Weekly Blog Post #4

The aptly named Carnival is a show about 1930’s Dustbowl America. The show has a freakish quality about it that is reflected in its characters. In “Black Blizzard” we are presented with a bearded lady, a snake charmer, a lizard man and a little person.

I really liked the texture and feel of the show. It immediately gives viewers the sense that it is a well-made, well-produced show. Additionally, the sense of Dustbowl era America is very intriguing topic for the show to be produced. In the American imagination, a lot is known about the Roarin’ Twenties, and the World War Two Era. However, the era of the depression in between these two is often overlooked.

What I did not like about the show was that it had to many swirling plot lines. Shows that have one or two concurrent plot lines are fine. However, this show reminds me of “Lost” where you almost have to take notes to keep up.

The main character, Ben, is one of the most normal characters on the show. Despite the label “normal” he still has the ability to heal people.

One of the things that would be challenging for the show is having a plot line that forced viewers to watch from the very beginning. The fact that viewers had to watch from the very beginning, combined with the fact that they could not afford to miss a single episode, presents severe challenges to the show. The Folk article explains that because of these challenges, the show did not gain a real following until its DVD release.

After reading the Folk article, I realized that the show was deeper than I gave it credit for being. For instance, if asked I would have said that the sets looked authentic. However, I had no idea just how incredibly meticulous this show was when it came to maintaining authenticity. They used hundreds of extras, had to stop filming every time a plane flew by.

One thing that I found shocking, was the sexual nature of the show. Despite being set in the 1930’s the characters slept around quite a bit.  For instance Gecko is presented as a bisexual, which for the time would be incredibly off-putting.

The fact that the show was set in a freak show carnival atmosphere helped ease over the sexual nature of the show.  In fact ,the  contrasting of two separate worlds with completely different sets of ideals was a consistent theme throughout the show. They present the world of Dustbowl America, decades before the civil rights movement or the second wave of the feminist movement. It was not until World War II that opportunities began opening up for women in the working place.

Yet at the same time the show presents a conflict of the 30’s morality with the connotations and implications of the behavior associated with a carnival. Here we get dirty characters that do not neatly fit into society and who have moral codes that differ from the vast majority of Americans to this day.

Works Cited:

“Black Blizzard”. Carnivale. Home Box Office, 2003. Video File.

Folk, Moe. “Slights and Slants: Visual Representation in Carnivale.”  Print. 26 Jan 2011.

Carnival Blog

Narrative complex television shows are special in that they have elaborate plots used to transfix a cult like viewing audience yet miss out on great percentages of expansion for viewer ship due to intense and drawn out story lines. Often times these types of shows garner a great deal of critical praise yet turn off a plethora of viewers due to overly complex themes that sometimes are difficult to understand and go over the audience’s heads. People tend to think of television as a means of solace and usually flock to shows that are easy to comprehend that they can relate to and find either amusing or entertaining yet shows such as Carnival that are extremely in-depth tend to turn off the viewer due to it’s complexity and overly elaborate back stories and underlying messages. Therefore the same thing (its intense complexity) that works towards the benefit of television shows like Carnival and attracts unique audiences and critical appeal also works against this type of show because the viewing audience tends to have a short intention span and doesn’t necessarily desire to have to scrutinize something that should be a simple as watching a television show.

After a long day of work, people in the viewing audience usually tend to come home eager and excited to catch the new episode of their favorite show, kick their feet up and relax. Present day society includes such an abundance of negative and draining social issues from day to day that often times, people who may not have the time or money to go a way on vacation, settle for coming home and catching their favorite broadcast on television to unwind. This is an activity that has become quite common for American people. This is my main point in examining the reason why the show Carnival never seemed to attract an overly large viewing audience because watching this show is more like work than relaxation being that the viewer must almost take notes as the episode goes on in efforts of to keep up with where the broadcast in going. This show is very confusing and all the part such as in the episode “Black Blizzard” were difficult to comprehend and didn’t seem to really relate to one another.

One minute the episode showed a sex scene between a sneaky prostitute and Samson (who was the over seer of the traveling Carnival which was the focus of the show) and then it showed an intense argument between the character Ben (who has special mind powers but chooses to deny his abilities) and Lodz (a blind mentalist who tries to encourage Ben to use his gifts to change the world). The show could be rather intense which explains the viewing audience that it did have, this broadcast is sure to keep one on their toes yet it also could be seen as being rather boring at the same time due to the fact that its based during a very glum time (The United States Depression) and tends to include rather sad themes.

Overall there were definitely pros and cons to this show; both of those have to deal with the complexity of the broadcast. Even though that same issue turned some off it surely was the same thing that keep the show gaining critical acclaim and the respect of the viewers that it did have.

Works Cited

“Black Blizzard.” Carnivale. 5 Oct. 2003. Television

Blog 4: Carnivale

After only two years of production, HBO’s show Carnivale was cancelled. The viewership of the show was too low and the production cost was too high. Carnivale was one of the most expensive shows to ever be produced. Although viewer ratings were always low, there was a huge fan protest when to show got cancelled. The show’s intense narrative was the reason why the fans loved it so much. It was the quality that also made it difficult for people to casually watch the show. After watching the episode “Black Blizzard,” I was able to understand why so many people did not like the show.

One problem with this show was that it was a running series. This means that each episode was a continuation of the story seen in the episode before. This prevents casual viewing because someone flipping through the channels would not know what was going on if they flipped to HBO and Carnivale was on. Because the story line was so complicated, it also made casual viewing nearly impossible.

Another fault of the show is its overly complicated plot. One can figure this out after watching just one episode. For example, after watching the episode “Black Blizzard,” I was left with so many questions about the show. I knew who the main characters were supposed to be, but after watching an entire episode, I was never able to indentify either of the two main stars. Within one episode, approximately 45 minutes long, there seemed to be countless different sub plots and tons of different characters. To make it even more difficult, the transitions from scene to scene were so choppy. This episode just jumped around to each different plot line at the most unusual times. It took me until the end of the episode to straighten out at least some of the characters in my mind, and even then I still felt lost.

Although continuous plot lines and complicated character relationships are what turn some people away form watching certain shows, these qualities also helped Carnivale gain a cult like following of viewers. Viewers got a chance to get hooked into the ongoing plot lines. Also, viewers had the opportunity to fall in love with a certain character and follow him or her throughout the series. At the end of each episode, the intrigue of wondering what would happen to your favorite character in the next episode kept many coming back for more.

That being said, Carnivale is a definitely a show that one must watch from the beginning to understand its complexities. Between the many different plots and the many different characters, it is easy to see why this is the case. Although these qualities are why so many people disliked the show, they are the same reasons why so many people watched the show religiously and were enraged when it was cancelled.

Black Blizzard.” Carnivale. 5 Oct. 2003. Television.