between the cancel culture and woke shows....it's become pretty dismal, and convincing people to look for reruns developed twenty to forty years ago.