Lessons from bad television

Does anyone out there watch Amazing Grace? I do, but after what? four episodes? I’m not sure I’ll continue to tune in. The whole idea of the show, with Grace Anadarko a “fallen” human being and Earl, her guardian angel trying to help her clean up her act, sounded like a good and interesting premise. I like characters with deep flaws, and hoped the show would be as thought-provoking and well-written as Joan of Arcadia.

The writing is good—to a point. Warm-hearted, but terribly screwed-up Grace never seems to learn or grow from her experiences. She buries her problems with alcohol (she’s an alcoholic) and sleeps with a married man, as well as any other male who happens to be available when she needs someone to hold onto. Yet despite drunken nights she manages to show up at work every day and somehow perform very well as a cop. Not one of her peers seems to notice or care that she gets stinkin’ drunk every night.

When a father almost killed his son in one episode, did Grace learn anything? Not that viewers noticed. When her soon-to-die aunt confessed to sleeping with Grace’s father, did Grace learn or grow? Nope, she simply got drunk once again and slept with another officer.

If I wrote a book like that, where the sympathetic but self-destructive heroine never, ever changed, readers would toss it across the room and would never again pick up one of my novels.

I’m not saying, solve all the problems. I just want to see a little change and growth now and then. A little hope. I’m betting other viewers feel the same way.

I’m thinking that TV writers could take a lesson or two from us novelists.


www.annroth.net
Summer Lovin’ Anthology: A Reunion Story, June 2007
Mitch Takes A Wife, August 2007