I had little interest in watching Awake on NBC.

I was like… ennh. Okay. Another cop show. This time — with a twist! He’s split between two realities! Or something! I don’t care! I want ice cream and tacos! Fuck yeah! Woo!

Further, I was still a little butt-chapped by NBC’s decision to shelve Community.

Except, then they unshelved Community. Earning a little good will.

Then they started showing promos for Awake.

Jason Isaacs as a detective who loses his wife and/or his son in a car accident — every night he goes to sleep and wakes up in a reality where one or the other survived. But it wasn’t the premise that sold me. The promos revealed a thoughtful, mature show that possessed a gimmick but did not rely upon it.

I knew something was up when my wife saw the promo, said, “Oh, that looks good.”

Suddenly, my interest was piqued.

And last night, I finally got around to watching the DVR’ed pilot episode.

You need to be watching this show.

A Show Written By Writers

That sounds strange, I know. “Chuck, aren’t all TV shows written by writers, you smeg-mouthed dope-donkey?” First: how rude. Second: technically, yes, writers write all shows. But that doesn’t mean they’re the ones in control. Or that what they wrote ends up on the screen. Hollywood offers an ecosystem whereby a great many individuals with absolutely zero sense of good storytelling get to call the shots.

This is not that show.

The show steps out of the gate and in the dialogue makes clear that it’s paying attention to the laws of good storytelling. The one shrink in the one reality tells Michael Britten (Isaacs) to start at the beginning. But the main character says “No, let’s start right now.” Meaning, we’re not going to get a dumptruck of back-chatter and exposition dumped on our heads. We’re going to move through the story where it is now, and get details when we need them — and never before.

Sharp dialogue, strong plotting, damaged characters? This is a writer’s show. (And here my bias as a writer is made clear: any show with quality components and strong story is, to me, a writer’s show.)

The Lost Vibe

I remember watching the first episode of Lost and finding myself more and more transfixed — and pleasantly bewildered — by what was going on. Up until that point where Charlie utters that famous line: “Guys… where are we?” Then, DOOSH: the Lost logo hit and there I was left blinking and wondering just how a show this sublime snuck past the bouncers in TV-Land. (How Lost ended up is a discussion for another time.)

When I watched Awake, I got the same vibe — the same freaky frequency drew me closer. All these little twists and uncertainties and slow reveals. I saw there thinking, “What is happening? What’s really going on?”

They took a very simple concept — plane crash on an island, cop pinballs between two realities (one of which may be a dream) — and gave it to us with subtlety and grace. With a focus on character and story above the contrivance of plot or the cleverness of the logline and yet while still promising that what you’re seeing is (as the therapist played by B.D. Wong puts it) just the tip of an iceberg.

Could it go off the rails?

Sure. Any show could.

But I like having a show so firmly on the rails first, and this is very much that.

Jason Isaacs

Isaacs is, to me, the devil. He plays bad very well. It’s not just Malfoy. It’s Admiral Zhao, or the guy from The Patriot. Isaacs is a chilly, scary dude. So to have him come out of the gate with this protagonist — who feels equally chilly here but yet contains a core of warmth and soul — who you care about so strongly from the get-go, well, it’s a win for me.

Rare To Find A Show That Demands Patience

I’ve no idea if the show will reward that patience — I’m not a haruspex, tearing the intestinal wire from forth my television to examine it for glimpses of the future — but I do know that the show is demanding my patience, which to me is a feature and not a bug. I like a show that wants me to sit down and go for the ride. I don’t want a story to pander to me, to shake its moneymaker in a desperate grab to keep my attention between commercial breaks. This is a show that’s subtle, that’s got nuance, that is asking me to chill the fuck out while it tells me the story it needs to tell.

Again, will it reward? No idea.

But if the pilot is any indication, we’re at least in for an earnest attempt.

You can catch up on the pilot (if it’s still live at the time of this linking) here.

And the show airs tomorrow night (Thurs) at 10pm. Check it.

Now, IFC is weird in our house: Verizon makes it a subscription-only channel and we do not subscribe. And yet, somehow we can still see it? I don’t know. I blame techno-djinn. As should we all.

IFC has been very good with the making-funny, given that there is where I also discovered Whitest Kids U Know (streaming on Netflix, and the Dinosaur Rap is necessary viewing).

Anyway, point being, I’m a bit late to the game here, but Sweet Jeebus, Portlandia is some funny shit. I’m not particularly aware of Portland culture, but it matters little — the show walks this bizarre line where it first puts hipster culture on a pedestal and then pelts it with Pabst Blue Ribbon cans until it falls off and breaks. On Saturday Night Live, I generally can’t stand Fred Armisen — and yet, here, he’s allowed to, I dunno, become his comedy self and go Full Tilt Weird with it. And it works. By god, it fucking works. (Oh, and his comedic partner in crime is, somewhat mysteriously, Carrie Brownstein from totally rad grr-grrl band, Sleater-Kinney. So, there’s that.)

If you don’t have IFC, Portlandia still streams on Netflix.

In the meantime, I leave you with this:

A show that was drifting lazily toward cancellation.

(I do however blame the shit out of their marketing team. Terriers flew under the radar in part because that’s where they advertised it. I love the show, and I almost forgot that it was on.)

I’m happy it got to finish out its season. A lot of shows don’t get that opportunity — though The Gods Bless the DVD format, because now shows canceled before the ends of their respective seasons can gain at least a little life on the back end, can at least be seen instead of ending up buried in the pop culture equivalent of a shallow grave near a gaggle of hobos.

Which means that from this point forward, you can at least point people to that DVD collection on your shelf. The one called Terriers. The one that features the Sunshine Noir of San Diego. The one that shares blood and soul with Veronica Mars. The one that stars the criminally underused Donal Logue and the hopefully-not-one-day-also-criminally-underused Michael Raymond-James. The one about friendship and love and murder and conspiracy, a show that was equal turns hilarious and heart-wrenching.

The one that, in five years time, someone will tell you “they never heard of.”

“Oh, I never heard of that,” they’ll say.

“I know.” You know.

It’ll give you a chance to lend them the DVD. (Of course, by then, fuck it, they’ll have to download it from the iTunes Mega Brain because while I love streaming and downloadable media I lament our inability to share such media with friends, because this forces them to buy it, and let’s be honest, they probably won’t).

Let Terriers live on.

Like you do — or should do — with other one-season wonders.

What other one-season wonders can you think of that earned your love? Firefly, obviously. Wonderfalls, most definitely. Both with producer Tim Minear, who was also attached to Terriers. Can we all just agree that Minear’s name attached to a project means it’s a) going to be brilliant and b) going to get canceled? I’m almost of a mind to not watch anything he does — I just don’t want my heart broken.

So, on a day when everybody else is going to be talking about WikiLeaks, let’s talk about one-season wonders, shows that made it to a season (or less) and broke our hearts when they went away.

What one-season shows do you miss most?

Nope, I’m not out sassing it up with the ladies. I’m not drinking Pabst Blue Ribbon with a tangle of hipsters. I’m not snortling blow from inside a hooker’s uterus.

I’m watching the fuck out of Ghost Adventures on the Travel Channel.

This show is ridiculous — by which I mean, ridiculously awesome.

How the wife and I got into this ludicrous piece of television programming is as ludicrous as the show itself. Get this: we were in Hawaii (Kauai in particular). It was the middle of the day. The sun was up. And we? We were in our hotel room and not frolicking around paradise. Okay, we had just returned from such frolicking, and I was coming down with a cold and the wife was coming down with a bad case of “there’s a baby inside me and now I think I might throw up.”

So, we took some time to just lay down in the hotel room. Hey, it sounds bad, but you open the lanai doors, you hear the surf crashing right outside your window — it’s relaxing as shit.

Of course, we ruined that by putting on the television but what waited there on the Idiot Box made it all worth it. There, in the middle of sun-blasted paradise, we watched an episode of Ghost Adventures.

If you don’t know the scoop behind the show, it’s like this: three guys go to a notably-haunted location (not just, say, some dude’s house but a well-known site like Eastern State Penitentiary) and at night they get locked inside the location, turn off all the lights, and run around in the dark yelling at ghosts and jumping at shadows with night-vision cameras running.

We were rapt. It’s unintentionally hilarious. You probably need to see an episode to really understand, but here, let me try to elucidate for you the reasons this show totally holds my interest.

Because This Guy Looks Like This Guy

Let’s just get it out of the way right now. Zak “Bilbo” Bagans looks like a roided-out Michael Cera.

Need proof? Boom.

See? What’d I tell you? Zak “Dildo” Bagans is like Bizarro Michael Cera — all muscles and hard angles but still the same turtle-faced dude. Sure, okay, Cera’s kind of a hipster goof with the body of an overcooked noodle, and Zak is like… I don’t know, some kind of Emo Jock Frat Goth? Still. I think they’re alternate universe versions of one another. They should devote an episode to that shit. Yeah.

Because This Is The Unlikeliest Crew Of Ghost Hunters You’ve Ever Seen

Your average ghost hunter crew comprises… well, social miscreants of some kind. It’s like someone emptied out a bag of nerds and gave them all EMF detectors. I don’t mean to knock the ghost hunter type: hey, I probably am the ghost hunter type. I love that shit. I believe in ghosts. Still, I’m just saying: ghost hunters often reveal some weird mix of science nerds, paranormal nerds, history nerds: nerds, ahoy.

Oh-ho-ho, not the Ghost Adventures crew. They’re the tough guys of the ghost hunter world. They’re ghost-tracking frat boys. It’s even in the title of their show: they’re having adventures, goddamnit. They see themselves as intrepid heroes — just as Indiana Jones banished the image of the nebbishy archaeologist, so too do the Ghost Adventures Crew squash the idea that you have to be a super-nerd.

Of course, it comes across as bizarrely insincere at times: one suspects these guys were hired together, chosen by network executives out of a TV-friendly lineup, but apparently, they’re not only friends but also worked together before the show on a documentary (that… won awards?). In fact, these guys are reportedly totally sincere which makes the show even better.

Oh, and they call each other “bro” and “dude” a lot.

As in, “I just felt some weird energy go up my arm, bro.”

Or, “Dude! I hear some old woman screaming in here! I just peed a little, dude.”

These guys look basically like the types who roll around in puddles of Axe Body Spray the way my dog likes to roll around in gopher diarrhea. You can practically smell the vinegar and water.

Because They Taunt The Ghosts With Their Brash Machismo

They have called their approach to ghost hunting “raw,” “extreme,” and “in your face.”

Here, then, is their basic mode of ghost hunting:

They go into a room or area known for its paranormal weirdness, and host Zak “Frodo” Bagans will inevitably taunt the shit out of the invisible specters. He’ll be like, “I know you’re in here, ghost. Are you upset that I’m in here? I hear you like to punch little girls. Why don’t you punch me? Why don’t you take this Samurai Sword that I brought with me and use it to chop my head off? Why don’t you molest me? Why don’t you take down my pants and molest me and then chop me in half with a Samurai Sword? Show me your power. I’m letting you have my energy. Go ahead. Take my body for a joyride. Are are you some kind of pussy? I heard you were a pussy. All the other ghosts were like, ‘Oh, that other ghost, he’s a big old vagina.’ Why don’t you stick a thermonuclear device inside my body and blow me up? I brought one. Are you man enough to blow me and the whole Eastern Seaboard to pieces, pussy-faced ghost vagina?”

I’m exagerrating, of course.

But not that much.

Because It’s Fun To Watch Them Piss Themselves

And yet, despite all the ballsy taunting of the spirit world, any time they hear a loud noise, think they hear whispering, see some kind of shadow — whatever — next thing you know one of them (usually Aaron) is shrieking like a girl scout who just had a mouse run up her kilt. He jumps, flails, says “DUDE” and “BRO” a whole lot, genuinely looking like he just filled his trousers with fear poo.

Because They Find EVP Everywhere They Turn

Other ghost hunter shows, they try to collect EVP — meaning, “electronic voice phenomena,” where they capture ghostly whispering on recorded media only — and it doesn’t happen all that often. They get one good one, maybe, and the rest they debunk. Oh, not the Ghost Adventures Crew. They get a dozen EVP an episode. Every time they whip out that digital recorder, it’s a goddamned EVP-looza.

Half the time, they hear something that just plain isn’t there –

ZACH: “Are you here, ghost? Why don’t you rip out my throat with a claw hammer? Prove your power!”

EVP: ***incomprehensible static that sort of sounds like some old man whispering to himself on a park bench**

ZACH: “And now, we receive a sinister and intelligent EVP from the spirit, where he says –”

TEXT ON SCREEN: “Kill Zak.”

And my wife and I look at each other, eyebrows cocked. “I don’t think that’s what the ghost said.”

Just to make sure, they replay the EVP on screen like, seventeen times. And each time it’s like, “Ehhh, I dunno. Maybe the ghost said, Whack attack? Or, Backpack? I’m just not feeling this one.”

Other times, the ghosts say something that just doesn’t make sense. My favorite is when one ghost said, “Coffee… Cafe.” Seriously? That’s what the ghost wants the communicate to us? “Coffee Cafe?” The spirit expended all his spectral energy to see if he could find the nearest Starbucks?

Because Of Holy Shit, Bro! Goosebumps! Dude! Bro! Goosebumps!

Goosebumps to these guys are not an indication of being creeped out, or cold, or whatever — no, no, goosebumps are hard scientific data. They get goosebumps, boy, that’s clear evidence that the paranormal is hanging around. They point to it like it’s their first erection: “Dude. Goosebumps.” “I know, bro, I feel it, too. It’s running up my arm.” “Man, it’s running down my leg. I feel the energy. Like a spirit is moving through me.”

Me, I’d get goosebumps too if I was running around in the dark playing grab-ass with a bunch of invisible ghosts. Hell, I get goosebumps when I watch Star Wars or listen to old Captain and Tennille records. It doesn’t mean I’m being haunted by specters.

OR DOES IT?

Shut up.

Because Orbs Always Look Like They’re Flying Up Into Someone’s Butt

They don’t do a lot with orbs, which I appreciate because mostly, I think orbs are completely ridiculous. It’s always dust or a moth or some shit, but a lot of ghost hunters spaz out whenever they see an orb — “Oh! Oh! Orb! It’s a spirit!” No, it’s a flake of dandruff. Wash your hair. I’ll get excited when a full-body apparition comes up and tries to cup my nuts or steal my iPhone. Orbs do not thrill me.

Still, once in a while Zak and his crew will find an orb, a mote of light that seems to move in ways one doesn’t expect — and on this show, they often seem to be moving into people.

And often, though it’s never acknowledged, into someone’s butt.

I don’t know why this is, exactly, but it suggests that specters are somewhat anally-fixated.

So, if you ever go ghost hunting, maybe tickle your rosebud with a little holy water.

I’m just saying. Be prepared.

Because They Always Save The Day

Obviously, reality television lives or dies on narrative, and ghost hunting shows are no different. Ghost Adventures doesn’t always hit you over the head with it — which is nice — except at the end. At the end of every show, Zak “Deep Frodo” Bagans will offer some magnanimous look back on their lockdown — “Well, I think we helped some ghosts reach the other side today. We gave these ghosts peace.” Or they mumble something about having solved a murder despite having solved no murder at all anywhere ever. Really? You believe this stuff? The most you did was threaten a bunch of ghosts and give one boogity-boojum directions to the nearest coffee house. You’re not Zelda Rubenstein from Poltergeist, dude.

OR IS HE?

Okay, probably not.

Because Despite All That, The Show Is Sometimes Pretty Damn Creepy

At least once or twice an episode, you get a moment which is genuinely spooky. Like in last night’s episode, you get to see this shadow on the wall that is plainly an arm and plainly has no source and then morphs into something and disappears. Or you get an EVP which honestly sounds like someone saying something from beyond the grave — the words are crisp, clear, and often sinister.

Sure, they might be making this crap up. But they seem to really believe it. And it helps turn this show from something that is pure farce into something on a whole other level — because I don’t suspect these guys think they’re bullshitting anybody. From all reports, they’re sincere as all-get-out. They mean it. They believe it. Are they making stuff up? Who cares? You’ve got a show with three lovable douchenozzles wandering around in the absolute dark, word-punching ghosts and squealing at whatever rat fart they hear two rooms away. It’s awesome. It’s funny, it’s goofy, and yeah, once in awhile it’s actually a little spooky.

Tell me you watch this show. Someone. Anyone?

Let us share the love.

Even the best television shows have episodes that are real stinkers — clunky junkers that don’t really feel right. But, for every shitpile episode, you also get those episodes that are truly gilded — they sit high atop a hill overlooking all of the Empire, serving as a gleaming example to what television can truly aspire.

Some episodes, you love more than others.

It’s like children. You have more than one kid, you end up liking one more than the other. I mean, c’mon. Don’t lie. It’s just between you and me. I won’t tell Suzy that you think Jimbo is your favorite and that’s why he gets one extra scoop of ice cream every night. I’ll keep that on the down-low.

What are some of the best episodes?

The Lost pilot. The Gilmore Girls “They Shoot Gilmores, Don’t They.” (Yes, I watched and loved that show, shut up. At first it was a requirement to get in good with my wife, but as it turns out, it was one of the whip-crackinest smartest shows out there.) Sopranos, “Pine Barrens.” Buffy, “The Body.” The Wire has almost too many — “Late Editions,” “Corner Boys,” “Hamsterdam.” Hell, Mad Men may have just had its best episode a month ago: “The Suitcase.”

Hell, if you have 20 minutes, watch my favorite episode of Archer: “Skytanic.” (“My vulva is smoother than a veal cutlet!”)

So what about you, Pikachu?

Favorite episodes ever. Across various shows. Emblematic. Unforgettable.

I await your input.

(Oh, and at the top is a scene from the best episode of Community ever — an episode that embodies what’s best about absurd television sitcoms. That Paintball episode is buh-rilliant.)

Det. James ‘Jimmy’ McNulty: You know why I respect you so much, Bunk?

Det. William ‘Bunk’ Moreland: Mm-mmm.

McNulty: It’s not ’cause you’re good police, ’cause, y’know, fuck that, right?

Bunk: Mm. Fuck that, yeah.

McNulty: It’s not ’cause when I came to homicide, you taught me all kinds of cool shit about . . . well, whatever.

Bunk: Mm. Whatever.

McNulty: It’s ’cause when it came time for you to fuck me . . . you were very gentle.

Bunk: You damn right.

McNulty: See, ’cause you could have hauled me out of the garage and just bent me over the hood of a radio car, and . . . no, you were, you were very gentle.

Bunk: I knew it was your first time. I wanted to make that shit special.

McNulty: It was, man. It fucking was.

D’Angelo Barksdale: Now look, check it, it’s simple, it’s simple. See this? This the kingpin, a’ight? And he the man. You get the other dude’s king, you got the game. But he trying to get your king too, so you gotta protect it. Now, the king, he move one space any direction he damn choose, ’cause he’s the king. Like this, this, this, a’ight? But he ain’t got no hustle. But the rest of these motherfuckers on the team, they got his back. And they run so deep, he really ain’t gotta do shit.

Preston ‘Bodie’ Broadus: Like your uncle.

D’Angelo Barksdale: Yeah, like my uncle. You see this? This the queen. She smart, she fast. She move any way she want, as far as she want. And she is the go-get-shit-done piece.

Wallace: Remind me of Stringer.

D’Angelo Barksdale: And this over here is the castle. Like the stash. It can move like this, and like this.

Wallace: Dog, stash don’t move, man.

D’Angelo Barksdale: C’mon, yo, think. How many time we move the stash house this week? Right? And every time we move the stash, we gotta move a little muscle with it, right? To protect it.

Preston ‘Bodie’ Broadus: True, true, you right. All right, what about them little baldheaded bitches right there?

D’Angelo Barksdale: These right here, these are the pawns. They like the soldiers. They move like this, one space forward only. Except when they fight, then it’s like this. And they like the front lines, they be out in the field.

Wallace: So how do you get to be the king?

D’Angelo Barksdale: It ain’t like that. See, the king stay the king, a’ight? Everything stay who he is. Except for the pawns. Now, if the pawn make it all the way down to the other dude’s side, he get to be queen. And like I said, the queen ain’t no bitch. She got all the moves.

Preston ‘Bodie’ Broadus: A’ight, so if I make it to the other end, I win.

D’Angelo Barksdale: If you catch the other dude’s king and trap it, then you win.

Preston ‘Bodie’ Broadus: A’ight, but if I make it to the end, I’m top dog.

D’Angelo Barksdale: Nah, yo, it ain’t like that. Look, the pawns, man, in the game, they get capped quick. They be out the game early.

Preston ‘Bodie’ Broadus: Unless they some smart-ass pawns.

That’s a really weird blog post title, isn’t it?  No, this is not the blog post where I finally transition into becoming a woman. (Fun Fact: had I been born a girl, I would’ve been named “Charlene.”)

Rather, this is a post where I exhort you to watch…

MTV.

I know. I know. Just push past it. For now, just nod and smile for me, okay? I don’t need the twisted frowns, the raised eyebrows, the “jerk-off” motions performed by mocking hands. Stop sniggering. Stop it right now.

I’m not suggesting you plant your breadbox down in front of MTV for 12 hours and absorb whatever programming shines into your dull, vacant eyes. I get it. I’m not MTV’s target audience anymore. I was once, but no longer. I have no interest in Jersey Shore (though I did inadvertently convince Tyger Williams that I was a writer for that show), I used to watch Real World when it seemed filled with semi-real people as opposed to drunken 18-year-old drama-monkeys, and I would prefer that the show Teen Mom be renamed Meteor Strike (though, full disclosure, my wife loves this show).

That brings us to My Life As Liz.

I think…

I think I love this show.

At least, I like it. A lot. Maybe I “like-like” it.

Maybe it’s not a great show. Maybe I’m grading on a curve, like a starving man who eats at Sizzler and finds it a religious experience. I dunno. But I watched it, and I found myself taken in by its charms and by its earnestness. It’s a “scripted reality” show in roughly the same territory as The Hills or… Lacuna Bitch or Vagooner Beach or whatever those shows are (ever watch one? It’s almost like watching an art installation or abstract film, but not in a good way). Here, though, instead of taking handful of vapid rich kids in a vapid rich area of the city, it goes with middle-class high school kids in the middle of East Fucking Nowhere, Texas. Further, our protagonist, the titular Liz, is a girl who did not so much fall from social grace but pushed herself to fall. She once belonged to the empty-headed blonde hotties, but like SkyNet, she became self-aware.

At present, that’s the show. It’s her senior year, she’s realized that she’s different from anyone else, she’s embraced it, and life as a result is effectively a little slice of high school hell. She’s surrounded by cheerleaders and conservative Christians and her gaggle of doofy geek buddies (who gamble with comic books instead of money), and she’s clearly trying to navigate these strange waters until she can reach the other side of the shore (i.e. “end of high school”). Mind you, the “reality” part of this show is tenuous, as best — Liz Lee plays herself, and this is her interpretation of her senior year, but that year has come and gone. It’s not like they filmed it as it happened.

What do I like about it? It’s funny, for one. It feels sharp without being sharply written. Does that sound strange? What I mean is, a Kevin Smith film is sharply written, and it wears that on its sleeve. People don’t really talk like that. Buffy was the same way. Or Gilmore Girls. I love all those things, but the writing sometimes came off as a little insincere, because it’s so tightly wound. Here, the writing feels like the way funny teenagers talk; not always spot-on, but natural, and still with that occasional slash of razor-wit.

Two, I like the story here. I can’t help but embrace the irony that MTV has become the guardian of social norms as opposed to the guardian of freaks and miscreants (which, in some way, it once was), but here they have a show where the main character would probably never ever watch MTV, ever. She’s probably think it was bullshit. She represents what MTV used to look like, maybe, and the girls she considers her nemeses are far more in line with the girls of The Hills and such.

Three, it’s like Daria and My So-Called Life had a baby. Except with a kind of “low-budget indie comedy” vibe.

Four, I dig the protagonist. She’s cute, funny, imperfect, quirky (maybe too quirky?). I probably would’ve wanted to date her in high school or college.

Fifth, the music the music the music. Once again, maybe I’m like the starving dude in the desert, but Sweet Molly McGoggins, the music is great. Whodathunkit? Music. On MTV. The show has near-constant music playing, and at least half-the-time puts a little bar at the bottom of the screen to tell you what the song is, by whom, and on what album it lives. Given that over the course of the first two episodes I heard at least seven songs from my iTunes playlist, that tells me it’s got a beat to which I can dance. Because MTV kindly puts the show’s music list online, I can peruse it. In fact, it allowed me to discover new music. I’m always looking for solid ways of music discovery, and now I have a new source. (For instance, before I did not know the joy of The Bird And The Bee. Now, I do.)

So, yeah. On this, the day of the Manliest Contest, the Super Bowl (which would be much more interesting were it the Supernatural Bowl, y’know, like instead of Saints Versus Colts, it’s Catholic Saints Versus Pagan Vampires or something), I come to you as a 30-something dude and recommend to you an MTV show about a pixie-like teen girl. That’s just how I do.

Normally, you can check out  full My Life As Liz episodes on the web, but they seem to be gone until February 18th. I checked ‘em out On Demand, so, try that.

Or don’t. I’m not the boss of you.

Yet.

Warning. Sirens. Red lights flashing. A naked old man gesticulating wildly.

I’m going to spoil various fictional properties.

I do not like spoilers, and I am not spoiling them because I drink in your misery. That said, in making my point it will be necessary to pull back the curtain on some particular pop culture properties — otherwise, I have to say something like, “And that ahem, main character dies in that one television show on ABC that we’ve all seen, wink, wink, thumbs-up,” and you’ll blink and be totally knackered.

Is that the word? “Knackered?”

I’m not British. Maybe some of my UK Killah Beez can hop in here and course correct.

Are we all sufficiently warned? Yes? Good. Moving on.

Because I need to get into the meat of this post, which is: death in fiction is intended to be a gut-punching dramatic turning point.

Unfortunately, at least half the time what death ends up being is a soap operatic crutch that does not create conflict, but steals conflict, instead.

The Joss Whedon Problem

I am not a Joss Whedon hater.

I am also not an apologist. I think as a creative person (read: self-important jack-ape) it’s important to know how to think critically about other creative properties, and so I turn my scrutiny toward just about anything that passes in front of these two peepers.

Joss Whedon, however, has a problem.

He likes to kill off characters. Don’t believe me? Clicky-clicky, web nerds.

Now, before you get froth-chinned and spittle-mouthed, I’m not suggesting that killing off a main character is 100% always a bad idea. In fact, in what is probably a classic mis-step in the arrangement of this post, I haven’t even told you what the real problem is yet.

Many of the early deaths in Whedon’s work get a thumbs-up from me.

Ah, but he started to rely on it as a dramatic crutch, leaning on it more and more.

Of course, I still haven’t told you why this is a problem, have I?

Let’s correct that.

A Line Drawn In Bones

You’re writing a story. You’re making a TV show. You’re drawing a comic. Whatever. You’re creating some kind of narrative, and you come upon the option of, “I could have this character die by getting tossed into this rocket-powered grain thresher.” That’s a viable choice, given that this is your story and all.

Except, pause for a moment.

Ask one question:

“Does this create conflict, or does this remove conflict?”

I’d suggest that at least half the time, it does the opposite of what you want for your story — meaning, it steals conflict from the narrative.

Made-Up Example:

Hiram Q. Cockpuncher is a man with many secrets. He knows, for instance, who the father of our protagonist, Squidboy, really is. Further, he also knows where the Moon Pirate’s Secret Treasure is buried. So, when Hiram is thrown into the growling tines of the grain thresher and torn asunder, his death creates conflict. How? Because with him die secrets. Squidboy may never learn who is father was, and the Moon Pirate’s treasure may remain forever lost.

Made-Up Example Number Two:

Hiram Q. Cockpuncher knows a different secret, instead. He knows Squidboy’s true identity. He knows this because he is Squidboy’s brother. Hiram getting rent into bloody ribbons by the super-toothy grain thresher therefore thieves conflict like a magpie. Hiram represented an agitating presence, a grain of sand in the soft oystery mouth of the story that yields pearl after pearl of good narrative conflict. Taking him off the table solves a problem. In fiction, we don’t want to solve problems until the end, unless the solving of a problem (i.e. the answering of a conflict) leads only to new problems.

Look it this way. Fiction is an amalgam of conflicts. Some big, some small, but all are obstacles for our protagonist(s). Without conflict, fiction is lifeless and dull, and it offers no shape — a jagged or curvy line is far more interesting than a flat one, which is why we get hotter over Marilyn Monroe more than we do, say, Olive Oyl.

Or something like that.

The characters in any work of fiction are all potentially agitating elements, even if they’re not antagonists. Characters do things we — and the other characters — don’t expect. As characters, they complicate the narrative rather than simplifying it. And that’s a good thing. Buffy hooks up with Angel, but it is not a safe relationship, and only serves to draw new conflicts to her — a-duh, she is a vampire slayer, and he is a vampire. Drum roll please, conflict. (Conflict’s here all week, folks. Don’t forget to tip your waiter. Try the swordfish.) Even Buffy’s friends tend to complicate her life — they represent vulnerabilities, they put themselves in danger, they sometimes argue and fight with Buffy, and so forth.

In fact, more examples like this are in order. Let’s dive in.

I Got Your Examples Right Here *grabs crotch*

Back to Buffy, then.

Various characters die over the course of that show.

Angel dies. Initially it reads like the removal of a conflict, but since this is a dark fantasy world more on par with comic book reality rather than real life, Angel’s death isn’t permanent. In fact, bringing him back only amps up the conflict all the more, and it serves to offer greater agitation, not less.

Jenny Calendar dies. Jenny was mostly a positive influence, more a simplifying and positive element for Giles than a negative complication. She did have that whole “I’m keeping Gypsy secrets” thing going on, but once that was largely exposed, the conflict lost a little of its teeth. So, with Angel as the one to kill her, it creates conflict. Giles now wants Angel to pay; Buffy wants to save Angel. Moreover, Giles is now tormented and put on edge — through her death we see a transformation in him. Conflict is born.

Buffy’s Mom bites it. This one doesn’t stack up to an easy equation — on paper, Buffy’s mother provided a lot of conflict in the show, and her death theoretically took all that off the table. And yet, it earned us a truly poignant episode of television, “The Body,” in which we get to see how sometimes, in Sunnydale, people die like normal people. It’s a gut-punching episode, and it does represent something of a pivot point for Buffy’s character. Hence, it nets out as a major narrative win, and further proves that despite all the shit I talk about on this site, sometimes fiction refuses to be pinned down for easy categorizations or rules.

Tara takes a dirt-nap. Willow’s girlfriend catches a bullet, and that’s that — further, it spurs Willow into Dark Willow, which is a giant conflict for the show. Hence, it works, because it’s a force for conflict rather than against it, though this actually leads to a second question — when considering death for a main character, ask yourself, “Do I get more mileage out of this character’s existence, and can I do the same conflict with her life that I was hoping to achieve with her death?” I might argue that Tara staying alive could’ve still been a source of conflict, and even the source of the same conflict (Willow Goes Evil). Tara and Willow did not necessarily have a complicated relationship, but it could’ve been made complicated — Tara cheating on Willow, Tara breaking up with her, Tara changes while Willow doesn’t (“growing apart”). Willow could still go Dark Willow, but then we still have Tara on the table as a viable source of future conflict. (Further, Whedon kind of the did the “random death!” notion with Buffy’s mom.)

Anya sucks the pipe. Anya dies, and nothing is gained. It’s a shallow death — as a demon character, she brought a lot of good conflict to the table, and in dying took that conflict off the table. This is maybe the first true instance where it feels like the death is purely melodramatic and driven by soap opera desires rather than actual narrative needs.

Spike double-dies. ZZzzz. Spike dies, and it’s kind of like Angel dying, and Spike comes back, and it’s kind of like Angel coming back, and… yeah, at this point the mechanic of “Main Character Dying!” starts to feel weathered and beaten, like an old sock. An old stinky sock. Filled with dung beetles and rotting marzipan. This removed conflict for Buffy, though arguably brought it back around for Angel, but even still — not sure of the point. He sacrifices himself, but it feels like the character can make a more meaningful sacrifice.

Whedon from this point relies on death as a narrative mechanic, and it starts to feel like an easy dramatic magic trick than anything engineered as a true dramatic mechanism.

More on this in a moment.

Location, Location, Location

I’m referring of course to the location in the narrative sequence, not actual location. Death isn’t made better if it’s at a Krispy Kreme in Des Moines. Unless it’s death-by-donuts? That sounds awesome. “I’ve been glazed!” And then the corpse is injected with jelly until it bloats and explodes. Splurt. Whee!

I think I’m off track.

Point is, death can be a greater thief of conflict when ill-placed in the sequence of events.

You might think, “Ahh, a death in the beginning is a motivating force.” And that’s not inaccurate, and it can be used to create conflict. But, if we don’t care about the perishing character, we’re less invested in the conflict and are likelier to recognize the moment as nothing more than an inciting incident. I like to think of Supernatural as a good bad example of this. I love that show, but in the first half of the first episode, Sam’s girlfriend dies — in theory, this is a good thing to set Sam back on the path of monster hunter, and yet… who cares? We don’t know her. Her dying is on par with throwing a mannequin under the wheels of a city bus. Further, Sam is only so broken up about it, and that’s because it’s very hard to make an internal conflict like that play out on screen.

Consider an alternative: Sam returns to life as a monster hunter, but leaves a still-breathing girlfriend behind. She’s diligent. She won’t let it lie. She follows him. She becomes a complicating influence because she’s put herself in danger, and thus puts Sam in danger. She becomes a target for the demon, and the conflict is dramatic and visual and put center stage — it’s not hurried and put behind us. (And you ask, “Okay, numbnuts, so what’s the inciting incident that puts Sam back on the path to monster hunter?” And I retort, “It’s already in there, poo-breath, what with the fact Sam’s father is missing.”)

That shift further goes to show that a death somewhere in the middle of a narrative gives us a greater dramatic payoff. We have time to build up conflicts, and have time to make the death meaningful both in terms of the new problems it creates and in terms of how the audience has come to grow attached to the character. (Once more, spoiler alert. Turn away now.) The Dexter season finale last night is likely a good example of this. Early in the series he’s with Rita not because he loves her but because she’s part of his mask. Over time, he grows to love her. They have a child. They get married. She and his children are the focus of his humanity, so when she is killed by Trinity at the end of the episode, we see that her death is sure to have major consequences for his character. Conflict is born. (Though, I say “likely a good example” because we don’t know how it pays off. I’ll say this about that finale: it was great, but going that direction has huge, huge risks. More on that in another post, I think.)

It’s also tempting to say, “Well, a death at the end can be impactful.”

And it can.

But it can’t create more conflict at that point.

You may wonder: “Why would I want to create more conflict at the end of a story?”

Bear with me, because this is a little “out there.” Even when the story’s done, it’s not done in our heads. The audience will forever fill in the blanks — it’s the nature of fan-fiction, really. Just because a beloved book or film or series ends doesn’t mean it ends in the minds of the audience. Star Wars is over, but it’s not over. I will forever have gauzy, uncertain continuations of favorite characters. Death at the end runs the risk of removing that aspect. When David Chase finally made it mostly clear that Tony Soprano and his family sucked a bullet at the end of The Sopranos, I felt… disturbed by that. I felt like it took something away. I like leaving them at that table, forever wondering, always on the edge of dying, but never dying. Or envisioning Tony in prison: a new conflict, a new story, a new narrative. What do their deaths do for the overall story looking back?

So, What The Hell Do I Do?

Not to be morose, but death is the one constant. I’m doing to die. You’re going to die. Our cats and dogs are going to die. The sun is going to die. Everything dies. And yet, despite that, it remains the number one mystery, and applicable to a number of themes and stories. I’m not saying to eschew death in your fiction.

I’m saying, make sure it’s not a crutch.

Ask yourself some questions when you’re thinking of killing off a main character. (And really, this post is about killing off protagonists — if we’re talking genre-based stuff, the antagonists are often targeted for death. Though, even here, you could ask: can we get satisfying mileage out of keeping them around? On the one hand, this is why Batman doesn’t kill Joker. On the other hand, it becomes kind of silly that Batman doesn’t kill Joker.) The questions are:

First, is this intended for melodrama? Is the death sexy? By which I mean, every goddamn season finale or third act of a story or comic book will salaciously advertise OMG SOMEONE IS GOING TO DIE! Crash of thunder! Cue the music! Gasp! Gape! No! It becomes rote. It becomes boring. That’s a clear sign of it being a crutch.

Second, by killing this character, am I taking conflict away from the story, or creating it?

Third, is I were to leave this character alive, could I still institute new conflict? Could I get more mileage out of their continued existence?

Fourth, if I choose to leave the death on the table, is it placed correctly in the narrative to maximize conflict? To milk it sweetly, the way one might milk a chocolate cow for its chocolate milk?

No, I don’t know what that means, except I kind of want a glass of chocolate milk. Go figure.

In the end, what I’m telling you is that, often enough, death steals conflict from the story as sure as a cat will steal the breath from a wriggling infant. Before you put Big Character Death in play, consider the ramifications, consider the reasons, and consider alternate options.

And somebody please, please get me a goddamn glass of chocolate milk.

Step One:

• Introduce the Apparently Funny Concept. These may include: people with kooky catchphrases, people who wear wacky outfits, or hilarious stereotypes! Mix all three for a potent Hilarity Cocktail! Yummers!

Step Two:

• Reiterate, but do not escalate, the joke. The arc of a good comedy sketch should be a single flat line going from Point A to Point B! Examples might include: saying the same catchphrase multiple times throughout the sketch, or, continuing to be stereotypey in the same way! Remember — if something is funny once, it’s funny when you do it without modification three or four times in a row! Tip! Get a special surprise celebrity guest to reiterate the joke, and you’ll knock ‘em dead! Bam!
  

Step Three:

• Do not end the sketch. Simply allow it to naturally run out of steam. The sketch should be just like our lives, and must expire lonely in an empty room while laying in a pile of its own sick. It should fall asleep before it reaches any notable conclusions about its existence, and then leave this life and enter the cold comfort of death’s embrace. Remember — viewers don’t like it when we subvert expectations or change the formula! A joke is best felt in the Laughter Organs when it lays there like a fish flopping on a dock.

Congratulations! You just wrote a Saturday Night Live sketch!