Good Television Is Every Teenager's Birthright
Recently, I saw that some of the kids channels have come up with Hindi shows which mostly aim at the teenage audience. I remember that when I was very little and my sister was as old as I am now, shows like ‘School Days’ and ‘Hip-Hip Hurray’ appealed a lot to the teens. But now, that is not the case. In recent year, teenage fiction shows have on channels like Disney have failed to be as popular as they once used to be.
It is because these shows have nothing to like in them.
Firstly, these shows are very unrealistic. For example, practically all schools in India have uniforms. We hate them, but we have to wear them. But in these shows, the students never have to wear uniforms. If they did have to wear uniforms, maybe then the writers could come up with some relevant storylines, like students campaigning against having to wear the same thing everyday or teachers punishing students because the hemline of their school is an inch too high. Here is a second example, students never have to go to Science Labs or P.T. Class, they are always in the Drama room or in the Hindi class. Another example: these shows have fifteen-year-old kids forming their own musical bands and struggling to make it big in the music world. This idea has been incorporated in the last three marginally high-budget teen shows I can think of and now it is getting a little stale.Besides, it’s not like all students have an interested in music; some are into art, some are into dance and some may even be really into academics! Lastly, in my life I have never come across an Indian band comprising of a bunch of fifteen-year olds who get paid to perform at gigs. In fact, I can’t really remember any mainstream Indian band at all. If only the producers could just let the characters have expectations which are more realistic and common than becoming a successful band, like getting into IIT or maybe even challenging the upper-middle class society and deciding not to get into IIT. But alas, these shows look like they are set in a parallel universe, where India is like America as it is portrayed by the media and teenagers worry about petty friendship-problems and never about board exams and home-work.
The second problem is that the producers seem to be hell-bent upon adopting the American concept of stereotypes and cliques. There is always the ‘Mean Girl’, the ‘Crybaby’, the ‘Tomboy’, the ‘Rock Star’, the ‘Nerd’, the ‘Sweet Little Girl’ and the ‘Rebel’. You can only describe these characters in a maximum of one word, like ‘sweet’ or ‘tomboyish’ or ‘stupid’. You can never use a little more mature adjectives for them, like ‘angry’ or ‘naïve’ or ‘egotistic’ or ‘confused’. The worst part is that when teenagers watch these shows, they feel that they too need to be of a certain ‘type’ and thus start conforming their behaviour to match that of their favourite TV character.
Last but not the least, these shows are not very original. They seem like the producers took some story ideas from ‘Hannah Montana’ and some ideas from ‘The Suite Life Of Zack and Cody’, mixed them together and translated them in Hindi. Sometimes, these shows become too wholesome. All the characters have perfect morals. They never get jealous and they never get too angry. That is why they can’t send out the good message they want to send to the teens, because all the characters are morally perfect, something we can never be.
I know that English shows are better than Hindi shows in lots of ways. I’ll end this with a comparison between my favourite American teen drama, Dawson’s Creek, and the Indian shows we get on TV these days. Dawson’s Creek ran from 1998-2003. It was about the life of Dawson and his friends Joey, Jack, Jen and Pacey. Joey is the one with a dead mother and a criminal father and Jen is a troubled teen. But if the show were Indian, Joey would have had no troubled past, she would simply be the ‘tomboy’ and Jen would not even be on the show. They talk openly about every subject we might call indecent, but at the same time they all (except Pacey, perhaps) are very principled. But if the show were Indian, there would never be an episode about how many kids are taking to smoking and alcohol these days. When Dawson’s Creek first started, critics blasted it saying that it had a bunch of teenagers who live in a world where conversations include constant analysis and small-talk seems to be a crime. Even this was incorporated into the storyline when Dawson makes an autobiographical movie and his film teacher says that “it is just about some teenagers who talk too much”. But can an Indian show develop its own identity instead of just walking the path which has already treaded by many short-running teen fiction shows and maintain its identity even if some critic points out a flaw? I don’t think so.
What producers should understand is that we need shows which are as good as Western shows, not exactly like the Western Shows. Maybe if we get a show which is relevant to our life and has to do with our day-to-day problems, we might as well watch it. Until then, I am going to stick to the original ‘Hannah Montana’.
It is because these shows have nothing to like in them.
Firstly, these shows are very unrealistic. For example, practically all schools in India have uniforms. We hate them, but we have to wear them. But in these shows, the students never have to wear uniforms. If they did have to wear uniforms, maybe then the writers could come up with some relevant storylines, like students campaigning against having to wear the same thing everyday or teachers punishing students because the hemline of their school is an inch too high. Here is a second example, students never have to go to Science Labs or P.T. Class, they are always in the Drama room or in the Hindi class. Another example: these shows have fifteen-year-old kids forming their own musical bands and struggling to make it big in the music world. This idea has been incorporated in the last three marginally high-budget teen shows I can think of and now it is getting a little stale.Besides, it’s not like all students have an interested in music; some are into art, some are into dance and some may even be really into academics! Lastly, in my life I have never come across an Indian band comprising of a bunch of fifteen-year olds who get paid to perform at gigs. In fact, I can’t really remember any mainstream Indian band at all. If only the producers could just let the characters have expectations which are more realistic and common than becoming a successful band, like getting into IIT or maybe even challenging the upper-middle class society and deciding not to get into IIT. But alas, these shows look like they are set in a parallel universe, where India is like America as it is portrayed by the media and teenagers worry about petty friendship-problems and never about board exams and home-work.
The second problem is that the producers seem to be hell-bent upon adopting the American concept of stereotypes and cliques. There is always the ‘Mean Girl’, the ‘Crybaby’, the ‘Tomboy’, the ‘Rock Star’, the ‘Nerd’, the ‘Sweet Little Girl’ and the ‘Rebel’. You can only describe these characters in a maximum of one word, like ‘sweet’ or ‘tomboyish’ or ‘stupid’. You can never use a little more mature adjectives for them, like ‘angry’ or ‘naïve’ or ‘egotistic’ or ‘confused’. The worst part is that when teenagers watch these shows, they feel that they too need to be of a certain ‘type’ and thus start conforming their behaviour to match that of their favourite TV character.
Last but not the least, these shows are not very original. They seem like the producers took some story ideas from ‘Hannah Montana’ and some ideas from ‘The Suite Life Of Zack and Cody’, mixed them together and translated them in Hindi. Sometimes, these shows become too wholesome. All the characters have perfect morals. They never get jealous and they never get too angry. That is why they can’t send out the good message they want to send to the teens, because all the characters are morally perfect, something we can never be.
I know that English shows are better than Hindi shows in lots of ways. I’ll end this with a comparison between my favourite American teen drama, Dawson’s Creek, and the Indian shows we get on TV these days. Dawson’s Creek ran from 1998-2003. It was about the life of Dawson and his friends Joey, Jack, Jen and Pacey. Joey is the one with a dead mother and a criminal father and Jen is a troubled teen. But if the show were Indian, Joey would have had no troubled past, she would simply be the ‘tomboy’ and Jen would not even be on the show. They talk openly about every subject we might call indecent, but at the same time they all (except Pacey, perhaps) are very principled. But if the show were Indian, there would never be an episode about how many kids are taking to smoking and alcohol these days. When Dawson’s Creek first started, critics blasted it saying that it had a bunch of teenagers who live in a world where conversations include constant analysis and small-talk seems to be a crime. Even this was incorporated into the storyline when Dawson makes an autobiographical movie and his film teacher says that “it is just about some teenagers who talk too much”. But can an Indian show develop its own identity instead of just walking the path which has already treaded by many short-running teen fiction shows and maintain its identity even if some critic points out a flaw? I don’t think so.
What producers should understand is that we need shows which are as good as Western shows, not exactly like the Western Shows. Maybe if we get a show which is relevant to our life and has to do with our day-to-day problems, we might as well watch it. Until then, I am going to stick to the original ‘Hannah Montana’.
Comments
Post a Comment