By Jay Kerner
I was babysitting for friends last week, and the boy and I were on the couch, channel surfing. I promised Mom nothing but educational programming, but hey with volunteer help you get what you get.
So I’m flipping from station to station, watching his expression as we go, to see what catches his attention.
He likes black and white shows for one thing, old sit-coms: Little Rascals, Three Stooges and so on. I’m not sure if it’s the content or just that it looks different, but for some reason he’ll watch it a lot longer than modern cartoon type programs.
He also likes baseball and can differentiate between other sports, which I think is a good sign. Maybe it’s the uniforms. I think it’s important to encourage this, so I give him all the candy he wants while we watch baseball. (I smuggle it in. Don’t tell his mom.) Every once in a while I turn on soccer for a minute and then give him a little pinch. He hates soccer.
As I said, I was flipping around when I came to this show called Wipeout. If you haven’t seen it, it’s pretty much like the cruelest obstacle course in the world. Contestants take turns running and jumping over big colorful geometric shapes suspended above a large mud puddle. An actual announcer from ESPN calls the action, including slo-mo replays. (I bet he never saw that coming when ABC bought them out!)
As each contestant, from a nimble PE instructor to an obese lady bus driver, fell off in to the muck, the boy had the same reaction; “Ha ha ha! He fall down in water!” Over and over….
When one of the better athletes lasts longer than the others, the boy gets frustrated. “Fall in water!” he yells at the TV. Almost immediately, they do. I know he thinks he did it, because he giggles hysterically. I’m thinking that at two, his sadistic streak shouldn’t be as developed as mine, but strangely it seems to be.
He likes it when they slip and fall over the side. He likes it when they walk past the wall of boxing gloves that punch them until they fall. He especially likes the rotating bar that drops them one by one, as they attempt to jump over it. He howls with glee as they land in the goo.
Maybe it’s something inside all of us from day one? Maybe a guy slipping on a banana peel is just universally funny?
According to Bob Shultz there is a German phrase that translates into something about taking joy in the misfortune of others. Perhaps focusing on someone else’s troubles takes our minds off of our own. We don’t necessarily want to see anyone get seriously hurt, but just a little hurt is hilarious.
Like, “Hey, my life may be all screwed up, but at least I’m not that guy! Ha ha ha, He fall down!”
I’ve ranted in these pages before about “reality programming.” I’m sorry, but I turn on the television for a break from reality. At the end of the typical day, I’ve had about all the reality I can take.
But this Wipeout show is taking things to a new level, at least for American audiences. You can dress it up and call it a competition if you need to, but I think my little buddy gets it completely. Really it’s just a show about people falling down.
But then I thought “that’s nothing new!” That’s what you get with Cops. That’s what you get with Jerry Springer. Hell, I could argue that’s what you get with Oprah sometimes. Do I have to mention the Jackass phenomenon?
Maybe the car chase, the physical challenge or the battling incestuous step-cousins, are just the set up for somebody falling down! I think the Wipeout people might be geniuses. As long as the obstacle course is ridiculously hard, we don’t have to wait long between splats.
Wait! I’ve got it! How about a show of nothing but splats? Spectacular splats! Belly flops! Pies in the face! The ever popular exploding cigar! People stepping on rakes, falling in manholes, thrown by animals, eaten by animals! You wouldn’t get as many contestants sign up, but think of the ratings! Just one slam, bam, thank you m’am after another. No set up, no backstory, just splat, splat, splat.
But wait! Maybe that’s still too complicated. Maybe I just buy a lot of bananas and peel. All I need is a camcorder and a city sidewalk. Simple and low budget.
Yeah, but then you’d get the amateurs doing it. You can have all the “Don’t try this at home!” messages you want, but you can’t control people. Within days there would be thousands of banana peel videos on You Tube. Before long I’d be out of business. People ruin everything.
But I bet the boy would bust a gut.