Election Night Recap: Looking at the Performances and the Oh-So-Bad Graphics

Election Night Recap: Looking at the Performances and the Oh-So-Bad Graphics

(CNN.com)

CNN's analysts show which Democrats are losing their seats and what years they were originally elected in one of the many dizzying graphics used by CNN on election night

Regardless of whether you’re a Republican, Democrat, Independent, or belong to some minor political party that nobody’s really heard of (like the Green Rainbow party, which…I mean… why would a rainbow be green? Isn’t a rainbow, by definition, red-orange-yellow-green-blue-indigo-and violet?—election day still carries an atmosphere of a carnival if you like politics, and Network TV provided all the hoopla and sideshows, along with some decent reporting, on midterm election night.

CNN’s coverage was strong, although the news’ organization managed to once again create a silly special-effect that detracted from the telling of their story. Like election night two years ago, when they tried “3-D Hologram Technology” (which was panned the next day in the media and quietly disappeared afterwards), this time CNN tried a strange 3-D graphic representing boxes that looked like Tetris squares. These “stacks” of boxes were life size—bigger than the reporters—that stood behind them to demonstrate how voters thought about issues, how voters voted in previous years, or who was “winning” so far in areas. Still, these Tetris-like block-towers were goofy, the correspondents looked awkward behind them, and they weren’t needed. Similarly, when CNN finally projected Republicans won the House, a silly “Republicans win the House” icon appeared on the bottom left of the screen and remained all night. While this was indeed a good idea—the sign itself looked like it was designed in a five-minute period by an intern. This sign was joined by a “Deomcrats KEEP the Senate” sign a few hours later on the left side of the screen, but all in all, it was strange.

Fox News, the Election Nights Rating winner, according to Neilson Media Research, had a busy on-screen graphic that looked too maddening. Taking cues from the stock market, multiple different races flashed in different areas of the screen, and this seemed to match the tone of the election coverage itself, with the in-studio talent screaming at times about other things. Remarkably, they got sidetracked and instead started talking about how Sarah Pallin’s daughter was “safe” on Dancing With the Stars—right in the middle of the Election Coverage—and at that point, serious newsgoers probably changed the channel. I know I did.

ABC reached out to the young—and didn’t dare disturb their solid primetime lineup until late in the evening—by offering a live internet “Facebook” broadcast. This including a video town hall and live election results from Diane Sawyer and George Stephenoplis. ABC, NBC’s (Brian Williams) and CBS (Katie Couric) were all solid in their analysis—but I can’t accurately review them here because our local affiliates in Boston “broke into” national coverage to spend more time on our Massachusetts races, which were horribly boring since only one party won every single race in the state (a problem of being in Massachusetts—very rarely is there election fun).

Election Flashback...When Simple Graphics Ruled...

Watching election coverage and the over-use of technology, often misapplied, took me back ten years ago, when an election had most of America (myself included) up all night. Literally--because the presidential race still wasn't decided. Little did we know it would actually be days until we found out who would win in that election, between Al Gore and George W. Bush. But I know that I'll never forget it--and most that night I sat flipping between all the networks and CNN--but found myself watching Tom Brokaw and his political analyst, the late Tim Russert.

Best Election Technology: (2000) --Tim Russert (NBC)

(Newsuem Exhibit--Washington DC)

Tim Russert's Famous dry erase "Florida Florida Florida" board, now at the Newseum in Washington, showed viewers that despite all the great technology, sometimes a dry erase board is a better graphic than any of the fancy computer-generated ones that networks use today. Russert, sitting with NBC's Tom Brokaw, abandoned the network's fancy graphics and madly starting writing and erasing electoral college votes on his dry-erase board all night long--and correctly (early on) noted it could all come down to Florida... It's one of America's most memorable news moments, which is why there is a space dedicated to Russert's coverage of that night in the Newseum in Washington DC...

How Un-Humanitarian: Emmys Get it Wrong by Denying Reality Hosts Proper Recognition

TV COLUMN

Just when you think they've finally tried to change, the Academy of Television Arts and Sciences finds a new way to alienate more viewers.

In order to make room for the Bob Hope Humanitarian Award, one of the much-maligned moments in an award show where you can literally--order a pizza, use the restroom, run a brief errand, take delivery of the pizza, eat the pizza, run the dishwasher, flip to a baseball game and watch three innings, type a blog entry, update your status on a social network, tweet about how BORING the speech is, and then unload your dishwasher as the speech is wrapping up--the Emmy Awards have decided to kick out the award for "Best Reality Host" and move it to an untelevised creative arts show that occurs a week earlier.

No Jeff Probst. No Phil Keoghan. No Heidi Klum. No Tom Bergeron. And No Ryan Seacrest. And no fun.

Television is at a crossroads--and it is doing two seemingly-contradictory things: evolving and dying. And the Academy is helping it die instead of evolve. Reality has been one area of television that has been growing and expanding. The academy itself recognized that two years ago when they added the "Best Reality Host" award.

And yet in an age of rapidly emerging technology, there are less and less shows that are must-watch, must see "live". The series finale of "Lost" this year on ABC was met with dozens of writers across the country bemoaning the fact that there are so few shows now--and perhaps none in the future--that will bring together people watching "event" television. Ask a room full of teens what shows they watch each week--and they tend to watch a sample of cable programming, sports, music, shows that cater to teens, and YES, reality television.

The Emmys have not changed enough. Because of agreements with guilds, the director of the show reportedly MUST show all the awards for miniseries and made-for-TV movies. These categories take up about an hour of the broadcast--and almost no viewers in America have seen any of those winning programs. Almost all of these awards go to pay cable, since Networks have mostly stopped producing original mini-series and made-for-TV movies. And with a few exceptions, like HBO's John Adams or Band of Brothers, few of these specials are seen by more than a million viewers in the entire nation.

Reality programming IS what America is watching. 24 MILLION viewers watched a single episode of Dancing with the Stars in March. Millions of Americans have seen Survivor and The Amazing Race. American Idol was the Number One show on Television for years. And Heidi Klum's show may not have the ratings of the other network-reality shows, but she's a super model, so it's safe to say she's well-known throughout the country.

More importantly, just as Major League Baseball is disenfranchising a new generation of viewers by starting World Series games at 8:30 PM on the East Coast, where they often don't end until close to midnight (or later) when children are asleep--thus missing out on a chance to celebrate the most significant events in baseball--the Emmys absolutely NEED young viewers. The Emmy telecast is meant to be educational and a celebration. By showing TV clips throughout the program, viewers are meant to gain an appreciation for the genre of television. Give college students pizza, they'll go to a blood drive. Give away prizes to consumers, people go to a grand opening of a store. Give young American's REALITY TELEVISION awards at the Emmys, they just might also see some really good acting clips that will make them appreciate the other wonderful television--both past and present--that is occurring. You will open up their eyes to the television genre. That SHOULD be the mission of the Academy.

Instead, the Academy want to give a humanitarian award to George Clooney. A film star, now, who really hasn't had the time to spend on television the past several years (other than a Hope for Haiti special). They'd rather pander to a film actor and have him eat minutes of a show dedicated to television--than reward hosts of some of the most popular shows on television. While it's wonderful he's raising money for multiple charities--getting an award in front of other actors in this case is simply the Academy's way of pandering for Clooney fans.

Reality television is being treated like the Cinderella of television. The big sisters (comedy, drama, mini-series, made-for-TV-movie) are all getting to dance at the ball and Reality Television is being told it's not important enough in today's world to take up a couple minutes of a long award show dedicated to TV. Let's only hope that TV viewers and fans can appeal to the academy to let the reality hosts back to the ball--the official Emmy Award ceremony. They've certainly earned their tickets.

Do you agree? What can you do?

1) Email the Academy and let them know you want the reality hosts back:

http://www.emmys.tv/contact

2) Join Entertainment Weekly's online petition or Facebook page to draw attention to this:

http://popwatch.ew.com/2010/08/04/emmys-reality-hosts-creative-arts-primetime-getrealemmys/

Jeff Probst (CBS--Survivor Nicaragua Press Photo--Fall 2010)

Phil Koeghan (CBS--The Amazing Race)

Heidi Klum (Lifetime)

Project Runway

Ryan Seacrest (Fox--American Idol)

Tom Bergeron (ABC--Dancing with the Stars)

What to Expect in the Days Ahead... (A little Background)

"Virtual Reality is Real. It's on Fox. And it's a heck of a lot of fun to watch."

As a college student years ago, I transitioned from the busy city-state news desk at one of the nation's largest college newspapers to try my hand at being a television critic. I had written television columns before, but my first review was for a silly and yet strangely captivating, but ultimately short-lived Fox television program called "Vr.5." It was a show that I said was "surprisingly good" that had "moments of brilliance." The show, which was about a woman sucked into an alternate world through her computer's Internet connection, warned of a new advanced level of virtual reality involving telekinetic abilities, the manipulation of the real world, and shifts in time and space. It was science fiction, a few year's ahead of its time, and ultimately, it failed.

My editor didn't like my informal "And it's a heck of a lot of fun to watch" line and replaced it with a dismal "And it's a lot of fun to watch." And for some reason that seemingly-minor edit still nags at me to this day. Because it still sounds a lot better, and certainly a lot more like me, to have it printed in the original way. So I thought it was a natural way to start this blog.

Vr.5 didn't last long (only 10 episodes aired during its original run on Fox), but my love of writing about television blossomed. I continued to write news articles, but a television critic had been born. From that moment on, I enjoyed researching, calling the press representatives and acquiring the press kits, running the photos, screening the pilots, promoting the specials, writing TV columns and features, but mostly--composing new television reviews for programs. By my senior year, I became the editor of The Tube, the nation's only original TV section at a college newspaper. While most college newspapers didn't even have a TV guide, the Daily Illini at the University of Illinois ran a complete TV section each week with TV reporting from about a dozen contributors.

I loved nothing more than to write about all things drama--and found myself teaming up with the writer who was an expert at writing about all things comedy. Yet, when reading her work, she quickly became my favorite writer. When not reviewing shows in our respective areas, we spent enormous amounts of time talking about TV, arguing about TV, analyzing ratings, and predicting what would or wouldn't do well and how we could make each Network. We teamed up to go behind the scenes at the local 10:00 Newscast and to poll our readers about who their favorite shows and actors were for a reader's choice awards. And you can see where this is going: We fell in love with more than just television. She's still my favorite writer, and we're married now--still talking about dramas, comedies, and TV ratings...(among other things, of course!)

This Blog will have my take on television-- TV columns, TV reviews, and Tube Week, an opinion-based what-to-watch (with a misguided sense of humor, if you will). I may be a bit rusty. I've been writing for academic publishers this past summer, and that type of writing tends to suck all the fun out of stringing sentences together. It's been years since I've been privileged to actually write about television a few days a week. But it's about time. And it's going to be a heck of a lot of fun...