Archive for December 30th, 2008
TDLevision – Law & Order: SVU
As mentioned in the Law & Order standard post, a series recording led me to give SVU another shot. Much like Law & Order standard, the problems I had with SVU are exactly the same as they were two years ago.
1) Any bit of deviance that any person has is outlined as some ridiculous terrifying thing that will eventually lead to rape and murder. Enjoy having cyber-sex on Second Life? Murderer. Enjoy “barely 18″ porn? Pedophile waiting to escalate. Own guns? Serial wife-beater and murderer waiting to happen. Watch porn? Rapist. Want to defend yourself against such charges? Demon. I’m sure this makes the SVU puritanical target audience very happy — after all, whatever their particular kink is isn’t nearly as evil, I’m sure — but, everyone in the world has something a little off that gets them… well.. off. Surprisingly, they don’t all go out and rape.
2) Plots are still so maddeningly predictable that it’s hardly fun. In one episode, while investigating the murder of an astronaut, Stabler randomly meets the guy who was his hero in the Marines. The guy’s a national hero, an astronaut, and wants to be the oldest guy to walk on the moon in 2015. For the entire hour, they laid on how well-respected this guy was, how much Elliot loved him, even allowing the guy to help catch a witness AND revealing Elliot named his son after this guy. In the “shocking” twist at the end, they revealed him to be the murderer. Did anyone who’s watched SVU for more than 10 minutes not see that coming? Is it any wonder that these SVU detectives are so messed up? Everyone they’ve ever known in their lives are either rapists, murderers, or rape victims.
3) The show has become laden with “FOR GOD’S SAKE PLEASE GIVE ME AN EMMY” over-acting. Whether it’s Stabler dealing with his daughter’s manic-depressiveness or Benson seeing Stabler getting shot… we get it. You guys want awards.
4) I see they’ve ceased mentioning that the department only allows people to work in SVU or a set number of years because it’s so hard on the psyche. They seem completely OK with Elliot breaking in to a guy’s apartment and beating him near to death for having a picture of his daughter.
Like, I understand that all the civil liberty violations on SVU are OK because the detectives are never wrong. But I constantly find myself asking “what if they didn’t do it?” No wonder Middle America thinks everyone’s out to rape their kids. No show has ever made me want to be a defense attorney more than SVU… and that’s saying something.