The Michigan Daily — michigandaily.com
Arts
6 — Wednesday, November 9, 2022 

The fatal flaw of teen TV

For the past three years, my 
sister and I have been sporadically 
watching 
“Dawson’s 
Creek.” 
Through 
intermittent 
binge 
periods we’ve borne witness to 
the epic highs — Dawson’s (James 
Van Der Beek, “Varsity Blues”) 
caricatural memeified crying face 
— and lows — Joey (Katie Holmes, 
“Batman Begins”) and Pacey’s 
(Joshua 
Jackson, 
“Fringe”) 
inexplicable break-up — of what 
is now a teen TV legend. With its 
small-town setting of Capeside, 
Massachusetts, 
obscure 
film 
references and mildly pretentious 
dialogue, the show was a certified 
hit in its heyday. Recently, we 
reached a new milestone while 
watching season five: the dreaded 
college years. 
Maybe it’s simply the wear 
and tear of one too many seasons 
or the destabilizing shift in 
environment, but something in 
the teen TV blueprint seems to 
set this phase up for failure. With 
long-running shows, first seasons 
get bogged down by expository 
set-up, superficially hindered by 

a lack of emotional attachment or 
familiarity with the characters. 
Early middle seasons tend to 
hit a sweet spot; the characters 
are worth rooting for, the plot 
is not yet overly convoluted and 
everything is heightened by the 
freshly rejuvenated sophomore 
effort. But the post-high-school 
season? That’s the make-or-break 
moment. The litmus test of truly 
enduring teen television.
A few episodes in and it was 
painstakingly obvious that the 
show had fallen short of the 
mark. Faltering at the sight 
of a Capeside-less horizon, it 
haphazardly made substantial 
tonal 
shifts 
to 
compensate. 
Dawson’s Hollywood director 
dreams were hastily crushed and 
not even the addition of comedic 
mediator Busy Phillips (“Freaks 
and Geeks”) could save the show 
from this inevitable slump or 
its bright-eyed characters from 
reckoning with reality. Diverting 
the show’s original focus after 
four seasons felt futile, especially 
when it’s been built upon a very 
specific period of adolescence, of 
the simple everyday dramas that 
absorb the monotony of small-
town teen life.

But this is no isolated incident. 
As seasoned teen TV viewers, this 
failure to smoothly transition into 
adulthood was hardly surprising 
for my sister and me. The post-
high-school season decline has 
never been the exception but 
rather the hard-and-fast rule. 
But why is this the case? Why not 
go out on a high note? Why do 
countless shows give college the 
old college try, only to taper out 
into mediocrity and self-dug plot 
holes a season or two later?
One fast, easy explanation is 
money. Prior to the streaming-
service era of the last decade, 
long-running shows were the 
norm, sustained by primetime 
slots that could draw in viewers 
week 
after 
week 
regardless 
of 
stale 
plotlines 
or 
tired 
punchlines. Exhibit A: Despite 
the dip in quality of “Friends” in 
its later seasons, each of the main 
cast was taking home a million 
dollars an episode. So that’s one 
very obvious incentive to keep 
a show going long beyond its 
lifespan. 
Another answer lies in the 
fact that the CW — arguably the 
most notable teen TV network 
of the 2010s — was notorious for 

stringing out kernels of successful 
TV ventures for far too long. 
Take “The Vampire Diaries,” for 
instance. The first few seasons 
were fantastic, but the decision 
to swap out Mystic Falls High for 
Whitmore College was a doomed 
one. Seasons five and six were 

sub-par, but once Nina Dobrev 
(“Love Hard”) left, they really 
should’ve pulled the plug. Instead, 
they chugged on for another 
two seasons without their main 
character, and it got pitiful to 
watch. Those endearingly absurd 
supernatural plotlines began to 

feel less excitingly shocking and 
more messily strewn together 
as a result of grossly repetitive 
writing. Even if Dobrev had stuck 
around, it already had one foot in 
the proverbial coffin. 

SERENA IRANI
Daily Arts Writer

Design by Tye Kalinovic

‘Star Wars: Tales of the Jedi’ is 
the perfect addition to the Star 
Wars universe

Z

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The Road to 
Zero Emissions

Learn about Zero 
Emission Buses 

The Ann Arbor Area Transportation 

Authority is committed to the health 

of our environment and community. 

Join us to learn about zero emission 

bus technology and how reducing the 

emissions of our fleet can lead to cleaner 

air for everyone.

Public Meeting Information:

Visit TheRide.org for public meeting 

information and to learn more about 

Zero Emission Buses.

Date: Tuesday, November 15th

Virtual Meeting via Zoom: 

Time: 12:00 p.m.–1:00 p.m.

In-person Meeting: 

Time: 6:00 p.m.– 7:30 p.m. 

Location: Washtenaw County Learning 

Resource Building

4135 Washtenaw Ave. 

Ann Arbor, MI 48108

Tenet,’ ‘Dark’ and the death of character

David Lynch would be very 
upset with the 2020 version of 
me. 2020 Rami, trapped in his 
little suburban basement, had no 
access to a high quality screen. 
He had no access to a state of the 
art sound system. He had no blu-
rays of the latest films. What he 
did have was his laptop, a shoddy 
pair of headphones and a website 
whose legality was questionable. 
What should have been a viewing 
experience 
characterized 
by 
a chamber of rumbling sound 
and overwhelming visuals was 
… decidedly not that. For most 
movies, this wasn’t a problem. 

“The Father,” “Minari,” “Sound 
of Metal” and the outstanding 
“I’m Thinking of Ending Things” 
survived the neolithic conditions 
of my basement to leave some kind 
of impact in my mind. 
This 
technique, 
surprisingly 
enough, did not work when I 
watched 
Christopher 
Nolan’s 
“Tenet,” a movie equal parts 
ambitious and ill-timed. Instead 
of delaying his bombastic summer 
blockbuster, as pretty much every 
other filmmaker did in the middle 
of the greatest public health crisis 
since 1918, he valiantly pushed on 
to theaters. How could you blame 
me for sailing the high seas to 
watch it on my little PC? My tiny 
setup took a lot away from the film. 
Gone were the garish visuals and 

sensory overload. What remained? 
Not much. Nolan presented some 
neat concepts. There were some 
funny lines. But at the end of the 
day, nothing in the movie mattered 
to me. The strange monologues, 
the “twists,” the batshit insane 
final fight. It all felt empty.
Maybe I wasn’t a movie guy. 
Or maybe I just needed to watch 
“Tenet” in theaters. About a week 
after watching “Tenet,” I moved 
to the oft-mentioned sci-fi drama 
“Dark” on Netflix. Focusing on 
a 
German 
teenager’s 
journey 
through time and, ultimately, a 
journey to find himself, the show 
is undeniably impressive. Its plot 
was as intricate as a Fabergé Egg, 
with thousands of small features 
and moving parts that constantly 

wowed. There were twists and 
turns 
and 
moments 
I 
never 
expected. The show’s tangled web 
of characters and family trees were 
organized, seemingly seasons in 
advance, to build a wide tapestry 
out of its strange timeline. But 
funnily enough, the same problem 
I had with “Tenet” re-emerged: 
After 26 hours of sci-fi drama, I 
didn’t care. By the third season, I 
had seen nearly every character 
die multiple times, I had seen the 
central town get time-nuked (do 
not ask) four times, I had seen a 
child bludgeoned by a rock (twice) 
and two separate incestuous family 
loops. Time after time after time, 
the show found ways to subvert all 
expectations to shock and awe, but 
it failed to be shocking.
How could two separate works 
of fiction, one focused on spectacle 
and the other on plot, contain the 
same core problem? It’s simple: 
Neither contains human beings. 
Sure, they looked like people. They 
grinned, frowned, cried, laughed 
and died. They went through all 
the motions, but that didn’t make 
them human, just human-shaped. 
Take John David Washington’s 
(“Malcolm & Marie”) character in 
“Tenet” — the Protagonist. Who is 
this guy? Is he kind? Does he care 
about others? Is he an optimist? 
Does he have goals besides doing 
what he’s told? Nope. Minus some 
occasional snark, there’s not even 
a hint of personality in him. How 
about Jonas (Louis Hofmann, 
“Red Sparrow”), the protagonist of 

“Dark”? Every single thing he does 
in the show he does because he’s 
told. Admittedly, he does have one 
leg up over Washington’s character: 
There are people around him he 
cares for. His father, his girlfriend, 
his missing friend and his mother 
(Fun fact: two of those are the same 
character). But does he actually 
care? Does he do anything to show 
that he cares, other than cry on 
command when they’re hurt? After 
his girlfriend, who is supposedly 
the only one keeping him happy, 
is murdered for the first time (do 
not ask), what does he do? Does he 
look for revenge? Does he try to go 
back in time to resurrect her? Does 
he fall into some kind of depressive 
haze? Does he do literally anything 
other than following the same 
instructions 
he 
was 
already 
executing? For all of the above, the 
answer is a resounding no. 
Every other “character” in both 

“Dark” & “Tenet” is the same. They 
move where the plot dictates. They 
have beliefs but no traits. Ideas but 
no feelings. The worst part? This 
wasn’t accidental. Washington’s 
character isn’t just the protagonist 
of 
the 
movie, 
he’s 
officially 
credited as “The Protagonist.” 
Nolan absolutely understood what 
he was doing here. There was too 
much going on in “Tenet”: strange 
concepts, an unhinged plot, gaudy 
visuals. Something had to give, 
and the chosen lamb for Nolan’s 
proverbial slaughter was character. 
“Dark” functions similarly, as 
an auxiliary storytelling device. 
Netflix created an online character 
guide for viewers. Instead of 
recording any characters’ personal 
aspects, there were paragraphs 
chronicling their importance to 
the plot.

RAMI MAHDI
Daily Arts Contributor

Read more at MichiganDaily.com

Read more at MichiganDaily.com

Ever since the arrival of the 
Star Wars franchise to Disney+, 
the streaming platform has been 
churning out new TV shows 
almost faster than fans can 
request them. From the recent 
addition “Andor” to the fan-
favorite “The Mandalorian” that 
brought us baby Yoda, the Star 
Wars universe proved itself to 
be — for better or worse — ever-
expanding. While the abundant 
additions to the Star Wars world 
have received a bundle of mixed 
reviews, the latest series proved to 
be, without a doubt, a resounding 
success. “Star Wars: Tales of the 
Jedi” is the perfect deep dive 
into unseen moments from “Star 
Wars” history, giving viewers a 
glimpse into the past of beloved 
characters with an ideal balance 
of surprise character cameos and 
critical backstory.
A six-episode mini-series, “Star 
Wars: Tales of the Jedi” consists 
of a series of vignettes that tell 
the stories of two characters on 
opposite sides of the rebellion: 
fan favorite padawan Ahsoka 
Tano (Ashley Eckstein, “Star 
Wars: The Clone Wars”) and Jedi-
turned-Sith Count Dooku (Corey 
Burton, “The Book of Boba Fett”). 

With three of the six episodes 
dedicated 
to 
each 
character, 
“Star Wars: Tales of the Jedi” 
fills in the blanks left by the past 
stories of the Clone Wars and the 
Star Wars series as a whole. The 
story follows each character from 
different pivotal points in their 
lives pre-imperial takeover, with 
Ahsoka’s arc ranging from infancy 
to her time as Anakin Skywalker’s 
padawan and Dooku’s following 
his break from the Jedi Order. 
Each story is told in short episodes 
of about 15 minutes, making the 
content 
easily 
digestible 
and 
thoroughly action-packed. While 
each installment is short, the 
content is impactful, serving to 
expand upon the nuances of the 
characters and institutions of the 
“Star Wars” universe in a way 
that full-fledged shows, and even 
movies, could not. In addition 
to the surprising depth of the 
show’s brief anecdotes, fans of the 
franchise are also blessed with 
brief yet beautiful cameos from 
other favorite characters such 
as Qui-Gon Jinn (Liam Neeson, 
“Memory”), 
Obi-Wan 
Kenobi 
(James Arnold Taylor, “Johnny 
Test”) and Jedi Master Yaddle 
(Bryce Dallas Howard, “Jurassic 
Park”). 
The 
introduction 
of 
these classic characters into the 
narrative paints a picture of the 
relationship dynamics between 

crucial characters that we didn’t 
get a full glimpse of in the original 
“Star Wars” series, making the 
short series feel fully developed 
and complete. 
Perhaps 
“Star 
Wars: 
Tales 
of 
the 
Jedi’”s 
biggest 
accomplishment is its dissection 
of the familiar institutions and 
politics of the original series 
— a large undertaking that the 
show handles with grace. In 
chronicling the adventures of two 
very different characters with 
diverging paths, the show is able 
to explore two opposing sides of 
an ongoing conflict in a surprising 
amount of detail. In the episodes 
of Dooku’s story arc, we see a 
growing breach between himself 
and the Jedi Order caused by 
more than just the Empire’s evil 
influence. With each episode and 
Jedi mission, the questionable 
politics of the Jedi order are made 
apparent through Dooku’s eyes 
as he comes face-to-face with 
the destructive effects of the 
Order’s political neutrality on 
the people of the galaxy. While 
a deep exploration of social class 
and intergalactic politics isn’t 
something you might expect from 
an animated mini-series, “Star 
Wars: Tales of the Jedi” certainly 
delivers.

ANNABEL CURRAN
Daily Arts Writer

Read more at MichiganDaily.com

Design by Abby Schreck

