Does TV just get better or is there another factor?

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Austforbeer

Veteran XX
I supposed if I only had to watch All in the Family and I didn't know about Game of Thrones I would be OK with it. TV in the 80's was pretty much shit compared to today's standards and plot lines. Even putting aside the better effect and everything. If I had to go back time and be stuck watching only TV from that period I'd probably kill myself.

I've always wondered how a show like Game of Thrones would have gone over in 1985.
 
I don't really watch TV anymore. Most series are so boring.
I only really watch British panel shows.
 
Pretty much every time I've tried to binge an older tv show for nostalgia's sake I've been horribly disappointed and quit after a few episodes. Better to remember them fondly than watch them again and ruin it.
 
yeah they spend about a billion more dollars on it and it's now a major rival to film & a respectable thing for actors/directors to do

sadly all that effort goes to creating soap operas dressed up as period pieces with shocking cliffhangers and full frontal

most people point to twin peaks and x-files as the beginning of this trend and obv sopranos is when it hit full frontal
 
TV seems way, way better and movies seem terrible now.

All the streaming services push the quality of TV.

Movies are just boring now. They all seem to struggle to do anything unique with that 2 hour format. While TV shows can get into characters more in depth.
 
tbh I am not a familiar enough with TV. It was banned as a child. They handed me books instead. Then I worked and well.. now I watch but not much
 
Austforbeer said:
I've always wondered how a show like Game of Thrones would have gone over in 1985.
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I think David Lynch's Dune is probably your closest parallel. It definitely shouldn't have been a movie.


Like bowl said; TV is a much larger market now. Way more money, talent and an audience for non-PG content.

Other than that, there isn't anything special about Game of Thrones - the first book was written back in what? '96? All HBO had to do was stay faithful to the story. If if you look at nearly everything else on TV today, it's mostly complete garbage so I wouldn't agree that TV has gotten universally better. I think most people now just stream the show(s) they want and are oblivious to everything else.
 
Fool said:
Pretty much every time I've tried to binge an older tv show for nostalgia's sake I've been horribly disappointed and quit after a few episodes. Better to remember them fondly than watch them again and ruin it.
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This is sort of my point. If you watch these shows again they're really bad and predictable. My example I set in the OP is more about, were shows back then ACTUALLY entertaining or were they acceptable because they were the best we had?

I just cant imagine because the person I am at my age during those years and enjoying those types of TV shows. Maybe I'm jaded or just spoiled by far superior storytelling now.
 
If you look at the vast ocean of television shows today, they are 99.9% garbage. Back in the 80s, you always had at least one of three choices that was worth watching.

I watched the entire 7 seasons of GoT in two weeks. I can't even imagine that taking 7 fucking years.
 
Kerosene31 said:
TV seems way, way better and movies seem terrible now.

All the streaming services push the quality of TV.

Movies are just boring now. They all seem to struggle to do anything unique with that 2 hour format. While TV shows can get into characters more in depth.
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eh i think mainstream blockbuster/oscar style movies have been pretty boring at least since the 80s, and there were bad eras before then too, but you remember so few movies compared to how many come out that is seems like the past was better. no one remembers the emoji movies and dark towers, they remember robocop and rambo 2. is force awakens *really* worse than howard the duck?

as long as you stay away from the obvious trash (reboots or anything with a TM in the title or About Social Issues) there's actually a lot of really decent stuff coming from hollywood - this summer was pretty shitty by recent standards, and it still had wind river, atomic blonde, blade runner 2, dunkirk, ape war, and even gog2 was decent (was john wick 2 summer or spring?)

honestly this has probably been hollywood's best decade since the 70s, but obv nothing is going to beat the 70s. the only really bad trend i see is everything being fucking >2 hours long, that's goddamn ridiculous for anything other than a historical epic

i am really bored today
 
Austforbeer said:
This is sort of my point. If you watch these shows again they're really bad and predictable. My example I set in the OP is more about, were shows back then ACTUALLY entertaining or were they acceptable because they were the best we had?

I just cant imagine because the person I am at my age during those years and enjoying those types of TV shows. Maybe I'm jaded or just spoiled by far superior storytelling now.
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the problem is you're comparing all in the family to game of thrones, that's like saying "boy this week's marmaduke really doesn't stack up to great expectations"

the actual question is would you rather watch all in the family or big banger theory? i wasn't even alive in the 70s and i'd take the former without a second thought
 
bowl of blood said:
the problem is you're comparing all in the family to game of thrones, that's like saying "boy this week's marmaduke really doesn't stack up to great expectations"

the actual question is would you rather watch all in the family or big banger theory? i wasn't even alive in the 70s and i'd take the former without a second thought
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This is a fair point but I'm trying to put it in the context of what was popular when I was referring more to what was entertaining. If there were really entertaining shows like that back then I'd like to know what they are.

Maybe Dynasty was good? To be fair I really don't know, which begs the question what was the best of the best TV back then as was it comparable?
 
It's not all that different as far as quality. There are great shows and shit shows, just more of each. Nowadays most of the great shows are on cable channels or streaming, though, with bigger budgets. The networks just can't quite compete at that level, but then they're only going for eyeballs anymore, not any sort of reputation for providing quality programming.

(I was alive and watching TV and movies in the '70s, and a huge fan of all the Lear shows)
 
There's a lot of great series these days but there's also way more shit that's only on because the cable networks will give a multi-season contract to any vaguely oddball family willing to say stupid shit on camera and label it "reality TV". It's all the same formula of weak manufactured drama or danger right down to the cliffhanger commercial breaks. No, the good shows are the exception.
 
Most TV in general is now shit but the drama series (Band of Brothers, Lost, Prison Break, GOT leading to all those new fandangled shows) etc has become way better.

Even so, I now watch almost no TV. 5-10 minutes of the cooking channel or something and Survivor. I always watch all of Survivor b/c it's just damn awesome.

Most movies now are steaming piles of shit.
 
Austforbeer said:
This is a fair point but I'm trying to put it in the context of what was popular when I was referring more to what was entertaining. If there were really entertaining shows like that back then I'd like to know what they are.

Maybe Dynasty was good? To be fair I really don't know, which begs the question what was the best of the best TV back then as was it comparable?
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this is just back to my original answer: shows didn't have a tenth of the budget back then that they have today, so no, earlier than twin peaks, there is no equivalent to game of thrones

the best classic television that i'm aware of is the obvious stuff, twilight zone and star trek
 
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